GRATEFUL DAVE; MATTHEWS BLENDS EXPERIENCE IN U.S., SOUTH AFRICA INTO A POTENT MIX.

Byline: Rob Lowman Daily News Entertainment Editor

For a musician, life on the road can mean a lot of unfamiliar faces. Unless you're Dave Matthews that is. Of the familiar faces that Dave Matthews sees at his East Coast concerts, there are a couple he describes as ``two of his more decorative fans.''

``She a body piercer and he's a body tattoer. ...I certainly enjoy seeing them,'' says Matthews, who is taking a break from working with his band to do an acoustic tour with his friend, guitarist Tim Reynolds. They'll play at the Pantages on Tuesday.

The fact that Matthews sees this decorative couple so often is amazing, considering how fast tickets go to the Dave Matthews Band concerts. Last year, two dates at Madison Square Garden in New York City (38,500 tickets) sold out in an hour. The same thing for two Philadelphia dates. Tickets were gone for a Chicago date (nearly 20,000 tickets) in 11 minutes. Last summer, DMB played to over a million people on 53 dates.

You don't have to tell Graydon Brown, a 20-year-old sophomore at the University of California, Santa Barbara, how hard it is to get Matthews tickets. The Valencia native, who has been a fan since 1994, will be home tonight when Matthews and Reynolds play there. He spent a night camped out trying to get tickets to the show in Santa Barbara. ``It sold out in five minutes,'' he says. ``A lot of the people that I know who are fans of his go to his concerts every time he comes around.''

Nicole Sandler, music director at 103.1-FM, an album alternative station describes fans of the DMB as ``real rabid, like Deadheads.'' His concerts are like a big party, says Brown, who describes the crowds as mostly college age, 18 to 25.

And what's the draw? ``I like how he changes things up, says Brown. ``With his music, it always sounds different. He does a lot of improvising. I've never heard a song that sounds exactly the same at any of his shows.''

Sandler says Matthews' tunes are not typical pop songs. ``There's a lot more to them. ... They are songs that don't wear on you after you hear them for a while. In fact, if anything, they get better with playing. I think they grow on you more and more. Certain songs you play and people start complaining that you hear it too much. That never happen with Dave Matthews songs.''

For his part, Matthews admits he's a bit mystified by his popularity and the legions of ``Daveheads.'' ``I have no idea why I'm successful, and I'll work my ass off until I get fired,'' he jokes. He does think that there is a spontaneity in the band that helps keep things fresh and ``hopefully helps keep things fresh for the fans.''

Whatever the reason, there is nothing about Matthews that is easily classifiable. If you've only heard his seductive single ``Crash Into Me,'' which features a breathy melodic top over a rhythmic bottom, then you're just beginning to hear the disparate influences that make up his music - jazz, rock, world music. Some of this can be attributed to his upbringing.

Matthews was born in South Africa on Jan. 9, 1967. He moved to outside New York City at age 2 when his father, a physicist, took a job in the U.S. Matthews' father died when he was 10, and the family returned to South Africa for much of the '80s. So Matthews was exposed to both pop and African sounds.

``I love melodies, so I was attracted to the Beatles and Bowie. I was raised on listening to classical and choral stuff, but I also loved a lot of African music and the rhythms in stuff by Hugh Masekela and others. And I grew up on Bob Dylan and Bob Marley,'' he says. ``A little while before the band got together, I got interested in American jazz, though I was interested in African jazz before that.''

After returning to the U.S. in 1987 (he had become a citizen at 13), Matthews held odd jobs, then worked as bartender in Charlottesville, Va., while keeping his musical ambitions to himself. In 1990, he formed the band after apSproaching a couple of local jazz musicians, saxman Leroi Moore and drummer Carter Moore. What they heard in Matthews was an unusual guitar sound.

``I played for years,'' Matthews explains. ``When I got obsessed in my playing, my inspirations were not so much listening to other guitarists but different types of music - African music, Indian music, Irish music. I didn't get into the guitar part of those kinds of music, but I got into the rhythms they were playing.

``Without having to get the courage to put a band together in my teens, I wanted a relatively full but simple sound that I could sing over. So I tried to cover percussive and melodic spaces with the guitar, really in a naive way, but just as big a sound ... with as little work as possible. So I got into this percussive thing that I'm into, sort of splitting the guitar in two. One being a punchy part to keep a grove and the other the roots to it all.''

The DMB was hardly an overnight success. Instead of trying to get a record contract right away, their manager put them out on the road for a few years. Part of the reason was necessity, Matthews points out. `Some of the band members had families to support.'' But all that touring helped give DMB its strong fan base.

In 1993, the band's self-released debut album, ``Remember Two Things,'' which sold at a rate of more than 10,000 copies per month - an incredible feat, considering it was distributed exclusively from the band's office. Their major-label debut, ``Under the Table and Dreaming'' was a hit, as have been the follow-up albums.

Matthews' latest album, ``Live at Luther College,'' debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard chart when it was released last January. Not bad for a live acoustic concert that he recorded with Tim Reynolds nearly three years ago, especially since Matthews allows taping at most of his concerts and the bootleg of this show has been around for a while.

South Africa still has a hold on Matthews. ``The music there is inspirational to me. Sort of reminisceSnt in a funny way of Irish music, melancholy but also so powerful. ... I think that there's something ancient about it that's inspirational. If it comes out in any way in my singing - however limited it is - I'll be pretty grateful that I could help convey it.''

But partly growing up there also opened his eyes to the political struggles that were going on.

``My mom was pretty politically active in the church in South Africa,'' Matthews says. ``You definitely have to take a side in that country. There was no middle ground. ... It wasn't the situation like here in America where you can say, `It doesn't involve me,' which in a lot of ways is a cop-out. ...

``(The situation in South Africa) made me acutely aware of racism. It also made be aware of it coming back to the States. So I see the racism here much more glaringly than I would have if I had just grown up here.''

But Matthews doesn't like to preach. ``I get annoyed by self-righteous people,'' he says, though he might occasionally ``talk about something in my concerts.''

That his band is racially mixed may be message enough for now, though Matthews would like to bring more ideas to his music in the future.

In the meantime, touring keeps Matthews occupied - ``I get ants in my pants,'' he says - and after taking a month off from this tour, he's going out with the rest of the band on a summer tour.

``It's easier for me to keep working and hope that I won't lose sight of inspirations and not get too caught up in why people got into what the band is doing,'' he says.

And keeping himself grounded is important to Matthews, who says he avoids ``spending too much time in too many extravagant situations.''

``I'm not denying that I'm really in an unusual position and that my life is different from a lot of people's. But I like to focus on not getting caught up in that. I think I could very easily. I think it's for selfish reasons that I try to hold on to simple things.''

And he credits his family with helping.

``Family and friends, people that know me well, will be the first to tell me if my feet seem to be raising above the ground and my head is starting to get lost in the clouds. They'll be the first to burst my bubble.''

On this day, the low-key Matthews was on the road, of course, calling from Salt Lake City, ``scratchy voice and all.''

When asked about his mother reportedly saying he could have a career in comedy, Matthews brightens and does an imitation denying she ever made that statement.

``I like to be as silly as the next person,'' Matthews admits, but he doesn't see a career in comedy ahead.

``You could represent me on that,'' he says. ``You could say, `When I spoke to David, he was particularly mundane.' ''

THE FACTS

Who: Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds.

Where: Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood.

When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday.

Tickets: Sold out, try brokers.

CAPTION(S):

Photo

Photo: Dave Matthews, left, and Tim Reynolds are in Southern California for a series of sold-out shows.