Jay Aston’s Gene Loves Jezebel is currently zigzagging the United States as part of a package tour with The Alarm and Modern English. These dates represent the most extensive roadwork from the Welsh band in many years. In part supporting its latest album, Dancing Underwater, as well as reclaiming its rightful place among bands that first emerged in the 1980s (Love & Rockets, et al.).
Frequently categorized as a gothic band among peers such as The Cure and Bauhaus, Gene Loves Jezebel’s music is, in truth, much harder to pigeonhole. The group remains one of the most stylistically and lyrically enigmatic of its kind.
Though Gene Loves Jezebel never quite became the darlings of MTV some had hoped it would, the band nevertheless maintained a loyal following across the globe. A lawsuit filed against Aston by his identical twin brother, Michael, requires that the outfit be known as Jay Aston’s Gene Loves Jezebel in the United States.
Jay Aston’s version of the band, currently on the road with Modern English and fellow Welshmen, The Alarm, features James Stevenson (guitars), Pete Rizzo (bass) and Joel Patterson (drums). The group performs at Liberty Hall in Lawrence on Saturday, August 10. (See wider tour dates below.)
Aston recently spoke with KMUW about the band’s history and future.
Interview Highlights
How has this tour been going?
It’s been a gas, really, to quote a hippie saying.
Have you done dates with The Alarm and Modern English before?
Mike [Peters, The Alarm] has opened for us acoustically. We played with Modern English very early on, before anyone had ever heard them or us for that matter, when they were first signed to 4AD. I’ve played with Mike acoustically as well and Jay Stevenson, our guitar player, often plays with The Alarm.
This is the Wales Across America tour, I guess.
[Laughs.] It’s unusual, in my experience to have so many Welsh people together on the road. It’s quite nice. We’re in the majority for a change!
You have a broad discography. How have you selected the material for the shows? Are there things that you know you have to play? Do you have things where you say, “I’m just so burned out on playing that” or “Whether I’m burned out or not, we gotta play it”?
[Laughs.] There’s definitely a bit of that involved, yeah. Our set is about 40 minutes. There’s obvious songs we have to play. “Desire,” for instance, but then there’s songs that we love to do, like “Break The Chain.” That’s not so well known in the U.S. “Motion of Love” is one we get asked to play a lot. “Jealous” was a big rock hit out here. “Twenty Killer Hurts” is a very powerful song. “Gorgeous” is one that we haven’t been able to put in because we haven’t got long enough in the set.
We’re used to playing for an hour-and-a-half and we’re used to having freeform sections in songs where none of us know exactly what’s going to happen. We haven’t had time to do that on this tour. We keep the songs short and sharp. But when people want to hear a song and they react to it, we don’t mind because they end up singing most of it anyway.
I’m sure that if you encounter fans after the show there are questions about the deeply obscure B-sides.
Sure. “Why don’t you play ‘Last Year’ or ‘Live Without Love’?” But we have been playing acoustic sets and done a tune called “Tomorrow’s Colours,” which I co-wrote with Peter Rizzo. When we get Experience sets it’s fun to play really obscure things in that context. You’re talking about a handful of people. It’s very intimate, a pre-show thing that’s working very nicely.
When was the first time that you came to the U.S.? Was it with the band or on a family vacation?
We came here first to work with John Cale and he lived in New York. He wanted to produce us away from Wales. We ended up doing a few gigs at Danceteria. That was it. We really had no intention of coming back. We saw the U.S. as Ronald Reagan country. In our little anarchistic minds in those days we didn’t need to come here.
We had a big tour of Europe, a big tour of Italy. There was a big soccer match in Liverpool [c. 1984] with a victory over Roma in which the fans rioted and I think 34 Roma fans died. We were due to leave for Italy the next day. We were advised by the foreign office of our record company that no British band should tour at this sensitive time. We ended up going to New York and a small label called Relativity which mostly dealt with heavy metal bands picked us up. Suddenly 20 dates turned into 60 dates.
Then we found out how wonderful so many Americans are. It wasn’t all bluster and all right-wing.
