Hi. I’m Samuel J. Lawrence, the J stands for James and the full stop isn’t necessary. I was born in South Africa (my parents lived there for a bit), but I grew up in Nottingham. Nottingham is right in the middle of the UK and is probably best known for Robin Hood, a guy that didn’t exist hundreds of years ago.
I started playing the drums when I was about 11 after watching ‘School Of Rock’, the brilliant Jack Black film about some school kids becoming rock stars. I began learning Piano around the same time and absolutely hated it.. I never practiced and it took me about 2 years to complete my grade 1. Early in high school I started singing and it wasn’t until I was about 15 that I picked up a Ukulele and fell in love with the idea of playing an instrument that I could actually carry around with me. Soon after, I upgraded to the Guitar and decided that I wanted to take music more seriously.
I’m now 20, living in Brighton and have just released my first ever single. It took me a while to release it as I’m such a perfectionist, a trait that can be very helpful but is also my biggest downfall.. apart from my grammar of course, I tend to just write ‘…’ whenever I don’t know the right punctuation.
The track is called ‘Bitter Mind’ and it’s about my girlfriend.. she’s still a little offended by the title. The song is about our arguments and how they can become so bitter, especially when we’re tired or hungry. Nevertheless, I would say that the song has a very positive outlook: one of the lyrics reads 'I want to fall into your bitter mind’ this is the acknowledgment that you only argue when you care.
My main influences are the likes of Jeff Buckley, Nick Mulvey, Vulfpeck and Nina Simone, to name a few. I suppose the genre of ‘Bitter Mind’ is quite mixed, it goes from folk to funk to rock but I think we got away with it. I’m in a weird stage where every song I write is a slightly different genre, I’m telling myself that that’s a good thing? I’m not really sure.
I’m predominantly a Solo Artist but I formed a band in April under the same name. They’re fantastic and the track was influenced immensely by all of them.. from the funky bass to the wonderful Electric guitar work, they really did smash it and I’m really looking forward to playing some more gigs and recording some more tracks with them in the coming months.
I’ve been in Brighton for a year now and I absolutely love it, it’s a very forward thinking city. There are lots of musicians here and it was very overwhelming to begin with. It’s very hard to get noticed when there is so much incredible talent surrounding you, although I must admit that it became easier when I realised that everyone is in the same boat and that actually you’ve just got to enjoy yourself, write a load of tracks and see if anything sticks. It’s far less overwhelming when you start simplifying your mentality like that. It’s a difficult industry, but It is what it is.
It would be awesome if you could check out my track, I’m proud of it.
Links:
WEBSITE: www.samueljlawrence.com
FACEBOOK: www.facebook.com/samueljlawrence
INSTAGRAM: www.Instagram.com/samueljlawrence