Corey Stevens

Born in the small town of Centralia, Illinois, Corey Stevens never just says he is from Illinois. After hearing, “Oh, from Chicago?” a few too many times, he has learned the succinct way to put it: “I’m from Southern Illinois - an hour east of St. Louis.” St. Louis is where he saw his first baseball game and where he saw the Rolling Stones twice on the same day. He says, “St. Louis is where I went to and saw the huge crowds and came home with big dreams.”

But, Centralia was where he grew up, diligently honing his guitar playing and soaking up middle America. “My grandfather put my first guitar in my hands and the story has become well known,” says Stevens, referring to the liner notes of his second album, “Road To Zen. He continues, “But, the rest of the story is just growing up in a small town. I really liked it. All my friends complained of how boring it was, but, hey, it was where I was, and I made the most of it.”

Corey Stevens is a guy who likes to consider all the angles. Although his earliest influences were early rock and rollers like Chuck Berry, comics who played with words to make people laugh had a huge impact on him. When the British Invasion swept Stevens away like millions of others, the words moved him as much as the music. It may be for this reason that Stevens aspired to be a songwriter and not just another guitar player.

Stevens grew up in a tight knit family with two older sisters. He was the youngest child and only son of parents a high school girlfriend once labeled “Leave It To Beaver parents.” He says, “No matter how much I rebelled, and I raised a lot of hell, I always felt a connection with my family.” Thanks to his sisters who were listening to Rock and Roll, Stevens grew up assuming music was one of life’s necessities. He would soon find that simple insight to be his calling.

Stevens coasted through grade school and high school, making passing grades and not really showing any exceptional talent. “I was no prodigy by any means,” he says of his childhood days. “I just drifted from one fantasy to the next. One minute I wanted to be a professional baseball player then I guess I got the music bug. The Beatles came along followed by the Rolling Stones and that was it! The dream or goal just got redefined, but it hasn’t changed since I was a teenager.”

Stevens still remembers the moment when his life changed forever. In the early seventies, he jumped in his friend’s car with three buddies and headed to Evansville, Indiana for a music weekend at a minor league ballpark. He remembers, “It was late in the afternoon and bands had been playing all day. The set change came and the announcer brought on Ike and Tina Turner. Ike and the band started playing some cookin’ music without Tina, then the stage was completely covered in smoke. Suddenly, Tina and her back up singers appeared dancing out of the smoke! I said to myself this is what I want to do for a living. It was truly an epiphany! ” From that day on, Stevens ignored the odds and pursued the dream. He knew he had a long road, but he believed in a transformation that only time could unveil.

After graduating from Centralia High School, Stevens enrolled in college and decided on music as his major. In 1974, Stevens left home and moved to Carbondale, Illinois to attend Southern Illinois University. Stevens studied classical music and began an intense four year study of classical guitar. Stevens remembers, “I learned discipline and practiced two, three, four hours a day. I was a serious music student, but I still partied on the weekends and heard bands on the strip. Shawn Colvin was a local and played a lot. She was great! I also spent many nights listening to Big Twist and the Mellow Fellows. That band was great, too! I use to think all I got out of college was the beer and the blues in the bars. But, over the last few years I have begun to realize that the discipline and the music theory helped shape who I am now.”

After graduating from college, Daytona Beach, Florida was Stevens’ next pit stop. He went on a vacation and decided to stay. Stevens recalls, “Coming from the Midwest, Daytona was a paradise, but staying there would have meant giving up on my dream. There was never really a choice. I had to move to Los Angeles even though I knew it would be a dogfight and no one thought I would make a dent.”

In 1980, Stevens drove cross-country from Florida to California. He reached Hollywood with a mission and started meeting other musicians. He sums up his first days in Tinsel Town, “One afternoon, I was having a few drinks with my girlfriend and two musicians that I met in a bar called Filthy McNasty’s. They were telling me all the ins and outs, where to find auditions, the clubs, the behind-the-scenes, and I thought I was really getting my orientation into the Music Business. Suddenly, one of the guys got up and said he had to go to his day job at the 7-11. I had never heard the expression day job, but I got the gist of it…before you make it you still have to pay the bills.”

