Jesus Jones
During May 1997, Snakebite went to the capital to join Jesus Jones at the 100 Club on the last date of their English tour. We spoke to Mike Edwards - the man behind the hits.

With bands splitting up all the time, individual members leaving, bands reforming, it gets to highlight just what a fragile business it all is. As one day your band are starting out, you're the next big thing and then you disappear and people forget you ever existed. The time has come for Jesus Jones to try and re-establish themselves once again on the music scene, that's if they can and if they want to.

It was around 1993 that saw the last Jesus Jones single, 'Zeroes and Ones'. It was a typical JJ tune that represented their style and sound. So now they're back on their first proper tour for ages. So what exactly happened to the guys over the years spent away, surely not a case of the Stone Roses syndrome? Not quite.

Looking content and eager to talk I ask Mike about the stories I'd read over the years regarding the problems that caused the album's delay. Were they true?

"Yes," he confessed. "We had a few knockbacks from the record company and yes I was gutted, but I think that they were right in the end."

Because of the band's UK success in the past and particularly in the US and Japan, this must have added to the pressure to come up with some new good tunes, and fast. Seems that the record company was keen to make sure everything was going to be fine once more.

"I was writing songs between October '92 and September '94 but my heart wasn't in it. I wrote 28 new songs but they asked 'Where's the singles?'. They needed singles. Then we got told to bring in some producers. We tried a couple."

Then Food Records kicked them while they were down. >>

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