Steve Harris’s extra-Maiden musical project, British Lion, is just about to release a new album, The Burning, on January 17th, right before kicking off a U.S. tour that runs until the end of February. Steve was kind enough to take the time for a phoner, discussing all the latest goings-on with British Lion, the new album, tour gear, and more.

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I just want to dig right into the British Lion stuff, I’ve been listening to this record, I’m very excited about it, and I heard that The Burning is a couple of years in the making, so what made now the right time to follow up on your 2012 debut? 

I know, I can’t even believe it’s that long, I don’t know where the time’s gone, it’s just mad. But obviously, busy with Maiden all the time, and we’ve done lots of touring with British Lion, with that first album – around the world really, we did a couple European and UK tours and last year we did Canada, and Japan for the first time, so that was great. And then next year, we’re going to play the States for the first time, so that’ll be great too, but I just can’t believe where the time’s gone.

So can you talk to me about the process in between the last record and this one, what led into deciding to make The Burning?

Yeah, we recorded this stuff in a proper studio, we went in straight after a tour and did most of it, and then we went back in and finished it off of another tour, so we were fresh and vibed up, and I think it really shows on the album. We tried to recreate the songs to be as much like live as possible, even the stuff that we hadn’t played live at that point, we just tried to get as much of a live feel as we could, and I think it’s got a really good vibe.

Absolutely, it’s got a great vibe, sound, really cool stuff. And you produced The Burning, not your first time producing, of course, but can you talk about that experience in the context of this record for British Lion? 

That’s just it, really. The first album, was a good first step and we hadn’t played live together at that point, and then we toured a bit afterwards, but it was a whole different thing, the way we did the album – and this album, to me, was more how I would like to record an album, really. I mean, I’d love to go into the whole writing process and do like we do with Maiden, two or three months of writing, mixing, and recording all in one go, but we don’t have time to do it with British Lion, so we just do what we can. But the recording process was very much the same, just going in and recording it live, and Tony Newton, who recorded and engineered it, he’s our front sound guy for British Lion anyway.

I like that, just like you said, it gives it a very natural, live feel, just what comes out when you guys get in there together, so that’s cool. Now, seeing as British Lion in general came about long before anyone knew it, I know it used to be a band you mentored that transformed into what it is today, what was the original inspiration to pick it up and make into what we see now? 

Well, because at the time back in the 90’s, I was helping them to get gigs and write, doing all kinds of stuff with them, and things all fell apart, unfortunately, but I said to Richie, the singer, “Listen, at some point, I promise you I’m going to make sure something happens with this material because I think it’s really strong songs, and it needs to see the light of day”, so eventually…fast forward quite a few years, but I’ve managed to work something out and I just said to him, “Look, you know what, the only way to do this will be to grab it by the scruff of the neck, and I’m going to be in the band. We’re just going to take it and do it and put an album out and go on tour with it”. And he was obviously up for doing that, and I’ve never regretted it. I absolutely enjoy it, and the guys in the band are really nice people to work with, they’re great writers and it’s just a lot of fun.

That’s awesome. I want to touch upon the single “Lightning”, not only does it have such a definitive bass opening there, feels like you’re making your presence known, but it’s such a great sounding track overall. Can you talk about what’s behind that one? 

Yeah, we actually played that one on the tour in November I was just talking about, in Japan and South America and Canada, we tried it out live and it felt great. It’s a really strong song, and it’s one of my favorites on the album, actually, so it’s good that you chose that one to talk about. But yeah, I think it’s just a really powerful song and I like the recording we did in the studio, it’s really captured the essence of what it’s like live as well.

What you keep referring to is that “live” sound, so it’s almost like a live album in essence, that natural, organic vibe. British Lion has such a great sound in general, there’s elements of classic hard rock, but a lot of elements of modern hard rock as well. I’m wondering, do you take any different approaches to tone, or even gear for your playing in British Lion as opposed to what we normally hear from Steve Harris?

