AUSTIN, Texas -- Mat Oldiges is the lead singer, keyboardist and producer for the Austin-based band The Human Circuit. He’s also a nurse, the owner of a music booking company and an active member of the local music community. After getting hit by the effects of COVID-19 from nearly every angle, Oldiges has a unique perspective and hopeful outlook on the future.

• Mat Oldiges the lead singer and keyboardist for the band The Human Circuit
• The Human Circuit a 15-person collective with an 8- to 10-piece live band
• In addition to being a live musician, Oldiges is also a producer, business owner and active member of the local music community

“I’m the person who goes out on like a Monday or Tuesday night to see who’s bringin’ it to a cool spot - just to catch them early and tell them that they’re cool and that we’ve got a lot of venues that would dig them,” said Oldiges. “I mean, I love our music community. I really do.”

Lone Star Music Beat interviewed him at Mohawk back in February when he relayed the story of his music career and his upcoming plans for SXSW. Two months later, we spoke with him again and had an entirely different kind of conversation.

“As an artist, it’s probably been the biggest hit to my spirits in a long time,” said Oldiges. We were speaking via FaceTime for this interview. If this were life pre-pandemic, he would’ve been preparing to go on stage in a few hours with nine other people in The Human Circuit. 

“We’ve had multiple festivals, nationwide, already cancel, and I’ve lost my band practice every Wednesday, which is like anywhere from like five to a dozen people coming over and hanging out and playing music,” said Oldiges. “That’s a real bummer, too, ‘cause that’s like more than half the reason I even do it all. It’s just for that comradery and companionship, and so I’m really missing a lot of that as an artist.”

As owner of the Austin music booking company Pull Strings Events, Oldiges took a massive financial hit with the cancellation of SXSW. 

The Human Circuit performs on stage. (Courtesy: Helaine Bach)

“As a booking agent, it’s been even harder,” said Oldiges. “My booking company has zero income right now.”

Fortunately, his part-time job as a nurse in telemedicine has helped him make ends meet over the last several weeks. Any extra money he’s made since March, he’s given to his contractors in exchange for miscellaneous busywork.

“A lot of the reason that I even got into booking was to pull community together and to get people to kind of all believe in a similar dream.”

Oldiges has been supporting others for much longer than the time he’s owned his booking company. His supportive nature is what led to the formation of his now 15-person music collective.

“When I first started, I was playing on like a little drum machine sequencer and my keyboard,” said Oldiges. “I had a couple other friends that got really excited by the music and wanted to learn some of the parts and play along. I realized that as long as I was there and performing and playing and doing my piece, that I was like a circuit that people could just, kind of, reach in and plug into.” 

Since the cancellation of SXSW, Oldiges and The Human Circuit have been disconnected. Apart from his friends and bandmates, the Austinite surprisingly hasn’t been performing live-streamed concerts like a lot of other musicians have been doing.

“I’m standing in front of my keyboard right now, but I get a little bit guilty feeling when I’m messing with it, because I still feel like there’s a lot of other really important things happening right now that are going to, hopefully, be what can help bring us all back together,” said Oldiges.

Although it’s not the life he imagined he’d be living right now, Oldiges has remained equally humble and hopeful as he was when we first spoke in February.

“There’s a lot of people here still around, alive, that are really suffering,” said Oldiges. “I wanna do something.”

He can’t help financially, but Oldiges has continuously given to others what he has been given. The beauty he finds in other people is what he says keeps him hopeful for the future.

“I’ve dedicated a lot of my life to humanity. There’s a lot of people that can be disappointing, but I think that the outliers - there’s a lot of them that all wanna make a positive change and make a difference and will come together,” he said.

A promotional image for The Human Circuit. (Courtesy: The Human Circuit)

Although he admits things won’t be the same when government restrictions for the pandemic are lifted, Oldiges is remaining confident that he’ll be reunited again - one way or another - with his band, The Human Circuit. In the meantime, he’s focused on connecting everyone else to the circuit of life. 

“The thing that gives me hope is being human,” said Oldiges. “If you look out in the universe, it’s crazy, it’s chaotic, and nowhere does it seem like it’s supposed to be peaceful and make sense that way without us. I think that’s our superpower as a human being, to go into this crazy insanity in constant chaos and correlate things and create peace and be sort of a light in the dark. It gives me a lot of hope just knowing that that’s my role, you know? To bring hope.”