David Lee Roth flew to New York, and we met where I was living... But I said 'I'm not going to bail on Whiplash Smile'": Steve Stevens Talks 'Dream Into It,' New Signature Guitar, Turning Down DLR & More | Interview

Steve Stevens Talks 'Dream Into It,' New Signature Guitar, Turning Down David Lee Roth & More | Interview

When Steve Stevens burst onto the scene in the early 1980s alongside his legendary musical partner in crime, Billy Idol, he quickly established himself as one of the most distinctive voices on the guitar. From his iconic riffs and genre-bending solos to his continual evolution as a player, Stevens remains at the cutting edge of rock guitar across the decades.

Now, with Billy Idol's long-awaited new full-length album, Dream Into It, out worldwide, Steve sits down with Guitar Interactive's Jonathan Graham to talk about the making of the new record, his latest signature six-string, working on those early Billy Idol albums, and why he once had to turn down a gig with David Lee Roth.

Steve, 'Dream Into It' is a fantastic album. It's been a while since you dropped a full-length release. What made you and Billy feel like it was time to do another one?

Well, Billy says that he has to do as much press for an EP as he does for an album, so he might as well just put an album together. I think also, you know, we had developed a really good working relationship with Tommy English, the producer of the album. We had written with him before, and he had actually produced a couple of tracks. We thought, "Oh, it was really fun working with him. Let's try doing a whole album."

The new tracks balance that classic Billy Idol vibe while still sounding very fresh. Was that a consideration when it came to the writing process?

Well, I think that, yeah, it was, and it's also the result of working with younger producers. Also, we had a couple of great co-writers that we worked with—Nick Long and Joe Janiak. Billy and I pretty much work—our songwriting process has never changed. We sit in a room with a couple of acoustic guitars, and it starts with maybe a little bit of a therapy session, like, "What's going on in each other's lives?" But it's great to get this new energy, and these guys work very quickly. We were able to accomplish a song a day, so we kept the adrenaline and the excitement up, working quickly—not laboring on things too long. If something was good, it stuck, and if it wasn't, it got thrown out immediately. It was really a lot of fun, I have to say—really, really good fun.

Billy and yourself were both into very different styles of music when you first met. Do you feel that clash of styles led to you creating your unique sound?

Yeah, I would say, yeah. I mean, the thing is, you know, Billy had done three records with Generation X, had moved to a new country. I definitely got the impression that he wasn't looking to continue that, you know? And he had started working with Keith Forsey, his producer, who came from the Giorgio Moroder camp, doing Donna Summer's records. The EP that he did before I joined—the "Don't Stop" EP—was definitely not a punk rock record, although "Dancing with Myself" was on there. But "Dancing with Myself" is not really punk rock; it's just great rock. Reminds me more of, like, glam rock—Sweet, you know, things of that nature.

But then when we started to talk, I made no bones about the fact that I was a fan of Jeff Beck, Jimi Hendrix, all that stuff. But I was particularly bored by 1977 with what was happening in prog, and I had started to listen to—I remember Devo. I was a huge Devo fan because it seemed to me that they were taking technology and doing it in such a cool, unique way. Then I loved Elvis Costello, The Jam, and XTC was a big one for me. I thought they had tinges stylistically of almost Steve Howe, but wrapped up in a different way.

Then when Billy turned me on to John McGeoch from Siouxsie and the Banshees, I went, "Oh!" I think I had the conversation with him and said, "Look, I can play anything that a song's going to require stylistically. I've got a background of folk and even flamenco." I said, "I think it's going to suit you better to have somebody who has capabilities for any idea, rather than you always having to push someone. It's better to siphon the goody—maybe I throw out too many ideas, but at least you can pick the good stuff." I think that's what we were able to do, and certainly with "Rebel Yell," I think we kind of went, "Oh, okay, I can see how this could work."

What was the first track you worked on together?

When we first met, it would have been "Dead on Arrival," which was on the first record—a pretty basic rock thing. Then we started to delve into things like "Hole in the Wall," using a lot of echoes. By then, I was listening to a lot of the Andy Summers stuff and, you know, delay lines and things like using delays. I think this is even before YouTube, but I had gone to see The Police and I was just knocked out with what they were doing, so I was using a lot of effects and things. I think Billy liked that.

How long into the sessions before "White Wedding" appears?