You travel around the world. Do you try to make yourself aware of the politics where you’re going?
It’s risky. I’m the kind of person who has to speak his mind. I get into trouble sometimes. I do look into things deeply before I open my mouth but when I do open my mouth I know what I’m talking about. You better if you open your mouth, wherever you are. I’ll always be on the side of the under-privileged. The disenfranchised. It’s part of my working class roots. My dad was the leader of his local union, my mum was very egalitarian in working class Wales. We were taught to be aware of the fact that the world isn’t fair and that you should try to help people who aren’t as well-off as you are.
If my music doesn’t do that directly, it does it metaphorically. There’s a song on the new album, Dance Underwater, called “Cry For You.” It’s a song that Peter and I wrote about Brexit but you’d never guess it from the lyrics. You’d get it if I told you. But I try to keep music as an escape. There’s a lot of romanticism in our music, mysticism, probably. Every song’s real, about someone I know. But outside of that, if someone asks me my opinion, I’ll tell them. I’m as entitled to my opinion as anybody.
Do you feel that your working class roots shaped your work ethic with the band?
We tend to stick together. I met guys in L.A. who were in five different bands. I thought, “How can you be in five different bands?” I think Mike Peters and the guys in Modern English would agree with that. The Modern English guys are basically the same guys I played with in the early ‘80s. It’s us against the world.
In our band, we don’t all agree politically but we’re great friends and we respect each other’s opinion.
You mentioned Dance Underwater. What was it like to get back into the studio and make that record after having a bit of a layoff?
We had a long layoff. One of the main reasons, apart from what’s happened in our lives and my life, is that the music industry has collapsed. There wasn’t money to make the kind of records we wanted to make. We always get together to play a few times a year and always have a great time. A few years ago, the guys said, “We need to make an album.” I said, “Yeah, it’s going to cost a lot of money to do the album properly.” Then Pete said, “I’ll get it together.” We got memorabilia, sorted out some bits and went through Pledge Music. We made a great record in a first-class studio with a great producer, Peter Walsh, who’d done some of our best albums.
It has to feel good to come back with an album like that and have the audience there to hear it.
We have a following around the world that still supports us so that we can do that. The most important thing for us was to make a great record. I’ve heard so many records where the singer can’t sing anymore. The playing’s not there. The production’s not there. They’ve recorded it in the bedroom. It was important to have something you could play alongside the best of our records and say, “Oh my God. That’s Gene Loves Jezebel!” Or, in the U.S. Jay Aston’s Gene Loves Jezebel!
[Laughs.] It’s a little early to maybe talk about it but have you thought about another record?
I’m a songwriter. It’s in my bones.
Jedd Beaudoin is the host of Strange Currency. Follow him on Twitter @JeddBeaudoin.
Jay Aston’s Gene Loves Jezebel Tour Dates:
August 9 Denver, CO Oriental Theater
August 10 Lawrence, KS Liberty Hall
August 12 St. Louis, MO Delmar Hall
August 14 Minneapolis, MN Fine Line
August 15 Milwaukee, WI Turner Ballroom
August 16 Chicago, IL House of Blues
August 17 Detroit, MI St. Andrews
August 18 Cleveland, OH House of Blues
August 20 Portland, ME AURA
August 21 Boston, MA Paradise
August 23 Huntington, NY The Paramount
August 24 Jim Thorpe, PA Penns Peak
August 25 Falls Church, VA State Theatre
August 29 Asbury Park, NJ Asbury Lanes
August 30 Staten Island, NY St. George Theater
August 31 Philadelphia, PA The Keswick Theater
Sept 1 Norfolk, VA Norva
Sept 3 Charlotte, NC Neighborhood Theatre
Sept 4 Atlanta, GA Masquerade
Sept 5 Orlando, FL The Social (The Alarm/Jay Aston’s Gene Loves Jezebel only)
Sept 6 Bonita Springs, FL Southwest Florida Event Center, Fort Meyers
Sept 7 Miami, FL The Ground at Club Space
Sept 8 St. Pete, FL Ferg’s Concert Courtyard
