| CD REVIEW Saxon |
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Band: Saxon Rejoice (read with a cynical tone), Saxon fans, because the music industry has found a good reason for you to finally buy all of the band’s older albums on CD! You can now store away your original vinyl copies to safeguard ‘em, and in addition (and here’s where the cynical tone of the beginning of this article can change into an exhilerated one) you get a shiííít-load of bonus tracks!!! Yes dudes, EMI is re-issuing all of Saxon’s first 8 studio albums (if I’ve understood things right) in a special set which has the nice detail of, when put in the correct sequence in your CD-rack, shows you the band’s logo. All re-issues come with extensive liner notes by Metal Hammer UK’s editor Jerry Ewing, and bonus tracks culled from b-sides of singles and other live material which a lot of us may not have in their collection. On top the label has had collaboration from the band, who’ve delved into their archives to give us not rare pictures and also some recordings never heard before! Now, in stead of giving you a long-winded and detailed story with each of the albums (stuff which you can look up on an assortment of websites anyway – try Wikipedia or Rockdetector.com for starters, but the booklet of these re-issues will furnish you with enough reading anyway), I thought I’d keep things down to essentials, concentrating mainly on the bonus tracks, since as far as the original albums’ material goes, you already know what’s in the kettle! Nevertheless, as many of you may never have come across Saxon’s self-titled debut, it’s important for you to know that they were formed during the mid ‘70s from the bands Coast (a somewhat Progressive Rock act which comprised singer/ bassist Peter “Biff” Byford and guitarist Paul Quinn, plus a drummer) and S.O.B. (short for Son Of A Bitch, who played shorter, faster and to-the-point Blues tracks…where guitarist Graham Oliver, bassist Steve Dawson, and drummer Pete Gill, plus a singer, were active). Around the same time Coast’s drummer and S.O.B.’s singer left their respective bands. Byford was called to audition for S.O.B., but they already had a bassist, and that waas not his scene. Also, he didn’t want to split from his buddy guitarist. Some time after he re-contacted S.O.B., suggesting they jam together…with two bassists. Things gelled so perfectly the quintet became a unit in 1976, Byford dropping his bass to concentrate on his singing. What’s important here, is that when the band went shopping for a record deal, their set still showed a mix of their seperate old influences, and also something new which had developed thanks to the coming together of the members. They also eventually came in contact with EMI’s A & R man Pete Hinton. The label wasn’t interested, but Hinton was. The band got a management deal with Trident, and was eventually offered a deal from French label Carrere by advise from Hinton. Saxon entered the studio with John Verity (former Argent guitarist with whom Byford and Quinn had toured for a while) as producer…with the first album as a result! As mentioned above, 1979’s Saxon was quite diverse musically. In fact, “Militia Man” and “Judgement Day” came from Coast. There were also some more Progressive tracks with album openers “Rainbow Theme” and “Frozen Rainbow”, but it was the faster “Stallions Of The Highway” (a biker Metal anthem, more representative of the live S.O.B. sound) which attracted the most attention, getting frequent airplay on radio stations…and therefore became determinant for the stylistic evolution which made the band to what it grew out to be! Album sales were reasonably good for a debut album, but not enough for Trident to hold onto the band, and so they were swiftly dropped! Nevertheless, at the end of 1979 Saxon would be in the studio again, now with Hinton as producer, recording the epic Wheels Of Steel album! Well, certain things came together at the that time, as the release of the Metal For Muthas compilation album (which featured tracks by the likes of Iron Maiden, Angel Witch, Samson, Praying Mantis, Nutz, Sledgehammer, E.F.Band, Toad The Wet Sprocket, and Ethel The Frog) brought about an enhanced interest in British-made Metal. 