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Steve Bolton

British rock musician, songwriter

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 30, 2026
Entity authorityQ7611991
Source-derived summary

Steve Bolton (born 8 November 1949), also known as Boltz, is an English rock musician who, since the start of his career in the 1960s, has played guitar on video, film and television and recorded as well as toured with a number of well-known artists.

Music career

A native of Manchester, Steve Bolton played rhythm guitar with The Dominators, The Phantom 4, Modrox from 1963, and lead guitar in Puzzle from 1966, Jimmy Powell and The Dimensions, The Dimensions. In 1971 he was recruited into the band Atomic Rooster, part of a new line-up for a tour supporting the band's third album In Hearing of Atomic Rooster and their No. 4 charting single "The Devil's Answer". The tour was successful, and included a charity gig where the band supported The Who. The band was also recording their fourth LP Made in England which was released in 1972 with a more funky sound replacing their original progressive rock leanings. Bolton also appeared on Devil's Answer: Live on the BBC released in 1998, and on the release of In Satan's Name: The Definitive Collection.

Bolton left Atomic Rooster at the end of 1972 and joined the band Headstone, appearing on their albums Bad Habits in 1974 and Headstone in 1975. After leaving Headstone, he played with 20th Century and then continued working as a musician, recording and touring with a number of different artists. In 1982, he joined the band Vampire Bats, also in the 1980s he was a member of Paul Young band The Royal Family and played on some of his albums including No Parlez, in 1984 he played with K4, and in 1988 Richard Strange and the Engine Room.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Steve Bolton” as british rock musician, songwriter. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Steve, Bolton and British.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1949, 1963, 1966, 1971—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1949-11-08. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Steve, Bolton and British providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Steve Bolton”, the useful work is to connect “british rock musician, songwriter” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7611991. VIAF identifies the subject as 130149196665374792857. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1949, 1963, 1966 and 1971.

Critical limits

Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Steve Bolton”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Steve Bolton primary sources, Steve Bolton archive and Steve research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Steve Bolton”?
  2. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Steve Bolton” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.