The man behind the Jedward factor (and it's not Simon Cowell)

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Six months ago, as Robert Stephenson manned the door to the finals of the battle-of-the-bands competition he was hosting in Dublin, two mud-splattered identical twins bounded up to him.

They wanted to join the heaving 1,000-strong crowd of teenagers inside, but they had no money to pay the €10 entrance.

Under normal circumstances Robert, a social music entrepreneur, would have sent them packing but something about them made him suggest a trade-off instead.

Triumph of self belief: Jedward, aka John and Edward Grimes, on stage during X Factor 

John and Edward Grimes, or Jedward as they've since become known, beamed, he recalls, when he offered them “free entrance if they helped him clean up afterwards” and said: “Is it OK if we go home and change? We've just been out cross-country running.”

“They returned,” recalls Robert, “with their hair gelled and spruced up in jacket, shirt and tie and looking like a million dollars. I mean, it was a total transformation. They came across as polite but supremely sure of themselves and it so impressed me that I asked them to join our judging panel.  

“They did a good job — they were opinionated yet charming — and it was funny because one would start a sentence and the other would finish it, as if they were joined at the hip. Then right at the end, they went off-piste and blurted out: Oh, by the way, we sing as well. We've just auditioned for the X-Factor. Can we sing for you?'”

On their way: whatever the outcome of the contest, Jedward have already built a fan base and charmed a nation

Sitting in his pied-à-terre in Wimbledon, Robert, 56, founder of Blastbeat Education UK, a not-for-profit group that uses music to empower teenagers at inner-city London schools, plays me the video of Jedward's debut on the music scene. “Listen to this,” he grins. “This is Jedward as you've never seen them before.”

They begin with trademark brio. “We're gonna sing As Long As You Love Me by the Backstreet Boys,” they announce. But within a few bars, one twin trails off leaving the other to belt out a tuneless rendition that is, to be blunt, ear-screechingly bad.  

Robert winces. “Of course,” he laughs, “we gave them a rousing round of applause! There is a grand tradition in Ireland of people standing up in pubs and at weddings and spontaneously singing out of tune.

“It was clear to me that they couldn't sing, but what came across that day was the sheer force of their personalities. Of the thousand teenagers that night, they were the only ones who had bummed their way in for free, got onto the judging panel and performed an unscheduled song.

The power of music: Robert Stephenson, founder of Blastbeat Education

“They had a spark that reminded me of U2 — the first band I was ever involved with — and which made me want to engage them, too.”  

Three decades ago, when Robert was 27 and working nights to pay for his psychology degree at Trinity College, Dublin, he organised a festival of Irish music in London.

At the time U2 were still callow teenagers with questionable musical proficiency — much like Jedward — who'd been rejected by almost every record label, and Bono approached Robert to help get them to London.

“I basically brought U2 to London,” he says. “I raised sponsorship to fly them over, put them up at a hotel in Kensington High Street, and arranged their gig at what was then the 250-capacity Acklam Hall off Portobello Road. Island Records came to see them play that night, signed them up, and the rest is history.  

“But what strikes me is that my first impressions of Jedward and U2 were so similar. Like Jedward, I didn't think U2 was the best band in town, but I remember taking them for drinks — they ordered Fanta — and being charmed by their youthful exuberance and naïve honesty. And it was the same with Jedward.” 

Will Robert go down as the man who first discovered U2 and Jedward only to let both slip through his fingers? “Oh I'm not bothered about that,” he smiles.

“U2 already had a manager, although if I hadn't flown them to London — who knows? They might never have taken off. But I could lay claim to giving Jedward their first break in the music industry and spotting them €10 each!”

Ghostbusters: Jedward continue to stay in the competition

Is it true, as some say, that there's “one good twin and one crap one”? “Well, it is true that one has a better voice, while the other one is sharper and more together in other areas, so between them they sort of make a solid unit, which is why they work as Jedward and not as John and Edward.” 

But Robert, who personally knows their mentor Louis Walsh, is no fan of the X Factor format, he says.

“It's ironic that last week Simon was going on about what brilliant song writers Queen were, but the programme does nothing to encourage original song-writing or original artists. I agree with Sting: the X Factor is a machine that produces people who sing covers and financially exploits them. It is the total opposite of what my organisation, Blastbeat, is about.” 

Robert, who lives between London and Dublin, founded Blastbeat in 2003 when he had an epiphany after 20 years of managing bands and running his own independent label, Treasure Island Records.

It was triggered by the tragic death, 14 years ago, of his younger brother Karl, killed on Christmas Eve by a drunk driver. “A lunatic came flying down the street at 75mph and knocked my brother into the next life.

“It was devastating and it caused me to re-evaluate the meaning of my life. I had grown up the son of an insurance executive who worked in the City and had afforded us the best private Catholic schools, but like many in the music business, I had become reliant on alcohol and drugs — like cannabis, acid, and cocaine — to get me though the day.

Cult fanbase: John and Edward have even had hats made for them

“After my brother died, I started meditation and managed to give up drink and drugs entirely. One day, a few years later, I had this light-bulb' moment when I saw how I could use music as a hook to empower young people in deprived inner-city schools.” 

The idea has two components: to create social entrepreneurs by getting high school students to form their own multimedia company (MMC) which then stages local battles of the bands, ideally making a profit and donating 25 per cent to a charity of their choice.

And secondly it's a straightforward competition to find the best school band in the capital, although unlike the X Factor, all songs have to be original.  

First pioneered in Ireland, he took it to the US and the townships of South Africa before piloting it in London three years ago. This year Robert received more than £300,000 of government funding to go into 66 London schools.

The MMC teams receive instruction and mentoring free from Blastbeat, he says, and there are £2,000 cash prizes and recording deals for the winners (the final battle of the bands is to be held next July).  

“Funnily enough,” reflects Robert, “Jedward have all the attributes we look for from a social entrepreneur — belief in themselves, determination, vision.

“They have a social conscience, having climbed the four highest peaks in Ireland for charity last year, and they know what it is to struggle, having been born two months premature, and being bullied in school.” 

Despite his reservations, he'll be watching this weekend, he admits, and “voting Jedward”. But does he think they can win? “Probably not, but I wouldn't be surprised if they get to the final. Let's face it — X Factor is not a singing contest, it's a soap opera.

“And Jedward is the most entertaining act there. But even if they do go out this week, they've already won because they've built a fan base and charmed the nation. My prediction? They'll transition from pop-stars to TV personalities and become multi-million-pound presenters of their own TV show.”

 

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