Finish what ya started

Destin man hasn't let muscular dystrophy silence his Van Halen-style rock and roll music

By Wendy Victoria

 Destin - In the evening, Scott Landers perches on the fattest black recliner imaginable while his mom, Phyllis Landers relaxes on the couch.

She watches television. He jams on the deep red electric guitar propped on his lap, sliding his pale, slender fingers up and down it's narrow neck.

With a guitar in his arms, 35-year-old Scott is freed from a body that doesn't heed his commands. He is, almost, Eddie Van Halen.

From across the room, his music whines thinly up and down the music scale.

Through his headphones, it's full volume and he is transformed into a headbanger, complete with the jerks, twitches and facial contortions of a true performer.

"Sometimes he makes these noises like he's growling or something," Phyllis says. He gets into his music and he doesn't even realize that he's sounding out what he is feeling."

When Scott was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy, he was 18 and an aspiring musician in Nashville. His band, Blue Collar, took any and every gig it could get.

"We played some real dives," he recalls, laughing. "You play where you can when you want to be heard."

"We played strawberry festivals, crazy stuff like that. We never really got going. Basically we stayed in the garage a lot."

During the day, he worked at the Pizza Inn. After his diagnosis, his doctor made him give up his day job. The disease causes his immune system to attack his muscles.

His legs were the first to go.

"At first, I'd be able to stand and play," he says. "After a while I had to use a stool."

Life went on that way for a long time. Easygoing Scott shrugs and guesses at the dates. He played in the band until, maybe, about 10 years ago. Then, he stopped playing at all. No reason he says. Just didn't want to do it anymore.

Three years ago, his folks moved to Destin, bringing Scott with them.

Then last summer, his nephew visited and brought a guitar.

"I'm like, 'Let me see that thing.'" he recalls. "After I heard him play, I decided to buy a guitar again. I had gotten rid of all my equipment."

During the day, when his parents are gone, he is in his wheelchair and can't hold his guitar in the proper position to play. His arms are not strong enough anymore.

Instead, he gets on the computer, where he chats with other artists and promotes his music.

As soon as his folks get home, they move him into his chair, which is set up next to a table with all his other equipment. Using a hard disk recorder, he can play the bass guitar part of the song, then the lead and rhythm parts, then mix it together.

He works on his music four or five hours each night. The result is a collection of rock and roll instrumentals that sounds a lot like Van Halen's music.

Online reviews of his songs have been high. And he is currently talking online with other musicians who want to collaborate with him.

He's not one to complain about the way things were, all those years before he found his music again.

Life was fine then. It's nice now, too. Ok, maybe a little better now.

"It feels good," he says. "When someone listens to something that you do and says it's good."

"I believe in God and he had a plan for me and this is it. I don't know exactly what's going on, but I'm a laid back kind of guy."