The Scotsman Sessions #416: The LaFontaines
Welcome to the Scotsman Sessions, a series of short video performances from artists all around the country introduced by our critics. This week, Kerr Okan and Jamie Keenan of Motherwell’s LaFontaines perform the title track from their recently-released fourth album, Business As Usual
Formed in Motherwell in 2008, the LaFontaines are an alt‐rock/hip hop hybrid who deal in big, untrammelled emotions and, whenever the fancy takes them, some entirely unserious, whimsical notions. Life’s rich pageant.
Frontman Kerr Okan is a slick rapper, drummer Jamie Keenan sings with a throaty rasp, like a wounded bear, and guitarist Darren McCaughey provides the occasionally Zep‐adjacent riffage.
It’s a pretty unique sound. The band are on record as saying it shouldn’t work, they’re fully aware of that, but somehow it does for the most part.
Their fourth album, the self‐deprecatingly titled Business As Usual, is out now. The title track, which Okan and Keenan have recorded in stripped‐down form for The Scotsman Sessions, was recently described by Okan in the band’s official publicity blurb as “the song that saved the band.”
That sounds rather serious. Keenan, who serves as the LaFontaines’ jocular spokesman on this particular occasion, elaborates somewhat.
“That’s maybe reflective of how Kerr felt for a while. After all, circumstances have drastically changed for him since our last album [2019’s Junior]. Not only has he tied the knot and reproduced a beautiful bundle of joy, but he’s actually moved to a different country. Perhaps life as a LaFontaine is different when one resides in Londinium, and has much more honourable, time‐consuming and exorbitant commitments.”
“When one still inhabits the promised land of Wishaw, you’re still able to dine out on being a LaFontaine, thus I was never under the impression that the band needed saving. In Wishaw, I feel like the next Olly Murs, which is, as you can imagine, just wonderful. The ego has landed, or something.”
With that cleared up, we move on to the album itself. What can Keenan tell us about it?
“Every man, woman and child across this nation will be impressed beyond words,” he declares, “and I truly believe they will be talking without words about how impressed they are with this record for another half‐decade to come. Aside from this, I could also mention that the album was recorded within the budget set aside for it, which everyone involved was pleased with.”
The LaFontaines have experienced a lot in the last 16 years. Today, though, one particularly dramatic incident looms large in Keenan’s mind.
“We played at the Reading Festival a few years ago and a wasp kept landing on my microphone, and would periodically do a quick lap of my lips. I think my calm demeanour and exceptional set of pipes meant it was buzzing to be there, and I therefore didn’t get stung. Best seat in the house. Apart from onions, the second last thing I think I’d like to ever pass the threshold of my teeth would be a wasp.”
The LaFontaines embark upon a short and hopefully wasp‐untroubled UK tour in September, see www.thelafontaines.co.uk