Scott Matthews was born in Wolverhampton and until a recent ‘temporary’ flit over the border to Shropshire, has in his own words “never known anywhere else really”. Nor does he need to, arguably. His introspective song writing, folk/blues voice and humorous connection with the audience are perfectly pitched to take the world by storm, from any city. He’s signed to the San Remo record label and has just released his debut album, called Passing Stranger. I caught up with him just as he hopped off stage at the Moseley Folk Festival on 2 September 2006, three pints of lager into the day. FC – "That went really well and Janice Long was really bigging you up, predicting you’d be signed to a major record label soon." SM – "Yeah, who knows… things are going great, I’ve got some great people behind the record and that’s on of the key things… I’ve been doing lots of gigs, people are buying the record and people are lapping up the music, which is the key thing for me. I couldn’t wish for anything better to be honest at this stage in my career." FC – "Do you think being from Wolverhampton has made any difference?" SM – "It just happens I’m a singer song-writer from Wolverhampton, I could have easily have been from anywhere. It just so happens that I’m from Wolverhampton and I think that’s a good thing, man. "I’ve been in Wolverhampton all my life and it’s the only thing I’ve ever known, really, er … Wolverhampton is pretty cool in itself you know, it does the job it says on the tin, you know: ‘come to Wolverhampton, there’s things to do!’ [laugh]. It’s wicket, man. We’ve got a fairly decent football team as well, they kind of do their job in a fashion." FC – "If people want to see you, buy your records etc, what should they do?" SM - "I think one of the things would be to try and see the gigs really … it’s important to see an artist live … if they want to buy the record, you know, that’s great for a start but, you know, I want people to judge for themselves." FC – "You have a good connection with the audience live, because you’re quite funny and honest." SM – "It’s just to kind of break the ice with people, there’s too many people that just get a bit absorbed in theirself: ‘these are my songs and that’s it’, you know, I think it’s definitely important to show for a start that you’re a genuine person and you’re an honest chap whose just wrote a few songs and erm, hopefully people are digging what I’m doing." FC – "What are your immediate ambitions now then?" SM – "My ambition was to make a record and that’s been achieve, I think just being happy in my life and in what I’m doing really, that’s the ambition. Music aside, you know, being a blacksmith or whatever, whatever you want to do man. Whatever makes you happy." FC – "Art as well as music have made you happy, right?" SM – "I could have gone the illustrator route but music took over when I started writing my own songs … there’s a bit [of my art work] on the actual CD itself in the booklet inside, just a couple of doodles and things but, er, I haven’t done any painting for a few years, that’s quite worrying and I will be doing some and maybe the second album cover or something, you know." To look out for the second album and other news from Scott Matthews, see his website at http://www.scottmatthewsmusic.co.uk. | 
