{"id":49223,"date":"2016-10-20T00:00:48","date_gmt":"2016-10-20T00:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=49223"},"modified":"2016-11-20T16:08:27","modified_gmt":"2016-11-20T16:08:27","slug":"feature-saxon-10-16","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/feature-saxon-10-16\/","title":{"rendered":"SAXON – Rocking The Nations (October 2016) | Features \/ Interviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAXON – Rocking The Nations<\/strong><\/span>
\nAnthony Morgan<\/span>
\nOctober 2016<\/span><\/p>\n

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Saxon (l-r): Nibbs Carter, Paul Quinn, Biff Byford, Doug Scarratt and Nigel Glockler<\/b><\/em><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n
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\nHard rock trio Mot\u00f6rhead were scheduled to tour the United Kingdom during late January 2016, with support from Yorkshire, England-based metal ensemble Saxon and London, England-based hard rock outfit Girlschool. Sadly, Mot\u00f6rhead frontman Ian \u2018Lemmy\u2019 Kilmister died on December 28th, 2015 at the age of 70 following a short battle with an extremely aggressive cancer. The bassist \/ vocalist had learnt of his condition just two days prior. <\/p>\n

Saxon have rescheduled said tour, the veterans upgraded to headlining act. Supporting are Girlschool and English rock assortment Fastway, including former Mot\u00f6rhead guitarist Fast \u2018Eddie\u2019 Clarke. Beginning on October 28th at the O2 Academy in Newcastle, England, the tour concludes at Rock City in Nottingham on November 9th.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe tried to put a package together which was interesting,\u201d submits Biff Byford, vocalist and co-founder of Saxon. \u201cObviously, it\u2019s not as interesting without Mot\u00f6rhead, but yeah. It\u2019s just sad really that we had to cancel the gigs in January, so yeah. We just put it all back together and tried to do some gigs and carry on really, to support the Battering Ram<\/em> album (October 2015). We\u2019ve got this live album coming out now as well (Let Me Feel Your Power<\/em>).<\/p>\n

\u201cIt should be great, actually. I\u2019m looking forward to it. I was talking with Eddie yesterday; I think he might get up with us and play a Mot\u00f6rhead song, and that might be cool. Eddie could play anything, but we would probably play \u2018Ace Of Spades\u2019 I would think (from the November 1980 album of the same name), or \u2018Overkill\u2019 (March 1979) \u2013 one of their bigger songs. So yeah, it\u2019s good. It looks like a good package, I think. I think it\u2019s quite unique, because I don\u2019t think Eddie and the Fastway boys go out a lot. So, it\u2019s a good chance for people to see them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fastway\u2019s selection as a supporting artist wasn\u2019t chosen due to \u2018Fast\u2019 Eddie Clarke figuring among their respective line-up, as certain quarters might mistakenly assume. \u201cNo, no,\u201d the frontman clarifies. \u201cIt just came together by accident, really. It just came together that Fastway were doing some festivals and things. It wasn\u2019t really planned, to tell you the truth. The Girlschool idea, obviously we put that forward quite a long time ago, but the Fastway thing just came along.\u201d<\/p>\n

Saxon\u2019s connection with Mot\u00f6rhead dates as far as back as 1979. \u201cMy first tour ever was with Mot\u00f6rhead in 1979 on their Bomber tour,\u201d Biff remembers. \u201cWe had a bit of a following at the time, but not a lot, no. No, not much of a following. It was the tour before they recorded No Sleep \u2019Til Hammersmith<\/em> (June 1981). The Bomber<\/em> tour was massive, though. They were huge; Mot\u00f6rhead were huge before we even started writing our first album (Saxon<\/em>, May 1979), really. <\/p>\n

\u201cSo yeah, it was a great tour for us, definitely. That\u2019s a lasting memory, and we\u2019ve been friends with the Mot\u00f6rhead boys \u2013 all of the Mot\u00f6rhead incarnations over the years \u2013 really well. I think Mot\u00f6rhead were probably our biggest friends in the rock \u2019n\u2019 roll world, and obviously Girlschool were around at the same time really. They more or less started the same time as we did. So yeah, we have good memories of them touring and partying. I once went to a party with Girlschool at the Tower Of London, which was really crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n