1980 was also the year when Angel Witch, Def Leppard, Diamond Head, Girlschool, Iron Maiden, and Tygers Of Pan Tang were to release their debut albums. As a result of the converging events, Saxon grew to Stardom overnight, and with Geoff Barton coining the phrase “New Wave Of British Heavy Metal”, that became the scene the band would become one of the forerunners of! Before the year was over, Saxon had played several live-in-the-studio radio sessions, toured with Motörhead, played at the Monsters Of Rock festival, recorded their third album Strong Arm Of The Law (again with Hinton), and released it in October of the same year! So, it was about time that we turn our attention to the bonus tracks on these fiirst three re-issue albums! There’s a common thread between the first two albums, as the band’s performance at MOR on August 16th was split up over the two bonus tracks areas…Saxon being enhanced with live versions of “Still Fit To Boogie”, “Backs To The Wall”, and “Stallions Of The Highway” (all of which also feature on the debut album). The rest of the set is fittingly placed on Wheels Of Steel’s re-issue, fittingly, as “Motorcycle Man”, “Freeway Mad”, “Wheels Of Steel”, “747 (Strangers In The Night)”, and “Machine Gun” were all songs off thàt album. Additionally, Saxon features 5 tracks (“Big Teaser”, “Stallions Of The Highway”, “Backs To The Wall”, “Rainbow Theme”, and “Frozen Rainbow” – as you’ll notice all of which songs that would end up on the album) off a 1978 S.O.B. demo (evidently with a somewhat lesser quality, but in this mastering the tracks came out fairly well), the session they did for Tommy Vance’s Friday Rock Show (containing the “older” tracks “Backs To The Walls”, “Stallions Of The Highways”, and “Still Fit To Boogie”, but also “Motorcycle Man” and “747 (Strangers In The Night)” off the sophomore album which was just then released), as aired by BBC 1 on February 15 in 1980 (àlways good soound quality on those BBC recordings…I mean, they were renowned for that, really!)…and eventually also the live version of “Judgement Day” which was used as the b-side for the single of “Suzie Hold On”, the feelgood “ballad” off the sophomore album! Good for an album packed to the gills with a playing time of just over 79 minutes! Bonusses to the Wheels Of Steel album then? Well, that’s slightly less impressive in quantity than on that re-issue of the debut. Of course, the average track length was a bit longer now, and there àre the 5 live tracks from the MOR festival relating to this album to begin with! Additionally, you’ll also find demo rehearsal recordings (of rather fair sound quality, but evidently a bit shaky around the corners, especially in the vocals) of “Suzie Hold On” and “Wheels Of Steel”…and the live version of “Stallions Of The Highway”, which was used as the b-side on the single for “747 (Strangers In The Night)”. That’s it…”only” 8 bonus track, but it nevertheless fills the second installment in this re-issue series to just under 77 minutes of duration…so you still get your money’s worth! Over to the re-issue of Strong Arm Of The Law (I read an article once where Byford explained that the words to the title track were inspired by stuff that actually happened to the band…a wiseguy cop stopping the band while on tour, dead-certain to find their pockets and luggage filled with illegal drugs of all kinds). Bonus tracks start with a set of 4 tracks recorded at the BBC for a Studio B15 live session on April 25, 1982. Besides including versions of SAOTL tracks “20,000 Ft”, “Dallas 1 PM” (my favourite off that album), and “747 (Strangers In The Night)”, plus “The Eagle Has Landed”, which came off the track-list of the 1983 The Power And The Glory album, recorded only days before that session. As many of you know, the title of that song was also used to name Saxon’s first live album (which came after the Denim And Leather album in 1982 – but more about that in upcoming articles about this re-issue series). To further fill this third episode of re-issues, the had tracks “20,000 Ft” and “Heavy Metal Thunder”, as well as an alternate version of “To Hell And Back Again” (I’ve still to discover what’s so “alternate” about it) givena new mix (from the original 24-track reecordings) at the Abbey Road studios last year. Most interestingly though, especially for fans of the band into the really special items, is the presence of a track called “Mandy”, which is really an early version (with quite different lyrics) of album track “Sixth Form Girls” (also re-mixed at Abbey Road by Pete Mew). Again, in spite of the “limited” amount of bonus tracks, you still get an album that’ll set you back a respectable just over 77 minutes in time with each listening session! Well, there you go (to the record store, or not…depending on your personal stance towards Saxon, I guess), that’s it for this time around! You can’t really expect me to give this a rating now, as the original albums are all part of the stuff of legends…and besides, having lived through it all, I àm somewhat prejudiced (in favour of the band) about all of this! See you next chapter, though. Tony. |
