Meet Luke La Volpe, the Bathgate singer taking the music business by storm and tipped to be as big as Lewis Capaldi

The singer/songwriter, who has just been announced as the support act for BRIT Award winner Tom Walker at the Caves in February, will also headline his own Capital show at The Mash House in the same month. However, with tags like 'tipped for the top' and 'one to watch' tripping from the tongues of those in the know, Luke himself proves an unassuming, down to Earth guy when we meet.

That said, less than a year ago he was still working in a warehouse, a job he was forced to quit in order to support Lewis Capaldi in Princes Street Gardens, last August.

He recalls, "Every day I was unloading lorries then filling them up again, wrapping parcels... I'd go in when it was pitch black and come out when it was pitch black after a 12 shift. It was horrendous, but until then they were always happy for me to do gigs.

"That month I had nine and the last two were with Tom Grennan and Lewis. They wouldn't let me off so I had to leave, it was a big decision but so far it's been alright, although I'm not loaded yet," he quips.

It proved the right decision when, the following day, he got a phone call from Capaldi's PR guru, offering to manage him. It was a life changing call he admits, "When I played with Lewis, I had it in my head that this was the last gig we were going to do as we weren't really going anywhere," he explains.

The 'we' he refers to are his band, "drummer Cobo, Eusky on bass and Ben on guitar".

He continues, "I thought, 'I've worked at this since I was nine, if we play Princes Street to 9,000 people with Lewis Capaldi and nothing comes of it, then what chance have we got...' and then something did come of it".

That call also left the singer with a dilemma, reveals Luke, who attended Balbardie Primary and Bathgate Academy. "I started as a solo act, but always had a session band, when the new manager came in he said he wanted to manage me but not the rest of the boys.

"It was quite awkward because he phoned me the morning after the Capaldi gig saying, 'I think you were brilliant I want to get involved in the management.' So I messaged all the guys saying, 'This is amazing' and everyone started going wild.

"After a couple of hours I got another call to say, 'I just want to make it clear, I want to manage you, not the band'. A few nights later I went to band practice with about 20 pages of things I wanted to say to the guys. It was emotional because in a way I was, not destroying their dreams, but adapting them... but at the end of the day, would you rather be playing the golf club every week or go onto bigger things. At the time I think they just thought I was a bit of a di*k but they're all happy for me now".

The good news is, he still has his band with him when gigging.

Luke inherited his love of music from his granddad, a singer in a military band. "My papa taught me how to sing when I was a wee boy. We'd listen to Sinatra, Dean Martin people like that," he says, but despite his love of music, Luke first made a name for himself as a boxer. "I boxed until I was about 16, when I got my nose all smashed up. I realised it was pointless unless I was going to be a champion, and I was never going to be a champion - I rather get a sore throat than a broken nose," he laughs.

If you're thinking that the name La Volpe sounds a bit exotic for Bathgate, you'd be right. Luke Gibson, to give him his real name, took his stage name from his "weird obsession with foxes", volpe being Italian for fox.

"I've kind of book-marked in my head that if I see a fox, it's good luck," he explains, "and now I see them all the time. If I pass a shop window and there's a cushion with a fox on it, I know it's a wee sign that I'm on the right path that day. It's weird. I just keep seeing them, like when I was in Rome I found myself in this street, it was Vicolo della volpe.

"I Googled it and found it meant Alley of the Fox, but apparently, while it's good luck to see a fox, if you see a white fox it is a bad omen. So anytime David Attenborough starts on about the arctic fox on the telly I turn him off," he grins, adding, "It's strange, but foxes follow me about, even at school I used to get called Foxtrotters because when I boxed they used to say that watching my feet in the ring was like watching someone doing the foxtrot".

As a singer, Luke landed his first proper gig at the age of 15 in a Bathgate venue called the Attic and he recalls, "All the young bands played there, actually that gig was with the lead singer of The Snuts and Lewis Capaldi and I was top of the bill, since then I've always been in wee sh*t jobs in the hope that there would be a manager somewhere along the way to whisk me away".

Which is exactly what happened when the tables were turned in Princes Street Gardens last year.

"That was the best day of my life. I felt like He-Man going on that stage," he beams. "The fact it was going to be my last gig was in my head and that was a bit sh*t but as soon as I walked on and stood in front of that crowd I knew, 'this is what I should be doing'. It came at the perfect time and the reaction after that on social media went crazy".

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the question has been asked, could Luke be the next Lewis Capaldi? the singer doesn't mind, but says, "The only comparison between us is that we both have powerful voices, we are totally different animals - he's a phenomenal ballad singer and my voice was once described as 'Frank Sinatra meeting Led Zeppelin' and a mix of everything from the blues to indie with a rolling stones vibe".

As his currency in the music business builds, Luke looks to the future with a dream of one day playing London's Royal Albert Hall, "I like playing venues where I can smell the history," he says, adding, "I want to be up with the greats, but it's never been about money because I lived half my life without any. It's about leaving a legacy through my songs. That's how I express my emotions and the things I can't speak about, through my music... I suppose I want to be like Johnny Cash, to die and be remembered through my songs".

Luke La Volpe, The Mash House, Guthrie Street, Saturday 29 February, 7pm, £11, www.ticketmaster.co.uk