A Maryport drummer is living it up touring with different bands all over the world.
Steve Jackson has been travelling across the globe playing with music icons and living a life he said he never thought would be possible.
From touring with 80s rock star Chris Holmes and being part of a documentary, to playing with top musicians writing music for film and television all while holding down a full time job – Steve said his life recently has been a whirlwind.
But it has never been about setting strict career goals for Steve, instead, he said it has all come from his love for music.
He said: “I’ve never had goals or targets, I’ve always just wanted to play music, I’ve just put myself in places that have led to how things are now.
“Someone once asked me ‘how long do you think you’ll do it for’ and I said, if Charlie Watts from Rolling Stones was still playing drums at 74 then I’ll do it for as long as I enjoy doing it.
“It’s quite a special thing to be able to travel and see new places and play and it’s a bit of a dream come true really.”
The Maryport lad, who works in the nuclear industry first started playing the drums at 10-years-old after he begged his parents for a drum kit.
He said: “I pestered my parents quite a lot apparently until I got one for Christmas after I turned 10. I had a couple of years with a teacher and he gave up teaching so I went from there and went on to do my own thing really.”
He continued to play drums throughout his school years and formed his first band AWOL in 2002, who he still plays with today alongside his band Heartbreak Remedy who formed in 2013.
Over the years, Heartbreak Remedy have supported several other bands which led to Steve meeting ‘Mean Man’ Chris Holmes, who played with W.A.S.P and LA based singer songwriter Zachary Kibbee.
Kibbee has written songs and music for TV shows including Daredevil, Agents of Shield and Lucifer as well as top commercials featuring stars like Jackie Chan and films including the Warner Brothers Scooby Doo.
Steve said: “Me and Zachary first met in 2017 and played loads of gigs together over the years and when I’ve been out in America we’ve met up and hung out and kept a close friendship over time.
“I’ve also known Chris for years because he used to play with W.A.S.P and some friends of mine were touring with him in 2017 and they needed a drummer for that tour because they were going to be supporting him.
“They were doing 16 gigs in 17 days up and down the UK so they asked if I would play with them and I said yes. Me and Chris spent a lot of time chatting as a result.
“I’ve spent a lot of time in LA where he’s originally from and we had mutual friends there and we got on really well. Later that year he phoned me up after his drummer left and asked me if I wanted to be his new drummer, so I said yeah, alright then!
“It was quite surreal to be honest, I didn’t really expect after all the years I’ve been playing drums to be doing something on the level I am and It’s a nice shock really.
“But that tour where I met Chris in 2017 I was in a bit of a rut at the time and I almost said no to doing it and if I’d said no to that, I would not be in the position I am in now.”
Steve did his first tour with Chris in 2018 playing all across the UK and Scandinavia and since then he has played with the band all over Europe and Canada.
He said: “It has been quite a fun ride so far, there’s been a few great shows, we played a festival in Vienna in an old abattoir which was unique and there was a guy there doing a documentary on Chris which is now on Amazon Prime called Mean Man – The story of Chris Holmes.
“When the documentary came out about Chris, Nikki Sixx from Motley Crue tweeted and said he’d watched it and I thought wow, that’s the main songwriter from my favourite band watching a documentary I’m in.
“It is surreal – I still work fulltime and fit everything around annual leave, I have to be really strict with what time I take off and making sure I can fit everything in that comes up. But I’m lucky to have a job that lets me do these things.”
More recently, Steve has been touring with Zachary and is getting ready to play two local gigs with Solomon, a four-piece heavy rock band based in Kendal, before he set sails on the Monsters of Rock Cruise at the end of April with Chris, travelling around Florida and the Dominican Republic.
Following the cruise, Steve will play a further gig with Solomon and one with his band Heartbreak Remedy before setting off on another UK tour with Chris.
He has also been endorsed by Natal who are connected to Marshall, one of the biggest amp companies in the world and Balbex – who provide him with drum kits and drumsticks, which Steve said was unreal to be supported by such big brands was quite something.
He said: “Music is a massive part of my life really, but it’s all about the interactions you get to have with people. No matter where you do, it doesn’t matter if you speak English or not, music brings people together.
“I remember playing with Chris in Czech Republic and at the end of the gigs Chris meets with fans and signs things and there was this guy there that didn’t speak much English and he met Chris and an album signed and he was crying.
“I went over to the person he was with and asked if he was okay and he said that where they had grown up was behind the Iron Curtain, so they weren’t allowed to listen to the music they played and that he was just so overjoyed that one of his favourite musicians was in his home town.
“It kind of blew my mind really, that although he didn’t really speak English, that person and music meant so much to him, which was a really nice experience to be honest.”
In addition to Steve’s packed schedule Heartbreak Remedy is also gearing up to release a new album, Let the Good Time Roll, on June 3.
Steve said: “We started recording in March 2020 right before Covid hit and a couple of week later everything shut down. It has 11 songs and a friend from Leeds did the mixing and it was all recorded in Music Farm in Egremont with Tom Tyson.
“It’s three years of work coming to an end really, we’re just in the last stages of sorting it now.”
Heartbreak Remedy will be playing the Solway Hall in Whitehaven on May 13 supporting Dress to Kill.
