Steve McLaughlin (musician)
| Scars | |
|---|---|
| Origin | Edinburgh, Scotland |
| Genres | Post-punk |
| Years active | 1977–1982 2010–2011 |
| Labels |
Fast Product Pre Records Charisma Records Stiff America |
| Website | The Scars' website |
| Members | Robert King Paul Research John Mackie Calumn Mackay Steve McLaughlin |
Scars (originally known as The Scars) were a post-punk band that hailed from Edinburgh, Scotland, and were a part of that city's bustling music scene of the late 1970s–early 1980s.
Fronted by Robert King and featuring Paul Research on lead guitar, John Mackie on bass, and Calumn Mackay on drums, the band's original sound was angular and offset with a dance-based rhythm section, as evidenced by their 1979 single for Fast Product "Horrorshow"/"Adult/ery". The band's popular set-closing song "Your Attention Please" appeared as a free gold flexi-disc in the first issue of the influential London-based style magazine i-D. This song would later be included in the band's 1981 (and sole) album Author! Author!, but in the meantime the group maintained an ever-mounting momentum and attention via singles releases and constant touring, and soon they were noticed by John Peel. Peel invited the band to record two of his legendary Sessions, once in February 1980 and another in May 1981.
By the time the band started recording Author! Author!, their sound had matured from being rough and aggressive to something more melodic. From that album sprang perhaps the most recognizable Scars song out there, "All About You", which was the only single launched directly from that album. Calumn Mackay left Scars the year prior to the album's release, so Steve McLaughlin took over drumming duties for the band at around this time. The band continued to receive positive attention and increase their fan base as they were first able to co-headline gigs with the Comsat Angels, then headline gigs with Josef K as their supporting act. Scars even managed to land a full-page spread in Smash Hits. By that time, the band was headquartered in London
In the summer of 1982, Scars landed a supporting slot with Australia's The Church as the headliners. This was to be the beginning of the end for the band. Having been together—and constantly playing live gigs—since they were all teenagers in 1977, the glue that held the band together started to weaken. Robert King left the band and the rest of the band members, in turn, tried to keep the band going as a cohesive unit with Paul Research taking over lead vocal duties. The band recorded a song called "Bone Orchard" for a planned second album that never materialized; at year's end, the Scars were no more. King would soon go on to modest but temporary success as a solo artist (the synthpop-ish "Paper Heart" being the most notable of his recordings), but by the mid '80s the various Scars bandmates have been content to continue being musicians and pursuing other interests beyond the glare of the limelight.
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