Broke Vinyl
Like all the greatest music, Scott Lavene is all at once familiar and yet hard to place. A storyteller delivering real life vignettes over wonk beats and scuzz riffs, he is a 21st century take on those maverick genius outsiders that Stiff Records used to release back in the punk wars.
Lavene has the lyrical smarts and the fairground bark of an Ian Dury, the incisive wordplay of a Costello and the deadpan pop of Madness in his creative DNA along with the street poetry of an Essex boy version of Lou Reed, the dislocated funk of Talking Heads, the jellied eel lyrical bounce of Chas and Dave, and the inventive surreal see saw of a Tom Waits and many other nonconformists.
It’s an intoxicating brew that he makes his own in this collection of wonderful quirky songs that will be released on a full-length album in June 2019.
These are songs that are full of detail of a life lived in scuffed shoes, rainy towns and the magic of the everyday. Songs about small talk, being skint, doomed affairs and the sweetness of falling in love over a cup of tea.
Growing up in the eighties his first musical memory was the Stray Cats thrilling rush ‘Runaway Boys’ before sparking off on The Clash on the Levis ads and Otis Reading, Beatles, Stones and all the classics. Soon he was embracing the kind of eclectic musical trip that his own songs reflect.
‘I like everything from cheesy pop mimic, hip hop, British music from sixties and seventies Ian Dury, to underground stuff like Suicide and the Membranes. When I first had a band I tried to be cool hip indie, like the White Stripes or the Kills but I’m not cool. I’m just a fella from the Essex street and when I started writing stories and songs about my own life and what I’d seen it all clicked.’
He drifted through rock n roll, underclass living, scratchy jobs and lo fi living in the shadows of modern Blighty which he briefly abandoned to live in France before turning up in New York and even managing to play CBGBs (before it was turned into another hideous coffee bar) then returning home to the magnetic grey skies and the permanent grey pallor off hungover UK to form his own band Big Top Heartbreak. They released an album before falling apart leaving him on a grotty old boat dreaming, scheming and skulking whilst the rest of the world seemed to have passed his music by.
It was the perfect grounding for his upcoming album that is drenched in living in the gutter but staring at the stars. These missives from the underclass perfectly document the tidal flow of modern British culture, like a rainy day take on Beck but with an added very British snark eye for everyday pathos delivered with a deadpan wit and a poetic eye.
After a few years of living on dreams 2018 finally saw Scott release a string of limited edition 7 inch singles, play a residency at Brighton Fringe Festival, embark on an autumn tour and also receive airplay from Steve Lamacq on his BBC 6 Music show.
Creating unconventional backdrops for his street tales Scott builds up shapeshifting rhymes and loping grooves.
‘Rhythmically I wanted to be able make a whole album where you could just listen to the drums and bass and yet twist with street stories and with an instrumental sixties atmosphere like Gainsbourg or film soundtracks like David Lynch or Wim Wenders - sort of like making soundtracks for films that had not been made. I love Tom Waits dark humour and his melodies to mess with people’s minds. Lots of gigs people who have heard my songs say they want to both laugh and cry in the same song which is great’
With all these words it’s no surprise that Scott is working on a book.
‘It’s called ‘All The Women I’ve Ever Loved’. It’s a coming of age book about the 10 periods of a man’s life and is sort of a cross between Nick Hornby and Charles Bukowski - sweet tales of dark romance’
There is also talk of a one man musical - a theatrical piece which embraces his love of Tom Waits fairground barker surrealism with his natural aptitude for almost music hall pizzaz - a showbiz touch that runs in the family with both his grandad and great uncle making a living in working mens clubs as whistlers and it’s a music hall tradition that he feels proud of and is still immersed in.
‘I tend to talk a lot live, people laugh and also look uncomfortable. I don’t have any illusions about being cool any more! I just sing my songs and tell weird stories in between’
Somehow in the avalanche of modern music he has found his own place with an idiosyncratic voice and a deadpan story telling soul of a great English poet - a poet laureate of the everyday like a John Betjeman of the 21st century urban with great lyrics full of pathos, razor sharp observations and a quirky off kilter humour that perfectly match his music that is warped off kilter rhythms, garage rock slashes and a clank and grind.