Scott Blasey

Scott Blasey is an American rock musician best known as the lead vocalist for the Clarks, a position he has held since the band's inception in the mid-1980s. Aside from the Clarks, he also has a successful solo career, and three studio albums have been credited to him.

Biography

Born in Connellsville, Pennsylvania in 1964,^[1] Scott Blasey graduated from Connellsville Area Senior High School in 1982.^[2] He then began attending Indiana University of Pennsylvania. There, he met guitarist Rob James, bassist Greg Joseph, and drummer Dave Minarik. Blasey, James, and Minarik first began playing together as "The Administration." When Joseph joined the three in 1986, they became "the Clarks." Initially a cover band, the quartet soon started writing and performing original material, with much of the writing output being by Blasey and Joseph.

Blasey graduated from IUP in 1987.^[2] Soon afterward, the Clarks entered the recording studio. Their first studio album, I'll Tell You What Man..., was released in 1988. The song "Help Me Out" received some Western Pennsylvania radio airplay, and was a local success. I'll Tell You what Man... was followed by The Clarks in 1991, which introduced "Penny on the Floor." Love Gone Sour, Suspicion, and Bad Debt (1994) and Someday Maybe (1996) followed, introducing "Cigarette" and "Mercury", respectively.

In 1995, Blasey's first solo album, Don't Try This at Home, was released. It was recorded at Studio L in Weirton, West Virginia, and was a moderate success. In a very favorable review, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette wrote that his "grasp of the nuances of rock 'n' roll's moral landscape has put him at the front ranks of the regional music scene for years." It went on to say, "What Don't Try This at Home reveals exactly is the full range of Blasey's emotional timbre unencumbered by the bombast of Top 40 considerations."^[3] Acoustic versions of some Clarks songs, like "Mercury", "Courtney", and "Flame", were included.^[4] In all, five of the songs from Don't Try This at Home ended up on The Clarks' album Someday Maybe.^[5]

Blasey's second solo album, Shine, was released in 1999, and found much success with Clarks fans. Critic Tracy Collins, in a favorable review, noted Blasey's "engaging, pop-culture-savvy writing".^[5] Among other songs on it was "Born Too Late"; a year later, the song would be re-recorded and featured prominently on The Clarks' fifth studio album, Let It Go.^[6] Also that year, Blasey appeared on Donnie Iris and the Cruisers' ninth studio album, Together Alone, on which he sang guest vocals on "Amazing Grace."^[7]

Over the course of the 2000s, Blasey recorded five studio albums with the Clarks: Let it Go (2000), Another Happy Ending (2002), Fast Moving Cars (2004), Restless Days (2009), and Feathers & Bones (2014). He continues to play with the Clarks as well as solo shows, mostly throughout the Pittsburgh region. In 2007, he released his third and most recent studio album, Travelin' On, recorded in Dallas with producer Salim Nourallah.^[8] Much of the album's lyrical content is based around his home life and his move from Pittsburgh to Texas, and it includes a song about his daughter Sofia.^[9][10]

Aside from Clarks shows and solo shows, Blasey also plays acoustic shows with fellow Clarks members Rob James and Greg Joseph as "Scott, Rob and Greg of the Clarks." The three originally played acoustic shows as "the Infamous Dicks," but that name was phased out.

Personal life

Scott Blasey has been married to Denise Blasey since 2004. They moved to Dallas later that year, and returned to western Pennsylvania in 2007.^[11]

The Blaseys have three daughters.^[12]

Discography

With the Clarks

Solo work

• Don't Try This at Home, 1995
• Shine, 1999
• Travelin' On (2007)

References

External links

• The Official Home of Scott Blasey
• The Clarks Online