Photo by Mark Seliger
I adore one-of-a-kind people and the brilliant song stylist Bettye LaVette fits that to a tee! I met her for the first time in the summer of 2001 when Make-up Artist Rudy Calvo and I went to a hotel in Burbank to pick up Bettye for a photo shoot in a dance rehearsal space. I was aware of Bettye’s musical history, in large part thanks to Rudy, who is a music historian specializing in artists like Bettye LaVette. (Check out my blog with Rudy here)
I fell in love with Bettye that day. She is another one of those “force of nature” type personalities. Thank God, she is a barrel of laughs and smart as a whip! It wasn’t long after, that Bettye’s star began to rise. Since then she has released several highly acclaimed albums and toured the best places all around the world. Anytime I’ve seen Bettye since that photoshoot several years ago, she is always the same, honest, warm, friendly, inviting, curious, strong and on point. She talked with me on the phone from her home in New Jersey a week and a half ago. I think our conversation is less interview and more talking between two people who respect and appreciate one another. Now here is a little information about Bettye LaVette's career so far.
An R&B diva with a sharp, distinctive vocal style that balances passion, ferocity, and confidence, Bettye LaVette experienced early success before spending years as a cult figure among fans of vintage soul (especially in Europe and the U.K.), only to find a new and appreciative audience in the 2000s. Bettye was born in Muskegon, Michigan. She was raised primarily across the state in Detroit, and at 16 she cut her first sides for the Northern label, with a test pressing of the disc making its way to Atlantic Records. After signing with Atlantic, she scored an R&B Top Ten hit out of the box with her debut single, "My Man -- He's a Loving Man," only to fail to reach the same commercial heights again.
Photo courtesy of Rudy Calvo Collection
After one more Atlantic release, 1963's "You'll Never Change," LaVette moved to Lupine for her third record, "Witchcraft in the Air." After a stint as a featured vocalist with the Don Gardner & Dee Dee Ford Revue, she recorded the long-unreleased "One Thin Dime" for Scepter before resurfacing on Calla with the 1965 lost classic "Let Me Down Easy," her only other record to crack the R&B Top 20.
Photo courtesy of Rudy Calvo Collection
Bettye LaVette returned to Atlantic, signing to their Atco division for 1972's Neil Young cover "Heart of Gold." An LP, Child of the Seventies, was also recorded at Muscle Shoals Studios, but Atco opted against its release after the failure of the single "Your Turn to Cry" (the album was reissued, complete with bonus tracks, in limited copies by Rhino in 2006). After joining the touring company of the Broadway musical ‘Bubbling Brown Sugar,’ Bettye briefly signed to West End for a disco effort, 1978's "Doin' the Best I Can."
Photo courtesy of Rudy Calvo Collection
She did not record again until 1982, landing at Motown and rechristening herself "Bettye." However, despite a heavy promotional push, neither the LP ‘Tell Me a Lie’ nor the single "Right in the Middle (Of Falling in Love)" proved her long-awaited chart breakthrough, and outside of a handful of recordings for Motor City during the '90s, she focused primarily on live appearances in the years to follow.
Photo courtesy of Rudy Calvo Collection
The 2000s found her in the recording studio more frequently with new albums ‘A Woman Like Me’ being released by the Blues Express label in 2003 followed by ‘I've Got My Own Hell to Raise’ in 2005 on the Anti label. In 2006, ‘Take Another Little Piece of My Heart,’ a collection of Silver Fox singles as well as other material, all of which had been recorded in Memphis between 1969 and 1970, came out on Varèse Sarabande. ‘The Scene of the Crime’ appeared on Anti in 2007. Bettye next tackled classic songs by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, and the Who, among others, on 2010's ‘Interpretations: The British Rock Songbook,’ which she co-produced with Rob Mathes and Michael Stevens.
