Steve Lukather’s son Trev Lukather sat down with Ultimate Classic Rock to discuss his new cover of Journey’s ‘It Could Have Been You.’ In the new cover, the singer worked with Steve Perry as a collaborator.
Lukather and the interviewer discussed Perry’s newer versions of Journey’s ‘Separate Ways’ and ‘Only the Young.’ He implied that Perry was getting negative comments about his singing and his voice. The rocker addressed the comments and said:
“One thing that people need to know is that Perry can still sing his ass off, okay? He doesn’t need to prove anything to anybody. People think they deserve [that] in a weird way. He doesn’t need to prove anything to anybody. He still has it and he gets excited working with younger artists, because it gives him that energy and that buzz to want to do [things like this].”
He added that people need to respect Perry for whatever he wants to do:
“Who knows what he wants to do? More music? Another record? Whatever — that’s up to him, man. People have to respect those boundaries and respect whatever he wants to do. But he’s still a powerhouse, man. I think that shows on this track. What’s so cool is Emmett channeled that. They worked so well together. Because Perry was in the mixing session too, by the way — people should know that. Perry was there with us and [mixer] Will Brierre. All of the vocal balancing is the stamp of the man himself.”
How Lukather And Perry Came Together
The Effect features Lukather on guitar, Phil Collins’ son Nic Collins on drums, Toto’s Steve Maggiora and vocalist Emmett Stang. Trev Lukather announced the news on his Instagram account and explained how Perry accepted their offer:
“Steve and I go way back. Other than my Pop, Steve Perry has been a mentor to me. When he heard the Effect, he called me and expressed how much he really loved what we were doing. It meant the world. On that same call, I started raving about a deep-cut Journey tune, ‘It Could Have Been You.’”
Although the band was already done with the album, they wanted to work with Perry:
“The idea came up about The Effect doing our own version of it. I asked Steve if he would sing on it and he was in. Even though we were done with our album, it was just too good of an idea to pass up. Any chance to work with my dear brotha Steve is one I’ll happily take.”
You can listen to The Effect’s version of the song below.