But further success eluded LaVette. A 1972 album called “Child of the Seventies” was shelved, a 1978 stab at disco was a dead end and a 1982 comeback album called “Tell Me a Lie” produced no major hits. By the ‘90s, LaVette was still touring, but her recording career seemed over.
Then an obscure French label called Art and Soul got the rights to “Child of the Seventies” and issued it in 2000 under the name “Souvenirs.” It became a surprise hit with fans of old-school R&B, and inspired LaVette to record her first studio albums in more than two decades, including last year’s acclaimed “The Scene of the Crime.” That album features members of southern rockers the Drive-By Truckers as her backing band, an unlikely but potent combination that garnered “Crime” a Grammy nomination for best contemporary blues album.
From her home in New Jersey, LaVette chatted with us about her long-overdue success and her first foray into songwriting, a tune she co-wrote with the Drive-By Truckers’ frontman, Patterson Hood.
Congratulations on your Grammy nomination.
Thank you, thank you. It’s the best Christmas present I ever had, since 1962.
What does it mean to receive your first nomination at this stage of your career? Was it worth the wait?
I don’t know if it was worth the wait. I don’t know that unless somebody said, “Well, you’re gonna have to wait 46 years and go through all kinds of humiliation and abuse. Do you wanna do it or don’t you wanna do it?” And I could say, well OK—I decided I wanted to do it. So I can’t really answer that. I know I feel vindicated—I don’t feel honored. I feel they owe it to me, if nothing else, just for endurance. You know, there should be an endurance award. It’s kind of like they plucked me out of ice or something. “We found this old lady completely intact. She’s a thousand years old. We gave her a microphone and she’s singing.”
If you win, what will you do with the trophy?
Well, my husband said that I would have a gold chain put on it and wear it around my neck. For bling. [Laughs]
What was your first impression of Patterson Hood?
Patterson and I are so much alike it’s ridiculous. So you know, he and I had a few issues up top, but…my daughter is his age! So I have to win. I either got really, really angry, like a real ghetto bitch, and cussed, or really, really small and pitiful, and cried. Whatever it was I had to do to get my way. But everything went exactly the way I wanted it to go. [Laughs] And then after that, I was real, real happy.
I know Patterson Hood suggested a lot of songs for “Scene of the Crime” and you didn’t like any of them. Do you remember what some of them were?
Oh, no, I don’t. Songs aren’t like that to me. My husband remembers everything he’s ever heard in his life. I just remember what I need.
If you decide you’re gonna sing it…
Then I remember it forever. I remember the entire thing.
How did you find the songs for “Scene of the Crime”? You’ve got tunes by everyone from Ray Charles to Don Henley on there.
My husband has every song that was ever recorded by anyone at all. In fact, we’re looking for a new house now so that all the music can have this house. [Laughs] It’s taking over. But he play music continuously—like right now, I’m watching politics and old movies; he’s downstairs listening to music. So he’ll play something and I might just hear it…and when I hear songs, I hear them to sing. I don’t hear them like, “Let me hear that again ‘cause I like it.” I hear them like, “Let me hear that again; I might want to sing it.” So he started to catalog songs for me and make notes of which songs I said I liked. To show you how absolutely taciturn my taste is, I chose 30 songs in five years. And I chose these 10 out of those 30.
There’s a first for you on this album: “Before the Money Came,” your first songwriting credit.
Mm-hm. That Patterson Hood got on my nerves so bad, it made me write a song. [Laughs]
Is that what happened? Because to hear him tell it, he was taking notes on stuff you would say…
He did. He was constantly encouraging me to write and I was saying, “I can’t.” Patterson hears in a song in anything—a conversation, in anything that’s going on. And so he took some of the things I had said—well, one of the things I had said: “Close shooting don’t kill no birds.” ‘Cause they like to record over and over and over...and I don’t. And they kept saying, “Well, we’re close, darling.” I said, “Shit, close shooting don’t kill no birds.” He said, “See? That would be a great song.” I said, “Then write it.” ‘Cause I was mad. So he wrote the song and it started with that line. And I said, “Well, I don’t like none of this, except the line I gave you.” [Laughs] Then he got mad at me. Because he had written a song, and I didn’t like it. So I just sat down and wrote the song down. I think it took me maybe an hour. And then he was angry because he liked it! [Laughs]
It sounds like Patterson may have found the perfect formula for inspiring you. He just does something you don’t like.
I love it! I’ve been calling him my muse. I say, “I write because of Patterson.” But I couldn’t even believe that I wrote this song. I was as amazed as anybody else was, really.
