Steve Stevens started playing guitar when he was seven and a half and was ripe for rock when he got his first electric at age 13.
“Up ’til then it was a lot of folk and classical,” Stevens tells Guitar Player via Zoom from his home studio in Las Vegas. “When I got an electric guitar, all the progressive-rock guys were using different styles — Robert Fripp, Steve Hackett, Steve Hillage… All these guys were creating stuff, trying to be as un-guitarlike as possible, or utilizing styles well outside of rock and roll — Chet Atkins in the case of Steve Howe, right?
“So I’ve never been a guitar purist at all. If I can muck-up the sound at all, I’m gonna do that.”
Stevens has certainly practiced that over the years, primarily with Billy Idol, but also alongside Michael Jackson, Robert Palmer, Vince Neil, the Cars’ Ric Ocasek and others, as well as his band with Terry Bozzio and Tony Levin. And let’s not forget that Grammy Award for the “Top Gun Anthem” from the hit film in 1987.
The stage is his home, too, as anyone who’s seen Stevens in concert — primarily with Idol — can attest. The pair, nominated this year for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, will do it again starting later this month in support of Idol’s new album, Dream Into It.
So it seemed like a fair time to ask Stevens to recount some past onstage landmarks — good, bad and, yes, ugly.
Best Gig
Stevens says Idol’s September 8, 1984 date toward the end of the triumphant Rebel Yell tour is “the one that was monumental.” It took place at the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Uniondale, New York. Stevens, who was born in Brooklyn and raised in Queens, considered it a hometown gig.
“All my friends were there, my parents, obviously, and a lot of the musicians I had been in bands with,” he recalls. “We had started that tour playing clubs, just like every other record I had done, and we were unaware during the tour that we were becoming an arena-rock band. The gigs just started getting bigger.
“I remember we moved from a van to a bus, then two buses. It was just happening, and we were along for the ride. I remember when management said, ‘You’re gonna end the tour at Nassau Coliseum.’
“I said, ‘Who are we supporting?’
” ‘No, you’re headlining.’
” ‘What?!’ ”
That night’s show opened with “Ready Steady Go,” one of three songs from Idol’s previous band, Generation X. It wrapped up with his hit version of Tommy James & the Shondells’ “Mony Mony,” with tracks from Rebel Yell and Idol’s self-titled debut in between.
“It was a helluva party,” Stevens says. “I’ve been so fortunate that all of the musicians I’ve played in bans with — cover bands, bands that struggled — they’re all happy with me. I never sensed any jealousy or anything like that.
“So Nassau was just a celebration, really a great vibe. Billy actually lived on Long Island for a while when he was a kid, too, so he had some family there, and it was just great.”
Worst Gig
“We were in Seattle on the Whiplash Smile Tour (May 15, 1987), and I had made plans to go to Jimi Hendrix’s grave that night, where he was originally buried before they moved him. The show was really rowdy — general admission, people tossing everything: disposable cameras, shoes and sneakers… And they loved us, that’s the thing. I never got that.
“Anyway, someone had made a bracelet out of a serrated knife and snuck it in. They tossed it at the stage and hit me right here” — he points to center of his forehead — “and just opened up a gash.
“Did it hurt? Fuck yeah! I’m still playing but I’m covered in blood. I can’t see, and Billy’s look at me like, ‘Yeah! That’s fuckin’ punk rock!’ (laughs)
“Afterwards, I got backstage and they stitched me up — two, three, four stitches.
“The thing I was most pissed off about? I wasn’t gonna get to see Jimi Hendrix’s grave. I was really looking forward to that. And now? No.”
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