"White Wedding" was the last song written for the first album. We didn't have a single, and they locked Billy and our producer, Keith, in the studio and said, "You're not coming out; you can stay there all night until you come up with a single." I remember about nine in the morning, at my hotel—we were recording in Los Angeles—and it's Billy with a boom box. He's got the cassette of his demo of "White Wedding," and he goes, "I think I did it. I think I got the single."

What was your reaction when you heard the demo?

Oh, it was fantastic. All the elements were there—the spaghetti western guitar motif, although I embellished on it, but it was there. That's the thing for me: if you have a song that has a great concept, it's like a great meal for me, because I can really paint with a lot of colors around that.

Can you talk us through some of the gear that you're using on this new album?

Yeah, primarily, the majority of the record was recorded in Los Angeles. I live in Las Vegas, so the guitars that I brought with me were mainly my NAG Signature SSC guitar, and I have one gold top that has the Jimmy Page wiring in it, so you can get out-of-phase, coil-tapping, all of this. It's like the Swiss Army knife of guitars, so any sound that I needed, I could get out of that guitar.

Tommy English had a number of guitars that I used. He's got a beautiful old Martin from the '50s that I used for the acoustic stuff. Then, I did some of the heavier guitar things at my studio at home in Vegas, and that would have been any one of my NAGs guitars—my NAGs. The current model is the SSC, the Steve Stevens Classic.

Are we talking all Friedmans then, amp-wise?

Exactly. My Friedman Signature amp, and also the Friedman BE. Some guitars we really wanted heavily treated, because I was the first to say, "Let's not put a lot of keyboards on here; let me try and take the role that a keyboard would be doing by manipulating the guitar in Pro Tools with plugins and things." Some guitars were recorded direct, and we used some amp sims. I'm a big fan of the Neural amp plugins; they're fantastic.

You have a brand new signature guitar with Ciari, which is a very interesting pro-level travel guitar—what can you tell us about it?

Yeah, I mean, it's not a gimmick. The technology that goes into this thing is mind-bending, but I think the way that working musicians operate these days is very different than it used to be. It used to be that you'd do recording, then go on the road, then come off the road and write. Now it's more intertwined.

So, I have a little recording setup with me in the hotel room, and I'm able to record album-quality guitar tracks while I travel with this guitar. It fits in a backpack; it goes under the seat of a plane. My model has coil taps, so you can get anything from a Tele sound, a bit of a Stratty thing, to a Les Paul out of this guitar. It's really cool. And of course, the ray gun logo—the light-up ray gun.

And you're not just playing this in the dressing room or in hotel rooms, right? You're taking this on stage?

Oh, absolutely. It sounds fantastic. We've got Bare Knuckle pickups in there, designed for this guitar specifically. I always try and tailor the pickups to the guitar, and I think we did a really good job with these.

On the acoustic side of things, you've been using the Godin models for years and years now. How did you get turned on to those guys?

When I decided to do my Flamenco A Go-Go album, I was just embracing some technology. I was listening to Massive Attack and Propellerheads and thought, "Wouldn't it be great to combine a nylon guitar with loops and things?" I read about this nylon guitar that could track MIDI and was at the NAMM Show. I knew it was Godin, so I went to the booth, met Robert—or "Robair," as they say—and said, "I'm a guitarist for Billy Idol. I'm getting ready to do a nylon guitar album, and I heard you have a guitar that can track MIDI." I already had a great relationship with Roland, so I got the latest guitar synth, picked up the Godin, and I was off and running.

In the past, when you've described your tone as having sharp, defined edges...could you explain or expand a little bit more on what you mean by that?

I've never been a fan of mushy tones. My taste—even with Jimmy Page, The Yardbirds, or The Kinks—is for guitar sounds where you can really hear where the note starts and the tonality of the note, rather than just covering things up with distortion.

I learned early on that the cleaner you can get your guitar sound, the better the recording quality. Let the riff or the tune carry the power. My first pro setup was Hiwatts, and I was a big Pete Townshend fan. My cover band did a lot of Who stuff, and I think that kind of got ingrained in me—that Hiwatt big, clean sound.

Sometimes, if the amplifier is too distorted, you can't play thirds in your chords. You can only play root, fifth, root, because when you start adding thirds into the chord, it starts to sound weird if it's too distorted. So, I like to have a sound that's clean enough to get thirds and sevens and ninths into the chord, so I can create harmonic textures—not just power chords.

Think of The Beatles—why they're harmonically so rich: those clean sounds enabled them to play beautiful chords. Even Hendrix, for the most part, had a pretty clean sound for chordal stuff. I try to have an aggressive rock guitar sound, but clean enough to play complex chords.

