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| "Too Wild To Tame"! AVENGER Rock Northumbria University'. |
Let’s face
it, when you look back at the great NORTH EAST New Wave Of British Heavy Metal,
there are a number of outfits that will and shall forever remain household
names. Whole heartedly synonymous, inextricably linked, if you will. AVENGER
are certainly one of those bands, and original drummer - Gary Young, is still
very much its ‘leader’! I caught up with him after he and his metal - troops headlined
the first night of BroFest#1.
“Gary
“Yes, there certainly seems to be a healthy renewed interest in the bands,
and even the whole fashion and spirit of the era too. Maybe it’s down to
younger people researching the whole scene, through coming across albums from
the time. I certainly did a bit of that myself back in the day. Checking out
the bands and their music that were quite a way before my time, so to speak. It
never led to a revival as we are currently seeing though, and that gives this
an even more special significance I think.”
“I refer to this RockBlog as a “Return to the Matrix Of Metal Mayhem”, referring to then Sounds Editor – Geoff Barton’s phrase describing Wallsend all those years ago. It must have been great to have been on ‘the scene’ in the North East at the time with Neat Records, all the bands etc, tell us what it was like back in the day?”
“Well
I’m from Wallsend myself; and my first job was working at Neat records which
gave me a really cool window on the whole developing scene. I managed to meet
and become friends with a hell of a lot of the bands, recording engineers,
managers and crew member. This was a tremendous forum for a sixteen year old
metal band wannabe like myself! To become educated about being in bands and that
whole developing scene. I would work with the bands during the week, and go to
see them playing live at the weekend. Helping out doing stage crew and getting
pissed and having fun! Through this, I actually managed to play in quite a few
NWOBHM bands at the time too, including Marauder, Unter Den Linden, obviously
Avenger and there was a spell in Blitzkrieg. They were certainly great times as
the scene gathered momentum, it was just really very exiting to see bands
playing pubs one week, then touring the USA
“Was it a case or ‘so near and yet so far’ for
Avenger though, like a lot of those great North East - NWOBHM bands?”
“Well I think we always tried to be philosophical about being “near” - if you get my drift. I don’t think we were focused on an ultimate goal; it was more of a case of having primary objectives. Like a recording session one week, or a festival date in Holland the next month and generally playing and trying to become better musicians and song writers. In hindsight, I think our potential was never exploited fully by our label - financially. We played all over Europe and toured in
“Avenger have certainly had quite a few line up changes over the years,
can you give us a bit of a lowdown on previous Avenger members, who they were,
where they went, what they’re doing now?”
“It’s
curious how line-up changes are such a profound issue within NWOBHM bands isn’t
it? When say, our ‘rock gods’ have as many, yet it seems acceptable for the big
bands, not so much of an issue! Look at Maiden for example, over the years they’ve
had what?... Two drummers, four guitarists. How many singers?? Paul Day, Paul
Dianno, Bruce, Blaze Bailey then Bruce again. I think generally looking at the time
scale, Avenger are pretty typical in terms of line up changes. However let’s
look at our principle former members. First Brian Ross our original vocalist. Like
myself Brian has done the rounds of NWOBHM bands not only with Avenger, but
Satan, Blitzkrieg, Lone Wolf, and Unter Den Linden, and Brian is as everyone
knows, is still singing with both Blitzkrieg and Satan at this current time.
Then what was the principle Avenger nucleus of Ian Swift, and Mick Moore along with myself. Ian was still with us until fairly recently, he left to join a band playing more seventies orientated hard rock. He’s recently left that band too. Mick was with the band in the early period of us reforming, he played several festivals with us, and did a
“I need to
broach something that came up at BroFest regarding the current Avenger, if
that’s OK…… There were one or two (quite literally) dissenting voices in the
hall after your set, complaining about the fact that TODAY’s Avenger bears
little or no relevance to the original band, and that your set-list should
contain more of the classic tracks. I personally enjoyed your set as you know,
and I found those criticisms a bit harsh, but how do you respond now, with the
benefit of reflection. Did those folks have a point, or not?”
“After the show, especially with getting such a warm reception, we were surprised buy these one or two comments. How many NWOBHM bands have 100% original line ups today? Lets consider for example Black Rose, Jaguar, Tygers of Pan Tang, Diamond Head, Blitzkrieg and Battleaxe, to name a few. They are all down to one or two original members; does that make those bands irrelevant? I’m not saying for one moment that I am a NWOBHM personality of the stature of say - Brian Ross. But within Avenger I am a founding member, a part of the song writing nucleus (both originally and currently). I personally designed all the single and album artwork on all of our releases. On the whole I was a hell of a lot more active within the original line-up and now sustaining the band than most drummers perhaps are. The current line up has nearly ten years within the ranks now. Liam Thompson being our longest ever serving guitarist. Sean Jefferies the second longest. The current line up, with the exception of Roddy was carefully assembled by me and Ian Swift. We wanted to be complimentary to the original material and the future writing of new material. Keeping it in the same vein and style, so naturally I don’t agree with those one or two people and neither do the audiences we play to in many countries every year. As far as the set was concerned, we did twelve songs from the first two albums and six newer songs. So the majority of the set was old material, what we would regard from other shows as everyone’s favourites. Those are pieced together through requests from many shows and we honestly thought we had included all the classics. Due to the venues curfew however, we didn’t have time to play ‘Under the Hammer’ but that wasn’t really within our control. I have to admit the highlight of the whole gig for me personally was everyone singing the lyrics back at us, so really those criticisms were as you say, a tiny minority on what was a great night overall for Avenger. ”
“And so to
the future then, other than Bro-Fest, what has the latest incarnation of the
band been up to over the last year or so, and what’s in store for the rest of
2014 and beyond, will there be gigs and new songs released this year?”
“Ah!...The
future !!!!! Well, our current line up has been busy playing in Germany and Spain
since the New Year and we have also played a few UK Brazil Belgium Diamond Head ,
Manila Road
AVENGER'S Gary Young was in conversation with Mark Gregory - NWOBHM Author of "No Sleep Till Saltburn". PREVIEW and BUY the paperback here:
CHECK OUT AVENGER "LIVE" - RIGHT HERE!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spjQMrS-_o8
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