Someone said recently that in pop music terms Scotland was just a region. I think that’s probably true, or at least it’s factually true. London is a hub for international music. Scotland, other than the occasional signed artist who happened to be born here, isn’t on the scale.

I used to speculate that it could be otherwise. Now I don’t care. But for what it’s worth I still believe it’s a possibility that Scotland could be on the popular music map. We have a distinct and historic identity in other more important spheres: the law, the Church, politics and education. Why not music? Well the immediate answer is there are no players; no one with the entrepreneurial drive and self-belief to make hit records with relevant acts. Hit records are what the world of popular music is all about. The context that produces them has to be nurtured and championed by individuals. Here there are no such types; no Epsteins, Blackwells, Walshes, Watermans, Calders or Bransons; not even an up and coming Simon, a Fuller or a Cowell.

Without individuals who have the courage and confidence to speculate it won’t happen. Without the vision, determination and a capacity for risk; without the staying power to see projects through and the bottle to stomach possible failure, it just won’t happen. Someone might stumble across the odd success here and there like a fluke thing but regards instituting of a real scene - no, not without the key players.

And I’m not talking all that pretentious bollocks, that fey, poser thing that has often pervaded Scottish pop in the past. By that I mean these small-splash bands with their bloated self-importance, the Belle & Sebastians, Orange Juices and Aztec Cameras, or the likes of Postcard Records which was supposed to represent something super cool and credible. Fuck that! They took themselves and their music oh sooooooo seriously! The opposite of cool actually. Genuine cool is uncontrived, probably unaware. These folks were too self-conscious and therefore to me unconvincing. Okay, pop music in the modern setting is all contrived. As someone remarked recently “artificiality is in the nature of the authentic pop tradition”. But these people were really bad at putting on the act. You could see the joins too easily. They took their supposed hipness to heart and forgot they had to get a result; they had to sell records to be real players. If you’re chasing success in pop you play the part convincingly like on a stage and go for big hits. That’s the recipe. It’s not easy to achieve by any measure but that’s the game. Scotland, save for the few happy accidents, has never come close.

So in conclusion, what d’you do? Sell records, that’s what. Make music people want to buy, get it out there and sell as many as you can. Forget cool unless it’s natural. Never mind trendy or having cred. That will only stunt potential and is of little importance these days to what really matters.