Is there any chance we'll hear another instrumental album from you?

I always come around to saying, "Yeah, I'd love to do something that was a classic rock guitar album." But it's hard for me to work without a singer, because I'm spoiled. I've worked with the best—from Robert Palmer and Michael Jackson to Billy Idol. My standards are really high for singers.

Yeah, I mean, I don't know. I guess because I don't listen to a lot of other—other than Jeff Beck. If Jeff did an instrumental record, I was the first to get it. Satriani and Vai have carved out that instrumental guitar record in such a great way, but a lot of them really bore me, and I'm just so fearful of doing that. I want people—when you think of Blow by Blow, people can enjoy that record whether they know anything about guitar or not. So, I think a guitar instrumental record has to be enjoyable to people who really don't care about guitar. That's the litmus test for me.

When I did Memory Crash—that was my last instrumental record—I found it really hard to do. When it came time for my guitar to play the melody, I hated it. I was like, "Oh, this could be so much better if there were words."

Over the years, have there been projects and collaborations you've had to turn down?

David Lee Roth, yeah, but I was still in Billy Idol when he came calling. He flew to New York, and we met where I was living. I was three-quarters of the way through the third Billy Idol record, Whiplash Smile, and I said, "I'm not going to bail on the record. I'm already committed to the record and the tour."

I would have done it because I was already friends with Eddie Van Halen. I'd performed at NAMM with him, but I was really quite fearful of that comparison—being compared and filling those shoes. Steve Vai was exactly the right guy, because he had such technical ability to cover that and also make his own statement. He was the right guy for that gig.

Is there any music you and Billy have recorded over the years that hasn't seen the light of day?

Yeah. When Chrysalis Records, his label, folded, and his contract was picked up by Capitol, we actually did a record that was never released, produced by Glen Ballard—who did Alanis Morissette. That album is still out there. It was Glen's idea to recreate Elvis Presley music. It was all upright bass, and it was ill-fated. It just was the wrong idea, so fortunately it never came out.

Looking back over your entire career, is there a track that you're most proud of?

"Eyes Without a Face," because I think it encompasses everything a great Billy Idol song should be. It's a beautiful melody, it's got this great melancholy to it—which I love—and then explodes in the middle with this wild, heavy rock guitar, and then this sonic blast of a solo. So, it's got everything. I never tire of playing it, and it's got so much drama to it. That's the thing that draws me to Billy—he loves a bit of drama. On this record, the song that opens the record—people said, "That's an unusual song to open a record with." But we love the drama. We look at it as a movie, and that's the way I look at this record—it's really a movie about Billy Idol.

You have an incredible knack for writing opening riffs that are so distinctively you. What are three other great opening riffs from other artists that have that type of impact on you as a listener?

Oh, wow. I mean, there's always the obvious, and anything Jimmy Page did is written in stone as far as rock riffs. Hendrix always had that gift too. "Siberian Khatru" from Steve Howe with Yes is a really good opening riff. It's kind of funky, but it's unique to him. The "Wanton Song," Led Zeppelin—sure, it's two notes, but it's so amazing. I have to throw Jimmy Page in there. There's also a really good Allan Holdsworth one—I don't know the title, but it's on Tony Williams Lifetime. I'll send the title to Kent so he can pass it along. It's so metal, and you wouldn't expect it coming from Holdsworth, but it's a great rock riff.

Steve, as a guy from New York, what did it mean to you playing at the top of the Empire State Building? That must have been pretty incredible, right?

Yeah, incredible. I've actually never been in that building. I grew up in New York, but to go up there and see all the boroughs—the five boroughs—from one vantage point, pretty amazing. I should have done it a long time ago, so it's great—absolutely great.

Regarding this year's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction results—is it something that you lose much sleep over?

No. When we were nominated, my answer was, "Well, I still have to clean my cat's litter box and take out the garbage every Tuesday. It's not going to change that." It's nice to be nominated. It was nice that I was nominated with Billy, but I do believe that Billy Idol will get into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame—he should be in. But I'm genuinely happy for the artists being inducted. They are deserving of it. Last year, we were able to help induct Ozzy into the Hall of Fame. I think for everyone that complains about it, they do go out of their way to honor the real forebearers of rock and roll, the early guys, the blues guys. I think they're trying to do the right thing. Who knows, maybe next year.

Billy Idol’s latest album 'Dream Into It' is out now worldwide via Dark Horse Records / BMG. For more information on guitarist and co‑writer Steve Stevens, visit  stevestevensguitar.com