It’s hard to be okay today
and I say goodbye Marlene
MarleneThe Scene (1998)
With a mixture of rock, muscle, romance and melancholy, former punk rocker Thé Lau brought to life in 1998 a woman in whose arms he could be someone else: Marlene. Take me with you, he begs her.
Marlene was a fantasy figure, she originated in the imagination of musician and lyricist Lau (1952-2015). He dedicated the tenth album of his Dutch rock band The Scene (dated 1979) to this self-chosen ‘mother of all men’, a woman with a sparkling look and wonderful eyes. He chose his own place of residence for the location. He thought of her ‘in the rain, the Amsterdam rain’.
The man with the raw, hoarse and tender voice stood at a crossroads at the end of the century. The fire of The Scene, flared up with the success albums Blue (of the breakthrough hit of the same name) and Open, was still smoldering, but the tire needed more fuel—and Lau himself.
The Scene was about to explode, he said in the Brabants Dagblad. ‘I remember one time somewhere in Brabant during a festival like this I walked off the stage in a village square and thought: it’s like a circus. The canvas is torn, the acrobats are tired. And who am I in that whole story?’
The previous years had been great, with hundreds of loudly acclaimed live performances, a prominent mention on the artist list of the major pop festival Torhout/Werchter and winning the Popprijs in 1992. In 1998 the great years were over. According to Lau, The Scene had become “a sort of variety show attraction.”
His answer was Marlene, an album that contained a gentler mix of poetry and melancholy – always that melancholy – than before. Singing lessons had made him a better singer, acoustic guitar work and even strings were new ingredients. The music press was convinced, but the public showed Marlene lie on the left.
Can happen. Stoicijns, Lau continued to follow his own path until the inexorable end. Throat cancer, metastases: in 2014 they were also harbingers of a formidable final chord. The public triumph included an Edison Oeuvre Prize, a piece of music (Platinum Blues), a novel (juliette) and an acclaimed performance at Pinkpop, curiously the first of The Scene in Landgraaf.
Death was already near when he wonderful interview gave to The Parool. Living and enjoying the day was his credo. He didn’t have to live at any cost. He declined chemotherapy. “I’m not going through all that misery to exist for two more months.” He continued to smoke and drink. ‘I enjoy life and haven’t felt this good in a long time.”
Thé Lau returned to his parents’ old tennis court in Mons – dissatisfied with his top spin back hand – and concluded that his illness had given him more than it had taken away. He passed away on June 23, 2015, the born musician who, to his own surprise, had become a well-known and beloved Dutchman in his last days.