Eddie St. James

Edward Vincent St.James
Born 1962
Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, United States
Genres Heavy metal, glam metal, hard rock
Occupation(s) Musician, songwriter, music teacher, sound engineer, record producer
Instruments Guitar, vocals
Years active 1984 - present
Labels Capitol / Edel / Clearaudio / Seagull-Semaphore / Mega Media
Associated acts Northstar/Eddie St.James Project/ Jon Dunmore Band/ Richard Grieco / London/ Eddie St.James/ Trance
Website www.eddie-st-james.com / www.myspace.com/eddiestjamesband

Eddie St. James (born August 1962) is a guitarist, singer and composer–arranger born in Hollywood, California and raised in and around the L.A. area (resides in the Rheinland-Pfalz–area of Germany ). He is most noted for his work with many well known musicians. Some of the guitar, vocal and songwriting work he has contributed can be heard on his first solo release Out of Nowhere (Capitol records-1989).[1]

Biography

Northstar / Eddie St.James Project

It all began in the early 1960s, as a young child after hearing and seeing one of the first legendary live The Beatles performances on The Ed Sullivan Show. Soon afterwards at the age of 8 years, Eddie had the guitar in his hands and at age 15 began to perform at friends' birthday and garage parties as he gathered his first experiences and honorary. In the mid 1980s, he joined a local glam metal act called "Northstar“,[2] a band that during the height of the Hollywood Sunset Strip era opened for such groups as: Great White, Warrant, Poison, Guns N' Roses, etc. The group also achieved status as a headliner at all the well known clubs such as Gazzarri's (where The Doors and Van Halen got their start), The Roxy, The Country Club, and The Troubador, etc., but failed to generate a lucrative record deal. In 1989, he began a solo career with the "Eddie St. James Project" as well as doing some studio work for other artists; this same year saw the release of the Capitol supported album Out of nowhere.

Projects / Studio Sessions / Move to Europe

By 1991, St. James reformed the band with Steff Fontaine, Marc Droubay[3] and Wayne Hutsell. The band played a few dates with changes occurring in the line-up and even opened for Lynch Mob (George Lynch, guitar ex-Dokken) on part of the wicked sensation tour and shortly thereafter the "ESJ project" dissolved. St. James is also an ex-member of the Jon Dunmore Band and performed on two Jon Dunmore CDs – Hypnotica (ClearAudiorecords-1994)[4] which also features performances by Kelly Keagy (drums: Night Ranger), Phil Soussan (bass: ex-Ozzy Osbourne, Vince Neil, Billy Idol, etc.), Mayron Grombacher (drums: Pat Benatar), Bobby Gianetti (bass: ex-Edgar Winter, Dave Mason) and Kris Gustofson (drums). In 1995 Eddie worked concurrently on the second Jon Dunmore CD entitled Baptized by fire (Seagul/Semaphore records-1995),[5] while also at the same time contributing guitar and backing vocals for the actor Richard Grieco (actor: 21 Jump Street, A Night at the Roxbury etc.) CD- Waiting for the sky to fall (Edel records-1995)[6] Some previous members of the Eddie St. James Band include: Steff Fontaine (vocals, ex-Uriah Heep), Marc Droubay (drums: Survivor), Bobby Gianetti (bass) and Wayne Hutsell (bass: ex-Swift kick, Tracy G.(Dio)). In 1998, Eddie was also shortly involved as guitarist with American singer/ songwriter Mark Pont, previous frontman for Bo Donaldson & The Heywoods (whose hits include "Billy Don’t Be A Hero" and "Who Do You Think You Are“), on the independently released CD Flying. In an interview, St. James stated that he moved to Germany with just $250 in his pocket, 1 suitcase full of clothes and 3 guitars and nothing else.[3] Since 1996 the area of Mannheim / Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany has become his home base and to date, Eddie continues with his solo career and is currently fronting his own group "Eddie St. James" as lead vocalist and guitarist. The ESJ Band makes regular live, TV and radio appearances in Europe. The group was even featured at the FIFA Soccer WM2006 in Kaiserlautern, Germany- in the main stage programm along with Reamonn, Xavier Naidoo and Revolverheld, etc. Eddie also does a one-man acoustic rock show called "Eddie St. James' Akustik-Underground".

London Pt.1

As of June 2006, Eddie also became the new guitarist–songwriter for the newly reformed infamous L.A. hard rock band London (heavy metal band) alongside Nadir D'Priest (vocals).[7] The "New" London is currently working on song demos for a new CD as well as some live dates in the US and Europe in 2007. St.James was involved as a songwriter in conjunction with the singer Nadir D'Priest during 2006-2007 and due to scheduling conflicts unable to work in person with the group. Some of the duo's compositions are now being showcased by the group as stipulated in a U.S. on air radio interview by the singer Nadir D'Priest.

