Interview by: Mark Lacey
Photo Credit: Kerry Vincent
Paradise Alley’s Steve Vincent is one of rock n roll’s great survivors, having formed the band in 1992 just as grunge was about to change the musical landscape monumentally, with fashions largely turning away from glam and sleaze. Thirty years on Steve’s band has seen its fair share of ups-and-downs, and even more so in the last few months – but he remains undeterred – having just completed a successful UK tour with a renewed line-up, and his much anticipated new album will be available in November. The Steve Vincent Band are firmly back on the map.
MyGlobalMind.com sat down with Steve Vincent and bassist, ‘Ged’ Norris at HRH Sleaze
MGM: You’ve just played HRH Sleaze as the Steve Vincent Band. You last played here two years ago as Paradise Alley. The band got a great reception. How does it feel to be back?
Steve: It’s great. The last time we played HRH Sleaze was as Paradise Alley, which was two years ago. That was for our 30th anniversary, so it’s nice to be back as the Steve Vincent Band because that’s looking to the future.
MGM: Why have you decided to market yourselves as the Steve Vincent Band rather than Paradise Alley for this tour and album?
Steve: Basically, the whole solo project just started out of frustration with the old line-up of Paradise Alley during the pandemic. We were all supposed to be writing and recording for a new album, which we’d announced. So that looked good … and then nothing; just complete inertia. I kept submitting songs, trying to get them to give me ideas. I got a couple of really half-arsed things off the guys, but it was just taking months. In the end, before I knew it, I had half an album written and semi-recorded. I just thought, I’ve had enough of this because it’s like pulling teeth. It just developed from there. Originally, it was just a solo thing, but as a band, it’s just under my name.
MGM: Paradise Alley had quite a good run back in the early ’90s, until the musical landscape changed. Walk us through the history of the band.
Steve: I’d been doing stuff since the mid-late ’80s. I moved to London at the start of the ’90s and started Paradise Alley, and it just snowballed. At one point, we were touted as the next Hanoi Rocks. We were doing well. We headlined the Marquee, and we were touring the UK. We eventually got a deal in the States, and went over there a couple of times. It was a bumpy ride, but it was a hell of a ride. It’s the band I think most people link me with. I don’t regret any of it. And it’s still there. If people want Paradise Alley, we’ll go out and do a Paradise Alley show.
MGM: What’s happened to the original line-up of Paradise Alley. Is everyone still alive and kicking? And are you all still talking?
Steve: The original drummer, sadly, is no longer with us. He passed away in 2012. Ironically, years after he was living a very clean, sober life. But he just had health issues, and sadly, passed away. But everybody else is still alive and kicking. A lot of them are completely normal now, and have nothing to do with rock n roll. From back then, there’s myself, and there’s Spider Cullen, who was the drummer. He’s been over in Finland a number of years. He’s still doing his thing with rock n roll, but he changed from drums to singing.
MGM: Talk to me a bit about how the current line-up of the Steve Vincent Band came about? You had a bit of a challenge trying to find the right lineup this summer.
Steve: It happened under pressure.
Ged: And by accident.
Steve: When it first started, I was going to do an album, and put it out there. If people liked it, I was going to put a band together. At the time, a guy got involved on drums and he kept pushing, us to have a band. He wanted us to get out there. And it snowballed. We put a band together, and booked some gigs. We played one show, and then he promptly stole the band from me. He basically threw a temper tantrum over something completely innocuous, and nothing to do with the music. But he just wanted a lot of control. He wanted to control the music, and wanted ownership of the music. And I was like, no. I’m not going there. I write these songs. I’m not being selfish, but I’m not giving you the right to something that you didn’t have anything to do with. But he just suddenly threw a fit one day and quit the band and then expected to turn up at the rehearsal the next week. And it was like, no, it doesn’t work like that. I didn’t like behaviour like that when I was 18. I don’t like it now. We had a tour booked at the time. One of the dates back then was Sleaze. That was a couple of years ago. So, the band quit, and a mutual friend of mine called Ian who was a drummer I knew from back in the day, got in touch and said he could help out. He had a friend, who’s a guitarist, but said he’ll play bass and he’d be great for it.
Ged: The accidental bass player! Normally, I consider myself a guitar player. I collect guitars rather than basses. Ian used to come around and go, we might be getting involved in something, playing for this guy in Paradise Alley. I’m going, Hold on a minute. What’s the we? He says, oh, yeah, you’re playing bass. Am I? Ian was in Rag Dolls back in the day, and we started just jamming in a rehearsal studio. I ended up playing bass because Mike Dolls is an awesome guitar player, and I just joined them playing bass. The next minute, the three of us were part of it. Mike, unfortunately, had to drop out for personal reasons. But here I am, and I’m enjoying it.