One would be safe to assume certain stories could not be recounted in print. \u201cI couldn\u2019t tell you, but we haven\u2019t got time anyway,\u201d the singer chuckles.<\/p>\n

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Not every band has earned a positive response from Mot\u00f6rhead\u2019s audience through the years, although Saxon isn\u2019t one such case. \u201cNo, not every band is suited to Mot\u00f6rhead,\u201d Biff agrees. \u201cMot\u00f6rhead loved us because of that; they loved us because of our music. It\u2019s quite similar actually; me and Lemmy both wrote historic lyrics, and we both wrote rock \u2019n\u2019 roll lyrics. I don\u2019t think our music was massively similar \u2013 not the latest stuff anyway \u2013 but some of their early stuff is quite close to our stuff. They influenced us quite a lot. \u2018Heavy Metal Thunder\u2019, \u201820,000 Ft\u2019 and things like that (both from September 1980\u2019s Strong Arm Of The Law<\/em>) are quite Mot\u00f6rhead\u2019ish. They\u2019re not the same, but it\u2019s the same sort of punky aggression that Mot\u00f6rhead had.\u201d<\/p>\n

Saxon\u2019s forthcoming 22nd full-length studio album will feature a tribute composition to late Mot\u00f6rhead frontman Lemmy, entitled \u2019They Played Rock And Roll\u2019. \u201cThere\u2019s not much to tell, really,\u201d the mainman reckons. \u201cIt\u2019s a song about that tour, the 1979 tour basically. I asked Nibbs (Carter, bass) to write a song that was similar in style to Mot\u00f6rhead, which he did. He wrote the guitar riffs and everything, and I put lyrics to it that I had already written. So, it was a pretty easy song for us to do. We might play something off of the new album… I don\u2019t know yet. We haven\u2019t got a lot of time to rehearse, actually, because we can\u2019t make any noise at the first gig until five \u2019o\u2019 clock. So, we\u2019re a bit pushed for time.\u201d<\/p>\n

And as well, work is underway on other tracks to be included on the forthcoming platter. \u201cWe\u2019re writing and recording at the moment,\u201d Biff informs. \u201cWe\u2019ve done a few backing tracks already. We\u2019ve got about ten or 12 backing tracks. We\u2019re still writing, really. I\u2019m in the studio at the moment actually, writing a new song. Yeah, we\u2019re working on the new album, and we\u2019ll do a bit of recording next week and rehearsing. Then I think we\u2019ll go back in again in February and take it from there, and see if we can get it finished. We\u2019re off to America in March with UFO. So yeah, we should have time to finish it really.\u201d<\/p>\n

Summer 2017 issue is being targeted. \u201cWe may miss that window, though,\u201d the lyricist warns. \u201cI don\u2019t know.\u201d<\/p>\n

Irrespective of the affair\u2019s eventual release date, Saxon\u2019s 22nd studio outing proper will feature familiar musical traits. \u201cI don\u2019t see us suddenly turning into U2, no,\u201d Biff laughs.<\/p>\n

As referenced towards the inauguration of this respective feature, Saxon\u2019s 21st studio outing proper \u2013 Battering Ram \u2013 will be belatedly promoted via live dates throughout the United Kingdom, scheduled to begin during late October 2016. \u201cWe\u2019re gonna try to play from a few of the middle albums, from the 90s and 2000s,\u201d the vocalist discloses. \u201cIt depends on what the audience will let us play. It\u2019s down to them, really. If we start playing the newer stuff and they start screaming for the older stuff… We\u2019ll have to see how it goes, really. It\u2019s a bit of an unknown quantity, really, with setlists. You never know what people want to hear. We rehearse quite a lot of songs, so we do have quite a lot of songs in the arsenal. We\u2019ve got \u2018Lionheart\u2019 (from the September 2004 album of the same name), and we\u2019ve got \u2018Attila The Hun\u2019 (from March 2007\u2019s The Inner Sanctum<\/em>), and we\u2019ve got \u2018Killing Ground\u2019 (from the September 2001 album of the same name). We\u2019ve got quite a few songs in there from the last ten albums, so we\u2019ll see how that goes.\u201d<\/p>\n

