Published- 28th April 2011
Publisher- Simon and Schuster Ltd
Pages- 274 pages (Paperback)
Straight Outta Scotland is based on the life of my awesome friend Gavin Bain. It focuses on his life in the music industry with Silibil and Brains (this being Gavin Bain). This book was written entirely by Gavin himself. This book is filled with cons, fights, girls and suicide attempts (only 1 suicide attempt I must add).
The only suicide attempt in this novel is written about at the start in the prologue. Gavin is found by his sister after having taken a mixed batch of pills. Gavin does end up in hospital a few more times after this from injuries he sustained in fights. Only one death is written about in this novel and that was of a close friend of Gavin's. The suicide attempt and the death of Gavin's close friend were the saddest parts of this novel.
Gavin and Billy (Silibil), who are both from Scotland, conned the music industry into believing they were the next big hip hop act from America. They managed to pull this con off for a couple of years aswell, until everything started to unravel for the band. Billy liked to party lots and drink a lot. Gavin liked to do the same, but he also wanted to concentrate on making new music for the band. This started to cause tension between Gavin and Billy until it all reached a head when Billy announced he was getting married and disappeared from the house they shared.
The fights written about in this novel were between Gavin, Billy and other guys from clubs. However, there were also a few fights between Gavin and Billy themselves when they started to disagree on what they wanted from life and the band. The main fight taking place between them when Billy announced he was getting married and was basically distancing himself from the band/the music. The guys loved going out on tour so they could pull as many girls as possible. They loved the ladies and the ladies loved them.
Towards the end of this novel you start to read about what happened in Gavin's life after Silibil and Brains ended. Gavin's one main passion in life was music and this is what he wanted to continue in the future of his life. From this Hopeless Heroic was created and to this day they are an awesome rock band with a twist. They are the only rock band I know to have a very talented violinist in their band.
This is a must read novel if you want to see how a talented musician duped the music industry into believing he was from America and not Scottish. Now Gavin has gone back to his natural Scottish accent. Hopeless Heroic continue to make rocking music with their best song being, in my opinion, Guinea Pig Syndrome. In my opinion this is a must read novel for any music fan. This book gets 5/5 stars as it is a brilliant novel by my awesome friend Gavin Bain.
Rating 5/5