Photo courtesy of Rudy Calvo Collection
Bettye celebrated her 50th year as a performer in 2012 by releasing ‘Thankful 'n' Thoughtful,’ covering songs by the Black Keys, Sly Stone, Tom Waits, Neil Young, and Bob Dylan, among others, and also issued her autobiography, ‘A Woman Like Me.’ She reunited with producer Joe Henry, who had been behind the controls for ‘The Scene of the Crime,’ for 2015's ‘Worthy,’ her first album for the British Cherry Red label. Bettye next signed with Verve Records, which released 2018's ‘Things Have Changed.’ The album found Bettye interpreting 12 songs by Bob Dylan; Steve Jordan produced the sessions, and Keith Richards played guitar on the track "Political World."
Photo: Alan Mercer Make-up: Rudy Calvo
Alan Mercer: Bettye, I LOVE that fate has decreed you, your rightful place in music history.
Bettye LaVette: It’s blinding for me. I think I’m supposed to be an anomaly. When they write the final chapter, it will go, ‘Now, can you believe this one?”
AM: There is no other life story like yours.
BL: I am certain that there isn’t. I come from Detroit. You know the whole Detroit story. I am now signed to the company that OWNS Motown.
AM: I bet you love that.
BL: Oh honey, I love it to death. It’s absolutely satisfying.
AM: Tell me about your brilliant new album.
BL: I am absolutely stunned by the reception these Dylan tunes are getting. I am getting standing ovations in the middle of my show. His fans are absolutely accepting this album.
AM: Who’s idea was it to record these Dylan songs?
BL: The photographer that has shot my last few albums, Carol Friedman, is a great Bettye LaVette fan. She constantly wanted me to sing Bob Dylan songs so one day she told me she could get me a deal with Universal in Europe.
AM: Wow! How exciting!
BL: Just the word Universal was exciting to me, but that deal didn’t work out, so we tried here in the States and they wanted it.
AM: Thank God.
Photo: Alan Mercer Make-up: Rudy Calvo
BL: It was like when I met you. You weren’t wheeling and dealing in the entertainment business. You and Rudy Calvo wanted to do something for me to help me. That is a unique quality in my life and career. People just decide they are going to help me.
AM: That is awesome. Who helped pick the songs for this collection?
BL: We picked the songs out of a pool of songs that my husband, who knows all things music, assembled for me. It was just a matter of me deciding who I wanted to go to bed with! (Laughter)
AM: I got the album the first day it was out. I knew it would be impossible not to love it!
BL: You knew you were going to like it!?!
AM: I did know it, but I didn’t know HOW MUCH I was going to like it.
BL: I thought you were going to be a little apprehensive about this one.
AM: I wouldn’t be apprehensive about anything you recorded. Are you enjoying playing in theaters?
BL: I like theaters. I learned how to move on stage, so it isn’t intimidating to me. It seems like my ego gets bigger as I get older, so I need more room to spread my arms out farther. (Laughter)
Photo by Carol Friedman
AM: How do you stay so slim?
BL: I never get anything to eat. Every time I sit down to rest they tell me it’s time to go. Also, I have developed a taste for good quality food, not fast food. I don’t want food that I’ve carried around all day long. So, I just don’t eat it.
AM: There are so many challenges when you are popular, but do you think you are enjoying it more at this time of your life?
BL: I’m enjoying life more at this time in my life, but not show business. It’s really hard work. I’m still not at the point where I can have a staff of people by my bed running to get me water. I have grown people who travel with me who have mortgages. I have to make enough money to pay them a decent wage.
AM: That’s true.
BL: I’m only known from city to city all over the world, but until you’re known from town to town, you can’t get on a tour bus and sleep. I have to get finished with the performance, sleep quickly, get up and get to the airport and get to the next place with time to sleep a couple more hours before it’s time to go on again. Sometimes I have to decide should I eat, or should I get some rest? When people think of my life I know they aren’t looking at it like that. They think when success comes, it comes like it does to Beyoncé and it’s not like that. I am making enough money so that when I am home, I am able to have anything I want. But when I have to take these other five individuals with me, it’s a different story.
