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Steven Alexander James (born on 21 November 1968 in Bournemouth, England), popularly known as Alex James, is the bass player in the band Blur, and one of the members of Fat Les.
The only member of Blur not to come from Colchester, James met future bandmate Graham Coxon at Goldsmith's College, where the two were studying, and was introduced to Damon Albarn and Dave Rowntree, who at the time were part of a band called Circus. He eventually joined the three's new band, Seymour in 1989, which would later be renamed Blur. He has remained in the band since.
Unlike his bandmates Albarn and Coxon, James has not released any solo material, although he has been involved in other side projects. In 1998 James formed Fat Les with Keith Allen, Damien Hirst and others, and released (amongst others) the World Cup single "Vindaloo", which reached #2 in the UK charts. He also worked on a side project called Me Me Me with Stephen Duffy, and has co-written songs for Marianne Faithfull and Sophie Ellis Bextor. Alex worked with Bextor on a couple of tracks on her debut solo album Read My Lips. He co-wrote and co-produced "Move This Mountain" and co-produced "I Believe" along with Sophie Ellis Bextor and Ben Hillier, and also plays bass on them. Sophie's latest album, Shoot From The Hip also features Alex on it. He co-wrote "Love Is It Love" and features on bass. He also joined his friend singer-songwriter Betty Boo in a band called WigWam.
James writes for the British newspapers The Independent and The Observer, as well as The Idler (who he represented in a team on BBC2's University Challenge: the Professionals in summer 2005 in a team also featuring John Moore of Black Box Recorder; they had a heavy win over the Financial Times in their heat, but didn't score highly enough to return for the tournament's later stages) and Q magazines. He also presented the Evening Sequence on BBC 6 Music as a stand-in for Tom Robinson from August 8th until August 26th. He has a serious interest in space and space travel, which led him to involve Blur in helping the ill-fated Beagle 2 project, producing the Mars probe's signature tune. His obsession with space is further illustrated by the track "Far Out" on Parklife, on which James sings a list of moons and stars.
He is married to Claire Neate, a video producer. They have three sons: Geronimo, and premature twin boys (28 April 2006, NME), Artemis and Gallileo.
External links
Blur | 1968 births | Living people | English bassists | Alumni of Goldsmiths College | Bournemouth
"Alex James (musician)"