Matt Pryor's first solo CD is getting strong reviews from other music sites. Unfortunately, I am going to be the contrarian as I found this disc hard to get through.

I've been trying to sort through why I am so down on this disc. It may be that my only exposure to Matt Pryor is through The Get Up Kids and, on this disc, Matt plays very mellow, slightly country-folk tinged acoustic tunes. This isn't to say that this is a bad disc -- it just didn't hold my attention. My biggest complaint is that many of the songs sound similar and this makes this 15-track CD start to drag after a few songs.

There are some standout tracks on this disc, which include the title track, "Confidence Man", which has a Dylanish feel and an upbeat swing and "A Totally New Year" which has Byrds-like feel to the song. "Still, There's A Light" is another strong track that has an Appalachian feel and great backing vocals from an uncredited female singer. On the reverse side, tracks like "I'm Sorry Stephen" and "We'll Be Fine" are really grating. The songs in the middle sort of fall into coffee-shop fodder and there just wasn't enough 'spark' to this disc to hold my interest.

Six of the disc's 15 tracks are streaming on Matt Pryor's MySpace page so check out the music and make up your own mind.