Jackie Leven (obituary; subheading: Scottish singer and songwriter who drew on his wanderings to produce a rich stream of poetic and mysterious anthems)

Unsigned Times obituary. It presents Leven as an outsider with a 40-year career, masterly but neglected albums and labels such as “Britain's greatest lost rock star”. Biography according to the Times: father an Irish Cockney of Roma descent, mother from Northumbria; Kirkcaldy High School with Gordon Brown, whom Leven briefly outshone when he won the Scottish Round Table's national school essay competition – with an essay about his dream of setting out as a wandering musician. Expelled from school over drugs, from 1967 a decade of wandering through Britain, Ireland and western Europe, Control as John St Field recorded in Madrid “in the mid-1970s”. 1977 founding of Doll by Doll in a London squat; Gypsy Blood is said to have impressed David Gilmour, who then played on Grand Passion (1982). 1983 solo contract with Charisma/Virgin, assault after a night session at a studio in Islington, loss of falsetto, heroin, CORE Trust with Diana as patron. Diana is said to have persuaded him to return to music by urging him to sing backstage at an official engagement; 1994 Cooking Vinyl, over 20 albums, Sir Vincent Lone, Jackie Leven Said with Rankin, who chose Leven on Desert Island Discs. The whisky “Leven's Lament” was named after him by Islay Mist.