A steadfast, unwavering Saxon setlist doesn\u2019t exist. \u201cWe have a setlist, but we don\u2019t stick to it very much,\u201d Biff muses. \u201cSometimes we change. We have songs we can play at different shows, so it makes it a bit more interesting for people. A lot of people travel around and go to different shows. So yeah, we might change it around a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

An eight-LP live box set dubbed The Vinyl Hoard<\/em> undergoes release on October 28th in conjunction with the beginning of Saxon\u2019s 2016 UK trek. \u201cIt\u2019s a good looking piece of kit, actually,\u201d the frontman compliments. \u201cI quite like it, the golden vinyl. I like that, and obviously Paul Gregory has done the artwork. It\u2019s good. The artwork looks better in a bigger size when you have real, real art, if you know what I mean, like old paintings. It looks great when it\u2019s on a bigger format.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is live stuff, but I think that\u2019s it now. We\u2019ve also got the Let Me Feel Your Power<\/em> DVD coming out on the 28th, which was filmed when we supported Mot\u00f6rhead in Munich before Christmas last year. They were the last shows we did with Lemmy. It\u2019s two shows in Munich, and we also put on there an American show we did. We thought it might be nice for people to see one of our American headlining shows, and then there\u2019s two or three songs from Brighton. So, we\u2019ve got that coming out as well. We\u2019ve got quite a bit of stuff coming out around the tour, like The Vinyl Hoard<\/em> and Let Me Feel Your Power<\/em>. Obviously, we\u2019re still promoting the Battering Ram album, because that\u2019s the tour that got cancelled when Lemmy died.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The Vinyl Hoard<\/em> collects various live sets originally issued in CD format. \u201cThey\u2019re all ones that were in the original set when they were on CD,\u201d Biff seconds. \u201cWe wanted a nice cross-section. You\u2019ve got the Dogs Of War<\/em> tour, which is quite early. You\u2019ve got the Lionheart<\/em> tour, you\u2019ve got the Rocksound Festival recorded in Switzerland, and you\u2019ve got other bits and pieces on there. I think it\u2019s quite a good package, and it\u2019s all on vinyl. If I had told you that ten years ago, you would\u2019ve thought I was mad.\u201d<\/p>\n

The respective live sets collected were recorded in various countries, causing yours truly to ask as to whether audience receptions differ from area to area. \u201cYou\u2019ll have to buy the releases to find out, mate,\u201d the singer jokes. \u201cNot really, though. I think the American audiences are probably a little bit older, but that\u2019s because you can\u2019t drink there until you\u2019re 21 in some states. So, the dynamics are a bit different there, but no, not really. I think people like different songs, like the big hits of the day. Power & The Glory<\/em> (March 1983) was a big album in America or Crusader<\/em> (April 1984), so people probably know those songs more than they do in Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Vinyl Hoard<\/em> will be released on October 28th, 2016 via Demon Records, while Let Me Feel Your Power<\/em> undergoes issue on the same day through UDR Music.<\/p>\n

Interview published in October 2016.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SAXON – Rocking The Nations Anthony Morgan October 2016 Saxon (l-r): Nibbs Carter, Paul Quinn, Biff Byford, Doug Scarratt and Nigel Glockler Hard rock trio Mot\u00f6rhead were scheduled to tour the United Kingdom during late January 2016, with support from Yorkshire, England-based metal ensemble Saxon and London, England-based hard rock outfit Girlschool. Sadly, Mot\u00f6rhead frontman […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,535],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","category-saxon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49223"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49223\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49888,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49223\/revisions\/49888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}