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 The
West Midlands is often overlooked as a region
rich in musical heritage. Led Zeppelin,
Black Sabbath, Slade and er Duran Duran are some of the many successful acts to
hail from the area, but compared to other cities in the UK, the Midlands
music scene just isn’t as celebrated by the music press.
“Yeah, I don’t why that is. I don’t even
think where you’re from has anything to do with it, to be honest, says Wolverhampton troubadour Scott Matthews as we meet backstage at his Birmingham gig. “It’s all about how good the music is and how
good the artist is. Does everything have to be centred round London or something to be recognised? I don’t
believe that. If your music’s strong enough, and you’ve got something to say,
it doesn’t make a scrap of difference where you live”.
Currently
on tour, the singer songwriter has been overwhelmed by the positive response he
has received from enthusiastic crowds which follows a short stint supporting Foo Fighters on their acoustic dates earlier this year. “I didn’t expect this whole reaction. It’s
kind of overnight that things have really been taking off, on the live scene
anyway,” he says. “Obviously one of
the main reasons is because of the single. Just the focus on that and just
obviously opening it out to a wider audience completely just by the play on the
radio that’s culminated in more and more people coming to the gigs”.
The
single that’s causing such a fuss and loved by Radio 1’s Jo Whiley, amongst many
others, is Elusive. A beautifully
haunting ballad, Scott tells us it could have sounded so very different.
“It was one of those songs I wrote that was
in bunch of songs at the time. It was quite rocky at first, this harder edge
sound to it. The original demo definitely got this Strokes-y feel to it,”
he explains. “We tried it in the studio
and then it didn’t really work -the same format with bigger drums and that. It
was getting more like Blink 182! It
wasn’t really happening so we went back to basics and just went with the guitar
and voice thing and it was the right choice definitely”.
The
single is taken from his debut album Passing Strangers, which was released
earlier this year on indie label San
Remo, soon to be re-released on a major label. Work on the album actually started back in
2003 when Scott decided to go it alone, having been in a string of bands since
high school. “I have definitely moved on
from those songs. Obviously it’s fresh to a lot of people,” he says. “There’s that element where you have to keep
it professional and appreciate the fact that a lot of people that are coming to
your gigs are just getting into it”.
Passing
Stranger is a collection that displays many of Scott’s musical influences, from
folk, to rock and anything else. “That’s
probably down to not being quite so sure where I wanted to go with my first
record. There’s a tendency to ram all my influences in there. I think it’s
still a strong record, it has its theme and that, there’s a strong feel
throughout music and it all pulls together,” he explains. “The influences come from everywhere, and
from being in various bands as well. My last band was funk rock, the band
before that was a bit Radiohead, Elliott Smith kind of thing. It wasn’t until l
picked up an acoustic guitar that I found my own sound”.
Compared
more to Jeff Buckley than the latest batch of singer songwriters like James
Blunt, Scott doesn’t isn’t exactly impressed with this current phenomenon.
“There’s this trendy take on it, on singer
songwriters. I’m just a musician who picks up the guitar and gets his mouth
round the microphone. Whatever you label that, I don’t know. I like to think that
with the music, there’s a deeper meaning to it all. I could just go off on one
about the whole James Blunt thing,” he rants before adding: “you’ve got to respect these guys because
they’re out there doing it. There’s thousands and thousands of people who like
these guys so fair enough. I like to think I’m pushed away from those kinds of
people. It’s more of a pop thing, not
pop but mainstream thing going on with those guys. People are marketing them
towards this whole ‘look at me pretty boy thing rubbish thing’”.
Having
recorded Passing Stranger without major label interference, is he concerned
about loosing that artistic freedom he had?
“I think
at the end of the day we’re all of the same opinion and we’re all strong minded
characters that we know exactly how it needs to go,” he reasons. “I think we have no worries on that front,
what we say goes on various things. Obviously the one of the things we’re
always going to do is have that artistic freedom to do what we want”.
So,
exciting times then?
“It’s pretty good really man,” he
enthuses. “It’s not a nine to five job or
anything, although sometimes it feels like it is. But we all enjoy it, that’s why we do
it”.
Elusive is out now. Passing
Stranger is released on the 2nd October
For more info:
www.scottmatthewsmusic.co.uk
Words: Helen Duong
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