Andy,
You may get some additional comments from others, especially the gang that is at the present workshop in Carmel right now.
There are a couple of things that I look for when printing on matte or glossier paper. One is the overall image and what "feels" right from a viewing perspective, including size, how displayed, etc. Some prints take on a richer look or fine art appearance if printed on matte. Not all, and there are some technical things that may impact choices. In general (really big caveat there that could draw some flames), matte papers tend to have a smaller color gamut in their output, but most folks may not ever see or care about that. The other thing is that matte papers also do not have as high a Dmax rating as some glossy or luster papers. The newer, fine art papers do, but things like Epson's Enhanced Matte do not. Why does that matter? It impacts the deepness of the blacks to a greater degree. The higher the Dmax, the deeper the blacks the paper will hold.
Another point related to the above is amount of ink used. Matte surface papers can be very absorbent, and may require a bit more ink in printing in order to get the proper level of color saturation. The paper profiles for you printer/paper combination make adjustments for that. Again, not something many folks care all that much about, but sometimes the colors can get blocked up a bit more on matte paper than glossier surfaces, where the ink does not tend to soak in as much.
Finally, since the matte surface is generally not quite as smooth as luster or semi-gloss or gloss papers, you may need to increase your output sharpening a bit more in order to achieve the same level of appearance compared to the others.
Since you asked about B/W prints, the issues about DMax and sharpening come into play, and not the color blocking so much. (However, many printers, unless using only all black inks will use colored ink, especially yellow, and that can effect the fine gray separations of things and shadows.) In my opinion, stronger B/W images with lots of contrast hold up nicely on matte finishes and can look very art like. Finely detailed B/W images with lots of intermediary tones tend to print nicely on glossier paper. It is all really a matter of personal taste.
I have been using a fairly new very high gloss paper (Lexjet Fibre Elite 285g), that has been giving me outstanding B/W images that look like traditional air-dried high gloss paper, and it is paper, not the resin backing stuff of more common luster or glossy papers. Detailed B/W images look stunning on them.
Not sure this really answers your question, but this has been my experience. I print with an Epson 7800 printer using the ImagePrint RIP. It has some excellent profiles for B/W papers, and I have not been dissatisfied yet. Some of the multi-black printers from Canon and HP are also turning out some stunning B/W stuff, and the profiles for papers for these have been growing, so your choices are increasing there also. Some of the newer, bigger printers even have built in profiling options (HP), to let you dial things in precisely.
My suggestion would be to go look at outputs, and even try to get sample packs of papers from vendors to test things. Only way to get what you may really like.
LJ