Stevens played in original bands and grew restless being a sideman. He worked on songwriting and played in a few cover bands for fun. He had developed a bad taste for the Hollywood club scene that he viewed as a misguided preoccupation with impressing the record companies and management firms. He says, “It was just such an uptight scene. I didn’t last long. I didn’t give up on my dream or the music industry, I just thought I had all the time in the world and regrouped.”

Eventually, Stevens would have two day jobs that not only paid the bills, but also put him on the path to success. First, he worked as a messenger and learned the lay of the land. The messenger job showed him enough of the industry to see how difficult it is to break in and how tight a click Hollywood can be. Stevens, not one to give up, made a plan. He realized that the messenger job had to go. He needed money to build a small four-track studio, buy equipment, and when he was ready, make 24 track demos. In the midst of hatching his musical career, an LA Times headline cried out to him. There was a teacher shortage and Stevens was looking for a job to back his career. Soon, he quit the messenger job and became a third grade school teacher for the Los Angeles Unified School District. He says, “I don’t want anyone to think I gave up on music and became a school teacher. I taught school, but I also practiced guitar, I wrote songs, and played gigs on the weekends. I was still a musician at heart, but I learned a lot being a teacher. The kids were a good influence on me. They are so honest and full of hope.”

The plan began to materialize in the late 1980’s when Stevens’ songwriting started to flourish. Living in a one bedroom apartment, he set up a four-track studio in a walk-in closet and began to sharpen his craft. He wrote “Blue Drops of Rain” and “Lessons of Love” and started getting interest from record companies. He dedicated himself to becoming the best songwriter he could be while juggling the teaching career and raising his daughter born in 1988. He started his own original band and used his teaching salary to pay for rehearsal halls and demos. Eventually the band showcased Stevens’ original material in Hollywood and just as before, Stevens quickly grew frustrated. He sums it up, “We did a show at what is now the infamous Viper Room which was the Central then. We called our friends, had about forty or fifty show up. But, when I called the club booker a few days later, I was Corey who? I read the writing on the wall AGAIN…the Hollywood scene was just not for me.”

Stevens amended his master plan. He dove into guitar playing with the same passion he had approached songwriting. He turned his songwriting studio into a guitar workshop and threw himself into learning blues guitar. He remembers, “When I regrouped and got into guitar, I turned my back on the music business and songwriting. I had written a batch of songs that I thought were valid and compelling, but the record companies passed. I had written “Take It Back,” “My Neighborhood,” and “Blue Drops of Rain.” Those three songs ended up on the radio in the nineties. At the time, I just thought I could keep writing songs, but for who?” As Stevens focused on guitar playing, the spirit of Robert Johnson invaded his thoughts. He wondered if he could disappear and reappear a “player,” a master of the blues guitar. He woodshedded the guitar with a renewed passion for making music, forgetting the superficial music industry and even his own songs for a moment in time. After months of hibernation from the stage, he got the urge to play out and began sitting in with bands. Using the E flat tuning of Stevie Ray Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix and others before him, Stevens found himself in awkward keys, but used the challenge to sharpen his skills even further. Soon, Stevens was ready to start another band and another journey. He did not know it, but his plan was coming together, even if he thought he had stopped trying. He started a band called Texas Flood and limited the playlist to Vaughan, Hendrix, Albert King, Freddie King, Buddy Guy and Muddy Waters.

