In 1962, at the age of 16, the young singer kicked off a promising career with her first single, “My Man He’s a Lovin’ Man.”
She was in good company. While making her way in Detroit, she lived across the street from Smokey Robinson, chummed it up with Otis Redding and loaned clothes to Aretha Franklin.
So, how was it working with these icons, she’s asked. What was it like, knowing the people before they became the faces of rhythm and blues?
For LaVette, now 66, they were just people.
“How did your 9th-grade classmates make you?” she shoots right back.
For LaVette, her overlap with such legends exists only because they also are musicians. The difference between LaVette and her contemporaries is obvious even on stage. Her show is not rife with over-the-top sensationalism. Often dressed in a simple black dress and backed by her band, LaVette allows her voice to be the centerpiece, the grit galvanized by the emotion she brings.
And in her demeanor, LaVette laughs often, speaks frankly and tells it like it is.
LaVette’s career did not follow the trajectory of those around her. After her initial takeoff, the album that was set to be her full-length debut was inexplicably canceled by Atlantic in the early ’70s. It was only in 1982, that she debuted in her own right with “Tell Me a Lie” on Motown.
Aside from a few recordings under Motor City Soul Records, LaVette’s career floundered, and she found herself performing regularly in Detroit.
But things changed for LaVette in the turn of the millennium. First, her original album was resurrected and released as “Souvenirs” in France under the Art & Soul label. In 2002, LaVette was invited to play at the birthday party of John Goddard, owner of Mill Valley Records. The party created inroads for LaVette and she inevitably wound up releasing the album “A Woman Like Me” in 2003 with Blue Express Records, before signing with ANTI- Records.
Since then, LaVette’s career has soared, reaching bigger and better heights as a recently unearthed gem from a classic era. Personal highlights include performing for the inaugural celebration of President Barack Obama, whom she says is as old as her career. The performance meant more to her than just a confirmation that she had arrived.
“It was wonderful,” LaVette says. “It was more for me than anybody else. I was the only person there besides Pete Seeger.”
Since 2000, Lavette has released several CDs, including “I’ve Got My Own Hell to Raise” in 2005 and “The Scene of the Crime” in 2007; won awards; shared the stage with former Beatles and toured with former Zeppelins. A book about LaVette is also set to be published in the fall.
Working from others’ material, LaVette identifies her work as interpreting. Each piece is carefully worked through and given her own flavor.
Her last album, “Interpretations: The British Rock Songbook,” was released in 2010. Her newest, she says, will take on more modern sounds.
While adapting material, LaVette occasionally changes words if they don’t make sense to her. Feeling responsible for presenting these songs to her adult audience, she says there are no untouchables. Not even Led Zeppelin, whose “All My Love” received the LaVette treatment.
“I was fortunate enough to go on a short tour with Robert Plant last year and he said, ‘You changed the lyrics,’ and I said, ‘You have to make sense to adults who maybe weren’t high’,” she recalls with a laugh. “And he didn’t kick me off the tour.”
During the latter half of her career, while going from gig-to-gig in Detroit, the idea of quitting ran through her mind about “two hours every day.”
“I would have been stupid to just go along and keep laughing,” LaVette says. “There were absolutely hard days and those were the days when my cousin ... in Detroit would say, ‘Have another drink, hit this joint, you’ll be okay in a few minutes.’ And then somebody would call and I would be thrilled for 72 hours.”
Now, with a career as loud as her voice, LaVette may just have the last laugh.
Photo by Carol Friedman
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