James Stevenson Still Making Waves By Lee Sherman

It was midway into the band’s set at San Francisco modern rock station Live-105’s listener appreciation party before Gene Loves Jezebel guitarist James Stevenson realized he had left his Morley wah-wah/volume pedal on the wah-wah setting. The audience didn’t seem to notice Stevenson’s brief mutation into Jimi Hendrix – they were too busy swooning over their idols. 

The next morning at the band’s hotel a shame-faced Stevenson dealt with the difficulties this charismatic band had faced in getting taken seriously. For his part, Stevenson is a world-class guitarist whose killer rifts (the basis for such songs as “20 Killer Hurts,” “Jealous,” and “Josephina”) are what keep the Jezebels from drifting into the clouds. His staccato, effects-laden playing balances lead singer and lyricist Jay Aston’s more ethereal vocals in a classic combination reminiscent of Jimmy Page and Robert Plant in Led Zeppelin. 

On Heavenly Bodies, their new album on Savage records, the band achieves a musical legitimacy that will surprise and delight those who think of these darlings of the alternative music scene as lightweight. Not coincidentally, it also is the band’s most guitar-oriented record to date. Even Aston has pulled out a 12-string acoustic on a few tunes. 

James Stevenson cut his musical teeth in the English punk scene of the late Seventies at the age of 16 as guitarist with the group Chelsea. “In 1977 the whole punk thing happened,” he recalls. “It meant that if you could play A. D. and E. you could be in a band.” 

A host of three-chord wonders appeared and just as quickly disappeared as punk faced but the real guitar heroes of that period – people like Stevenson and Mick Jones of The Clash – are still making waves in the 90s. Stevenson’s career includes brief stints with pop singer Kim Wilde and the last incarnation of Generation X with Billy Idol. It was Stevenson’s electric playing that enlivened the original version of “Dancing With Myself” and foreshadowed the combination of dance rhythms and hard rock guitar that he has perfected in Gene Loves Jezebel. Stevenson joined the band in 1985, taking charge of its somewhat flighty musical direction. “I think what a lot of people have missed about this band is that we are a rock band of serious caliber,” he says. 

For Stevenson, the creativity comes in combining the versatility of the electric guitar with the programmability of various rock-mounted effects. He also regularly experiments with using other kinds of stringed instruments such as the sitar and mandolin. He plays an active role in coming up with new sounds, which he labels with descriptives like “machine-gun mayhem.” 

A structured player who carefully works out the parts for a song, Stevenson turns up his nose in disgust at what passes for a guitar virtuoso these days. “You can tell they’ve been sitting at home trying to play as fast as they can. They’ve achieved what speed-typists have achieved,” he says. “To me that’s just nonsense. What’s the point? It just doesn’t groove. That’s not what guitar playing is about for me. It’s about creating a great part for a song.” 

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