Steve was born in Dumfries in the South West of Scotland, on 30th May 1967.
Although Steve didn't pick up a guitar until the age of 12, he was surrounded by a very musical family, and was "force fed" the sounds of Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young, Jackson Browne etc, by his dad, along with the "joys" of Abba, The Carpenters etc by his Mum. This led to him picking up an acoustic guitar in his dad's house, a guitar he still has to this day, and strumming along to the songs on his dad's record player.
Steve was then inspired to buy himself a guitar chord book, and taught himself
to play. Strangely enough though, Steve's first live performance was
as a vocalist.
At the age of 13, he performed with his band "Prowler", in-front of 600 of his fellow Pupils, at a Dumfries Academy Bands night, singing Iron Maiden Covers, as well as original material, watched by his "then jealous" brother Ray.” His words, not mine”, says Steve. However, within weeks Steve was back on the guitar, playing alongside Ray, the new, lead vocalist, in a metal band named "Electric Mistress".
His first electric guitar was bought with his savings from his after
school supermarket job. "It was an Ibanez Roadster, sunburst colour,
took two years to pay back the money to my Aunt, and when Ray moved to Edinburgh,
I loaned it to him. He then sold it, to buy himself an acoustic guitar!! Before
leaving school, Steve played alongside Ray in several lineups, The End, Pynk
Gyn being two, and they played several gigs in and around Dumfries,
playing in pubs and clubs, long before they were old enough too legally drink
in them. When Ray left for Edinburgh in 1986, Steve found himself with no
band and
took a full time job in an art gallery.
However, 3 years later in 1990, Steve got a phone call from Ray inviting him to come to Edinburgh to join his new 2 piece band "Guaranteed Pure". Steve learned his trade doing countless gigs with Ray, and keyboard player Paul Holmes, touring throughout Europe. This continued until January 1994, when after endless touring and self financing 3 albums of original material, the band called it a day. Steve decided to take on the Guaranteed Pure name, and for the next 5 years continued gigging, with various vocalists, and guitarists.In 1999 however, he become involved in Cut_, writing 1 track and co-writing another with Ray. The album Millionairhead and a 2 month support tour with The Scorpions and Westernhagen to promote the album followed. Since then Steve has worked with Ray in his solo career, as his guitarist and backing vocalist, on full band and acoustic tours, across the UK, Europe and, more recently South America.
He played on Ray Wilson Live & Acoustic Album. Four of his songs appear on the "Change” album, released in 2003, and, & Ray Wilson Live, released in 2005.When Steve isn't working with Ray, he performs solo shows across Scotland.
Contact: steve@raywilson.net