Well, I did on the first album, I sort of tried some things out, but after playing live with the band, I was just using my normal live sound that I use with Maiden. And really, that’s what’s happening now on the second album, it’s just my normal sound. The band has evolved into what it is now and it just feels better like that. And I have, just out of necessity, like when we played Brazil, for example, or Canada, we had a mate of mine, Andy Curran, Coney Hatch bass player – he was using an Ampeg rig and someone brought me this little gadget, I had this thing out, and he said, “Oh, it’s supposed to reproduce your EV speaker sound”, and I was like “Yeah, okay, we’ll see what happens with that”. He tried it in his Ampeg rig because it’s about as far away from my sound as you can get, I couldn’t believe it, it was like a miracle, it really sounded close to my sound, and I was like, “This is impossible! How can this happen through a rig like that?” but I said, “Well, can you recreate it?”, and he said yeah, so he’s done that. I just can’t believe it, so the good thing about that is that I can go to some countries – there are some places I can get EV speakers and some places I just can’t get them, and I was worried about going places and not having my sound the way it should be, and now I can do it. So it’s not just me tryin’ to flog a bit of kit here, it seems impossible to reproduce the sounds that I like as far removed from gear like that. But it just enables me to go around with British Lion to other countries and get the sound that I have.

That’s really cool, and that’s an angle not a lot of people think about, the traveling and going to remote countries while keeping your same sound, because you’re not exactly taking all the same gear with you all the time.

You can’t, it’s impossible to take it all. I mean, Maiden is different, obviously we’ve got a whole budget thing going, but British Lion, you’ve got to be more realistic, and I can’t spend a fortune working on getting my speakers somewhere, and I was worried about that, but now with this piece of kit, I can just whack it in me backpack and that’s it.

I love that! Now, The Burning is being released on Explorer 1, and also signed to Explorer 1 is The Raven Age, with your son George, who’s also toured with you before, I like the family connection with the record label, but how did you get involved with that label? 

Well, basically, Paul, the CEO from the label, is a good friend of Tony who does our out-front sound, and so that’s how it came about, really. He was looking for new acts and everything like that, and we were a way forward, really, caught a breath of fresh air from older ideas and things like that, so I was really intrigued as to what they were doing with my son’s band. So we were out with the signing to North America, and so…yeah, it’s great, it’s really been impressive so far as well with how they go about things. The guys they’ve got working with him are experienced guys too, so they got lots of good ideas. So I think it needs a bit of shake-up and some new ideas, so it’s really good.

That’s good, it sounds like a great partnership to start with there, and a great record to be starting off with. Your daughter Lauren is also a musician, it’s so great that some of your children are following in your musical footsteps in a sense. 

Yeah, she’s got some great material that never got released as well, which is a bit of the same thing that happened to British Lion, and I really think that that needs to see the light of day. I’m not going to join her band and go out with it, but I do want to make sure that album comes out at some point.

So getting back to British Lion, of course. You were a part of a Monsters Rock Cruise a few years ago, and now you’re set for 2020, so, any thoughts looking towards that?

Yeah, I certainly loved it. I really enjoyed it, and I’d never been on a cruise before, so I didn’t know what to expect, I didn’t know if I was going to get seasick *laughs* or something like that, I didn’t know. But I really enjoyed it, and straightaway they asked us to go back the following year, and I said, “I can’t commit to that because I’ve got commitments, but I’ll give you two years’ time”. So that’s what we’re doing, and yeah, I’m really looking forward to it. I’ve never been to Belize or Cozumel, so that’s another couple of things ticked off on the bucket list, so that’s good.

And it’s funny that it works out timing-wise with the British Lion record, since you had agreed to do it two years ago. 

That’s right, yeah, but to be honest, I really wanted to bring the album out in December, because we’ve got a couple of shows coming up, and I wanted the album to come out before that, but with the vinyl backup and everything like that, we managed to get it out the day before the U.S. tour, so that’s January 17th. But I’m just pleased to get it out the door, really.

Of course – it almost works out better that way, you’re kicking it all off at once with the record, then you’re going to run right out there on the road and get everybody excited about it, so that’s cool. What’s on the horizon for Steve Harris beyond that? 

We’ve got the tour with British Lion mid-January to mid-February, and then, just a few weeks later really, we start rehearsing and going out on tour with Maiden in May doing Part 3 of the Legacy of the Beast tour. That’s good as well, because we’re taking the show to Australia and Japan, it’s such a big show and everybody loves it, so we thought we should do Part 3 and take it there. Then, to top it off, we’re doing Tel Aviv – we did it once in ’95 with Blaze, but Bruce has never done it – Dubai, we’re doing again, and then we’re doing a few shows in Europe, much of the cities that we didn’t do last time.

Wow, exploring the world sounds like a fun 2020. 

Yeah, it’s not a bad way to see the world, actually! It’s fantastic!

Absolutely – and this time, you do get to take your gear with you, because it’s Maiden, right?

Yeah, exactly, the rig goes with me.

Well, I appreciate you taking a few minutes out of your day to talk with me, and I’m really excited about the British Lion record. Thank you!

Excellent, cheers, thank you.