Steve: It was all by accident. Then the guitarist had to drop out. And literally on the evening of the tour. Adam was recommended to us as a stand-in, and we literally had one rehearsal before that tour. And here we are two years later. Ian left at the start of the year. In the space of 24 hours, I had a phone call from Marc Valentine to do a tour with him. And then I got a phone call from Ian going, I can’t do it anymore. So, it was a bit of a curveball. But the three of us stuck at it. I’ve known our drummer, Russ for a number of years. Our path had crossed way back when I was in Paradise Alley in the early ’90s. The minute we walked in a rehearsal studio in Sheffield, the first thing we played was ‘Looking at You’, which we open up the set with. We just blasted through it and it was like we’d been playing together for years. I just remember finishing the song and just me, Ged, and Adam looking at each other. It just lifted us to that next level again. He’s very humble and he doesn’t realise how fucking amazing he is on drums.
MGM: How much of the Steve Vincent band set is solo material versus the traditional Paradise Alley stuff?
Steve: Well, there’s three new songs off the new album that’s coming out in October; “Baby, Don’t Cry”, “Stop Messing My Heart Around” and “Live for Today”. Then there are four songs off the debut album, “Recovered from My Past”. Then we do the Ramones song “Poison Hat”. I released that as an EP just after the first album came out. Then there’s three Paradise Alley songs in the set, which is “Looking at you”, “All fall down” and “I don’t care about you”. It’s nice because there quite a big catalogue to dip in, so we can always keep it refreshed and change things up a bit.
MGM: Ged, how familiar were you with Paradise Alley and the Soho scene in those early days?
Ged: I didn’t live in Central London, which is probably why I never crossed paths with Steve before. But for the best part of 30 years, I lived half an hour out of London. I was always up around that Wardour Street, Soho thing, but never crossed paths with Steve. Not knowingly anyway.
Steve: The St Moritz still looks the same. And Tiny’s still there behind the bar, which is lovely. It’s somehow survived. Gossips is now somebody’s basement flat, which is sad.
Ged: My favourite was the Hellfire Club on Oxford Street. My favourite memory of it is being in the queue outside and some guy walking up and down and telling people they weren’t getting in because they were dressed too normal. He’d see people in jeans and a denim jacket or something. And he’d go, no, you’re not glam enough.
MGM: You’ve touched on the new album. What can you tell us about that?
Steve: Well, it’s had a bumpy ride. Not as bumpy as the first album, but thankfully, we are back on track. Just before we came down for Sleaze, I got the last guitar tracks through. I’ve now got all the parts, and we’re going to start getting it mixed and mastered. And it should come out at the beginning of November. One of the things that drove the project originally was when the pandemic had kicked in, I was writing these songs and submitting them as Paradise Alley. I just thought, maybe I should do something with them. I played them to a couple of people. Steve Conti was like, I want to play on this. Then I had Bam and Steve James from the Dogs going, you’re really good at this shit. And Danny for the Wildhearts was the same. He played on the first album. As a teenager, I used to have these people on posters on my wall, and now I’ve become friends with them through years playing in bands and stuff. If they’re going, your songs are really good, I think I must be on to something.
MGM: HRH Sleaze has been a huge success, and this genre seems to be riding a new wave. Why do you think that is?
Ged: I think all music goes in waves. I remember 15 years ago, getting on a bus to go into town, and there were some young kids dressed with all the bandanas and all the regalia from 10-15 years before. There was a resurgence then. There’s a resurgence now. Seeing the young bands, particularly, and that young lad who was in the audience last night. It’s nice that younger people are coming through because then other younger people will get into it. My nephew was 16. I went down to his house and I’m going, I know that song. What is it? It took a while, but is was bloody Paradise Alley, and he’d gone and bought the album. He was playing it to his mates, and they’re going to come and see us.
Steve: I’ve never had a big fan of labels because to me, it’s just rock n roll. When I was little, like 3-4 years of age, I remember my uncle playing me stuff like Elvis and Little Richard. And growing up, watching the Sweet and things like that on TV on Top of the Pops and seeing the Dolls on the Old Grey Whistle Test and my dad getting upset at them. I was just thinking, this is amazing. The younger generations now are fascinated by that period and they’d love to capture it. But that was a lightning in a bottle moment. I’m glad to have been part of that, but I’m also quite proud of having the integrity that I’ve stuck to my guns. I haven’t followed fads. I remember the Soho scene, and everybody was suddenly cutting their hair off and wearing plaid shirts when grunge kicked in. I was still going down the Marquee and I still had my long, big, black-dyed hair. I’ve always stuck to my guns.
Ged: I think it’s got longevity to an extent because it’s just simple and it grabs you. That Stones vibe, you can move to it and it just gives you a good feeling. I’ve got friends who are into prog and that kind of thing. It’s just a bit harder to access. It’s a bit like jazz. But this is just good time. You’re going to have a couple of beers and you can sing along, like with the Quireboys, and the Dogs and stuff like that. I think that’s what will give it the edge over other styles.
Steve: The world’s so miserable, right now. I think if you’ve got something that makes you think, good times. That’s what you need to escape.
For more information:
https://www.facebook.com/stevevincentofficial/?locale=en_GB
https://paradisealley1.bandcamp.com/
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