Nadine: So you enjoy that complex type of character.
Stephen: Yeah. It’s really weird since we haven’t gotten a chance to see a lot of shows since we’ve been gone. When we got back there was Studio 60 on Sunset that was airing and then a couple of other new shows that were airing that we knew nothing about.

Nadine: Well you were literally on the other side of the world!
Stephen: Yeah. It was very Americanized there but they didn’t have a lot of good television I must say. But coming back it was kind of neat to see a couple of shows that I hadn’t seen yet. I started watching House and I’ve been a huge fan of that show. I think the work among the actors is phenomenal and the writing is brilliant. It’s just a great show.

Nadine: Actually how long have you been playing guitar, did you just start? Do you write songs as well or do you just play guitar.
Stephen: I do write all my stuff but I picked up a guitar about my second year on GH and I’m like ‘Oh, I play guitar’ (laughs) I can’t play a thing. I didn’t know what I was doing then. It’s just been in the past couple of years that I really kind of started to spend a little more time on it. I’m okay. I know a lot of chords. In music you only need three or four chords and you can write 250,000 songs. Like many country artists, they use four chords and they write everything. But for me I kind of strum and use it as a leverage for me to write down some lyrics here and there and utilize it for that source and once I get a band back together I will get some guys that are much better guitar players than me.

Nadine: When you write, do you do it systematically or is it just in every day life something will hit you and you write some lines down and flush them out later.
Stephen: Yeah pretty much it’s very sporadic. I mean it can be at any time. I know one song I recorded about a year and a half ago called “Through The Night” that stemmed from a nightmare I had while I was living in NYC on Guiding Light. I woke up at three in the morning and I said you know what, I got this idea for this song so I just wrote the lyrics almost poetically and I brought it into my producer and I had a whole vision of this song of where I wanted it to go and what I wanted it to sound like. We put it together in forty-five minutes and had it recorded and mastered within a day and the song is amazing. I think if it hit the radio, it would do very well.

Nadine: Are you trying to get it on the radio.
Stephen: I would love to but that part of the industry is just so not only sketchy it’s just—I don’t want to play the game too much. I would love to shop it, I would love to re-record it, I would love to be in the studio but if it happens great, if it doesn’t… The greatest thing about what we do is you can write, direct, star, sing, act, dance, it’s all open to you if you’re persistent enough and truth be told if you have the connections to do it. For me, I don’t want to be one of those artists who, looking Latin, and being half-Latin, I don’t want to be the pop singer who is up on stage dancing and singing. That’s just not me. I want to be the front man of a rock band and when a label is ready for me to do that then I’m for it. When I was shopping before and working with other producers it was like they all wanted me to be a pop singer and it just wasn’t me and I don’t feel like I should change who I am or what I like as a singer to fit that mold. And I know what it’s for. I know it’s marketing and advertising and where they can make the most money. It makes perfect sense to me but I’m waiting for that time- and I think it’s close- to where the old rock phase comes back. I think it will happen. I would love to see eighties rock come back. Growing up in the eighties was the most fun. I had a good time with the music so if it happens that’s great. So if you know anybody out there who can help me with a record deal, I’m all for it.

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