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Essex storyteller, Scott Lavene gives another tantalising preview of his forthcoming album Disneyland In Dagenham with the engagingly quirky new single "Sadly I'm Not Steve McQueen", out now in Australia through Cheersquad Records & Tapes.
Scott Lavene is the kind of artist that can be compared only to himself, he’s that voice in our ear who always has a tale more weird, more tragic, more funny than our own, but in whose experiences we can see our own. "Sadly I’m not Steve McQueen" contrasts the dreary romance of his Essex upbringing with his dreams of international stardom – a Malibu mansion next door to Keith Moon’s and a bright red open-topped sports car, but today such validation no longer matters.
“It would be nice to make £150,000 a year from tours and sell 20,000 records, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t really care about that any more". After some years of personal struggle, Lavene’s got something worth more than any of that – a fanbase for many of whom his music means absolutely everything.
“My music’s a bit marmitey,” he says, but for those who love it it’s a love that runs deep – a recent crowdfunding campaign for Lavene to set up his own home studio, for instance, rapidly outstripped its target, setting the stage for “the grotty Essex Neil Young album” he’s already got in the pipeline.
An audience that’s both smaller and more dedicated can mean a type of connection more worthwhile than any arena show, he says. “That guy’s come to three or four gigs since then, and to meet the guy is just so fucking beautiful. Music’s given me a lot over the years, and I find it bizarre and wonderful that mine can give that to people too.”
As Scott says...
"Started out bluesy and acoustic but thought I’d try a bigger sound for it. Great driving beat from Ben and he played the cute little wah guitar lick. Yet another two chords and a story, trying to be an Essex Keroauc. Overall the song’s about escape, hoping to be anywhere other than where you are. I was like that my whole life. Then one day you realise that where you are ain’t so bad after all."
lyrics
Sadly I’m Not Steve Mcqueen,
I knew it, I just knew it, I knew that when I grew up I was gonna smell fresh peaches in the air, baked pavements and milkshakes. Wild cats would eat my pets and I’d drive everywhere in a red open top car filled with sun bleached cassettes for I would live in Malibu, the home of the stars where Keith Moon would be my neighbour.
But you see,
Sadly I’m Not Steve Mcqueen.
The only Malibu I’ve ever seen is the white bottles of booze, Malibu and pineapple in frosted glasses held by girls with short skirts and scratched legs in suburban pubs, tropical drinks to keep the English winter from their bones. You see, I have not seen the white sands of west coast California but I have seen the weak shores of Leigh on Sea, with more mud than sea, more polluted estuary than zesty pacific, more decaying grey rot than rose coloured California, for you see,
Sadly I’m Not Steve Mcqueen.
I’ve never drove a big red shark on the pacific highway but I did once own a 2CV that I bought for four hundred quid from a widowed man in a brown corduroy suit. The roof came off and often didn’t go back on. Now, I drove that car up and down the A13 past Stratford and under the river to the city at night with my girl next to me, the lampposts and streetlights serenading our scene. Then back south past Tilbury Docks and Rainham Marshes with a glove box full of apples, and my hand in her lap, on our way to Canvey Island. And you know, nothing smells like the start of the English summer, all mustard fields and new fauna, beer gardens and false hope. So you know, maybe if Steve Mcqueen could see me and my girl, laying down, her head on my chest and we sweat in her dads caravan until morning when the sun fills the windows and there’s a cool wind from the west, then we realise we’re more in love than the night before. You know maybe if Steve McQueen could see that he would think, he might think,
Sadly I’m not Scott Lavene
Sadly I’m Not Steve Mcqueen,
credits
released March 13, 2024
Words & music by Scott Lavene
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