AM: That does change things up.
BL: I’m in a strange position. I’m setting myself up to be bigger when I’m dead than in the few more weeks I’m gonna live. (Laughter)
Bettye's Book
AM: You truly are leaving an incredible legacy.
BL: I’m feeling gratitude about that. My husband goes on eBay and finds pictures of me and CD’s and other things for sale. There must be some importance in a picture of me waving my arm in 1912! (Laughter) My husband deals in antiques, so he got the ultimate old soul in me.
AM: You two sure do seem happy.
BL: We are! The only time we argue is when I jump on him and beat him up. (Laughter) Other than me being an evil old woman…we get along. When I talk about Bob Dylan on stage, I talk about what we have in common. He complains about everything. Just like an old woman and I am an old woman. (Laughter)
AM: Do you know if he has heard your album?
BL: His manager gave me license and permission to do anything I wanted to do. He listened to it and he said he loved it. He said, “Go on girl.” We are going to believe that Bob has heard it. We don’t know that. We know we can believe one way or the other, so we are going to BELIEVE he heard it.
AM: I would think he would want to hear it.
BL: I would think so. Because he is covered by so many artists and also, I am making such a point of not letting any writers use the word ‘cover.’
AM: Why is that?
BL: Because you can only ‘cover’ records. You cannot ‘cover’ songs. You have to interpret songs. Pat Boone ‘covered’ records. The company wanted me to do two signature tunes, so I chose ‘The Times They Are A Changing’ and ‘It Ain’t Me Babe.’ I am facing someone who has been able to amass $250 million dollars by being mass replicated. I said I would contribute to that if I sell any records, but this is not another tribute album. I was determined that would not be the case. I don’t know his catalog. I’ve been talking to journalists and they will bring up his albums from 1973 and 1975 and I say, “Really?”
AM: They think you are a big fan.
BL: I don’t know what year any of them are from and since my album is not a tribute to him, I haven’t bothered to learn. I can only tell you my situation in the situation. I don’t know what year each album is from, nor do I care. I didn’t choose them as records. I chose them as songs. As far as I’m concerned, the song was written the day I sung it.
AM: I like your attitude towards it all.
BL: It’s the only attitude I’ve had about doing interpretations of songs. I am living with an Irish guy who grew up listening to these people and even has pictures of these people. They didn’t exist for me in real terms. They existed only as competition. Now the songs existed in real time because they were songs, but not people’s records.
AM: I’d sure like to hear you record a Country music album.
BL: We really thought that was going to happen next. My husband Keven keeps an ongoing catalog with five categories including American Popular songs, British songs, Beatles songs, Country songs and George Jones songs. When he can catch me in the little office upstairs he says, “Honey, listen to this.” He is constantly listening for me.
Photo courtesy of Rudy Calvo Collection
AM: The last time I saw you at the Troubadour in West Hollywood, I couldn’t pick my jaw up off the floor. I was so amazed by your brilliant performance.
BL: You sweet thing. I didn’t want you to be amazed. I want you to be proud.
AM: I am proud, but I am amazed too. I’ve seen so many performers that I can be jaded, but you were mind-blowing. I tell EVERYONE if they haven’t seen you live, they must, as soon as possible.
BL: Thank you baby, so much.
AM: You have done about everything by now, haven’t you?
BL: I’m still trying to collect my “Ray Charles” audience which means an audience that is filled with young and old people. It includes everybody who came to hear Ray Charles. They didn’t come to hear a new record. That’s what I’ve been after all of my life.
AM: I hope you are still going well into your nineties.
BL: I want to get to a place where I can just show up and they pay me, and I don’t have to really do a lot. I can sit in my Queen Anne chair and handmade cane, so I can count the tunes off with my cane. (Laughter) That’s what I’m living to do.
Photo: Alan Mercer Make-up: Rudy Calvo
To learn more about Bettye LaVette visit her web site http://www.bettyelavette.com/