By 1994, the band evolved into Stevens on guitars and vocals, Will MacGregor on bass and Dave Salinas on drums. Early in the year, Stevens, using his own money, placed a bet on the band and bankrolled an album that would become a classic, “Blue Drops of Rain.” The album captured a fleeting moment in time when Stevens, MacGregor, and Salinas would walk on stage in a small, smoky bar and entertain a riveted crowd with songs like “Lenny,” “Crosscut Saw,” or “Back In Time.” Ed Tree’s producing and Stevens’ originals would be the wild cards that proved to be aces. Stevens brought a number of songs to the sessions that the band had not been performing live that were perfect for the project. “The Brothers,” written about Gregg and Duane Allman was an instant fan favorite. But, the title track proved to be the compelling moment in the album showcasing Stevens’ bourbon drenched vocals, songwriting prowess and guitar hero chops. The years of hard work had finally yielded a complex exhibition of influences, in sound and lyrical use. Even a sense of humor popped up in Stevens’ choice of the Gary Tanner song, “Headshrinker.” To Stevens who had lived through the trials and tribulations of trying to make his mark in Hollywood, it sounded like he was rejoicing that he had kept it all together and had not lost his mind.

An independent label signed Stevens in 1995 and released “Blue Drop of Rain.” Although the year was not a huge success, Stevens saw the writing on the wall and in December quit teaching and said goodbye to his day job. In 1996, he toured seven months and made a video for the song, “Blue Drop of Rain,” which climbed the radio charts. The album was re-released on the independent label and Discovery Records and made the debut Billboard Blues chart.

In 1997, Stevens recorded his second album that yielded a top ten radio hit and video, “One More Time.” Other songs made it on the radio and Stevens hit the road in support. By the end of the year, Stevens had toured nine months, including a summer tour with Paul Rodgers and Lynyrd Skynyrd, and shared the stage with ZZ Top. The title track, “Road To Zen,” a heartfelt behind the scenes account of life on the road seemed to sum up Stevens’ new life.

In 1998, Stevens intended to take some time off to write, but ended up back on tour. Hitting the road in style, Stevens and his band finally got their dream ride, a Prevost tour bus. They played dates in the South and Midwest, setting the stage on fire just like the days in the small bars. While on tour, Stevens bought a house in Los Angeles. Returning home to California, Stevens experienced a brief interim of normality and reconnected with his family after nearly two and a half years of vans, airports, tour buses, green rooms and hotel rooms. The bus that picked him up early in the year now let him off at a new home in the Hollywood Hills. The four-track studio was no longer in the walk-in closet.

In 1999, Stevens continued to write songs at home in Los Angeles. But, his radio success had left a wave of curious fans eager to hear if he was the real deal. His loyal fans had experienced his shows and word of mouth spread. He developed a reputation for captivating an audience and performing his songs better than the records. Unable to stay home too long, Stevens maintained a busy touring schedule, but still managed to release his third album, “Getaway.” Stevens included a treasure in the song, “This Train,” which never made it to radio, but should have.

Stevens continues to tour, but says, “The last two years have been about getting back to being home for a change and being a normal guy. I spent so many years inside writing songs, inside on the phone, inside classrooms, inside hotel rooms, inside a van or a bus that I just needed a change. I escaped into golf, gardening, and my Tiki bar on my roof overlooking Hollywood. I just needed to be outside. I even bought a convertible. But, it’s time. The scales are now balanced and I need to get back to business.”

And back to business he has been. Stevens reacquired ownership of his first three albums and his publishing in a recent settlement with the label that he signed with seven years ago. He has completed a new studio album called “Bring On the Blues.” It is currently being mixed by Gary Hoey and features the same line up from the “Blue Drops of Rain” sessions, Will MacGregor on bass and Dave Salinas on drums. Stevens is also collaborating with DDR Entertainment for a DVD release of a live concert shot in 1997 titled “Road To Zen Tour.” Both are scheduled for summer release. Recently Stevens made a guest appearance on a new Canned Heat album that features his song, “Getaway.” Stevens’ blues guitar will also be found on Linda Stevens’ debut album scheduled to be released in the fall. -J.Cortez

:: Discography ::

- Blue Drops -
- Mean and Lean -
- Road to Zen -
- Bring On The Blues -

:: Contact ::

Website: http://www.coreystevens.com/
Email: mgmt@coreystevens.com