Con't Solo Releases

In 2009 (newspaper: Rhein Pfalz, Germany)reported Eddie is working on a new „ESJ" -CD in L.A., Ca., entitled "Streets Cry Freedom" with drummers John "JR" Robinson, (Michael Jackson-etc.) and Bernie Pershey (Edgar Winter, Walter Trout), along with Spencer Sercombe (Shark Island / Michael Schenker) and Hagen Grohe (Joe Perry Project) [8] in Co-Production with Michael Leukel. The CD-„Streets Cry Freedom“ was officially released in Europe in Dec.2013 and worldwide in Jan.2014,[9] with international distribution through PhonoNet Europe.

London Pt.2

In late August 2015 Eddie was contacted by none other than Nadir D'Priest and asked to help out as co-wroter and guitarist on the new and forthcoming London album, which also includes such luminaries as: Chris Sanders (Lizzy Borden, Britny Fox), Ronee Pena (Nadir Solo Band), Alan Krigger (Giuffria, Ike & Tina Turner, Brian Wilson), Tony Cavazo (Hurricane, Snow), Jack Frost (7 Witches), Chris Holmes (W.A.S.P.) as well as members of the Bob Welch Band. St.James recorded his tracks for 3 songs (titled: "Tie That Girl", "Face Yourself" and "Danger In The Sky") in Europe and completed his part of the recording by the end of September 2015. The band London (doing the main tracking in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, Nevada-USA ) has in the meantime gone through several producer and studio personnel changes and as of date continues to work on the album and has announced that it plans to release the new cd, entitled "Unknown" sometime in 2017.

Trance

Eddie St.James joins forces in August 2016 with legendary German metal band de:Trance (Band) (not to be confused with "Trancemission") as 2nd guitarist alongside founding members Markus Berger and Thomas Klein, including 3 other newer members: Joe Strubel, Neudi (Manilla Road) and Jens Gellner (Masters of Disguise). The group rehearsed for 2 months and then went immediately out on tour in October 2016 with 3 warm up shows and then joined Udo Dirkschneider (Accept) as support along with Vicious Rumors on the last leg of the "Back to the Roots" European world tour in December 2016. Trance has also recorded a brand new album entitled "The Loser Strikes Back" which is due to be issued for release as of March 2017, which is also the start of the next European wide tour for the band. The album "The Loser Strikes Back" entered the German Top 100 Charts on the 7th of April 2017 and reached position 98.

Charts (Trance)

Titel Rock- / Metalcharts[10]

(Staatenlegende)

UK NL BE LU FR CH
Loser 1
Baby Child 2 1 3
Heavy Metal Queen 1 1 1 2 4
Break the Chains 1 1 1 1
Album Rock- / Metalcharts[10]

(Staatenlegende)

IT JP KR
Boulevard of Broken Dreams 7 3
Die Hard 8
Experience (The Ballads) 10

Current ESJ Band lineup

Eddie St. James: Vocals / guitar
Michael Leukel: Keyboarder/ b.v.

Notable Ex-ESJ Band members

Discography

Solo/Eddie St. James Band

Jon Dunmore Band

Richard Grieco (actor: 21 Jump street, Booker, Marker-etc.)

Mark Pont

London

TV and film music

written by Eddie St. James and performed by Eddie St. James and the Dunmore Band.

written by Eddie St. James.

References

Specific
  1. ↑ http://www.metal-archives.com/artists/Eddie_St._James/173420 (Eddie St.James, Metal Archives)
  2. ↑ http://heavymetalrarities.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=19366 (Northstar, heavy metal rarities)
  3. 1 2 http://www.travellersintime.com/uw/uwest.html (Interview Eddie St. James, Canadian rock magazine Universal Wheels)
  4. ↑ http://www.speed-n-power.com/disk.php?did=8262 (Profile Jon Dunmore, Hypnotica CD, Speed-n-power)
  5. ↑ http://melodic-hardrock.com/dunmore-baptized-by-fire-1997/ (Baptized by fire CD)
  6. ↑ http://hardrockaorheaven.blogspot.de/2012/04/richard-grieco-waiting-for-sky-to-fall.html (Grieco CD Waiting for the sky to fall, hard rock heaven).
  7. ↑ http://www.fullinbloommusic.com/nadir_dpriest.html (Interview D'Priest's New London)
  8. ↑ http://www.travellersintime.com/UniversalWheels/ReviewsFeb14.html (Review Streets cry freedom CD, Universal Wheels Canada)
  9. ↑ http://www.rockhard.de/megazine/reviewarchiv/review-anzeigen/32253-streets-cry-freedom.html (Review Streets cry freedom CD, Rock Hard /DE.)
  10. 1 2 nationale Spezialauswertung aus dem Bereich Rock/Metal, Angaben aus Rock Hard Enzyklopädie. Band 1: Europe. S. 423 und The Ultimate Hard Rock Guide. S. 719.
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