In an interview with Trust In Rock, Saxon frontman Biff Byford shared his memories of Saxon’s early days, and their first tour. The frontman was asked about his greatest memory in metal. He reflected on the 1979 tour with Motörhead, saying it influenced Saxon’s view of the rock and roll lifestyle.
“It was the first tour we ever did, the first time we ever went on a tour bus. And they invited us on the bus to travel with them. And we were very naive Yorkshire lads then, and, well, still are, probably, but back in the day we had not seen the sort of glam side of it. We traveled to London,” he explained.
“And they came out of the ‘Top Of The Pops’ studio with about seven girls… It was the first time we’d ever seen that many sort of groupies, I suppose you’d call them. And it was a bit of an eye-opener, actually,” Byford recalled.
The rocker shared his gratitude and added: “It was a great time, and they helped us a lot in our early career, Motörhead. They were big friends of ours and remained friends forever, but I always remember that first tour we did with Motörhead.”
Byford previously talked about his experience of touring with Motörhead too. He detailed what he learned from the tour. “I’ll tell you what we did: We started meeting fans after the show in the venue because that’s what Motörhead used to do,” he revealed in another interview. “Lemmy said, ‘Never forget your fans, and if people have paid money, if they’re waiting outside in the snow and in the cold, then bring them in the venue and sign the autographs in there.'”
The singer added: “So, we started doing that, specifically, after Motörhead did it. They gave me some bullet belts. We used to wear bullet belts in them days, so I used to start wearing bullet belts as part of the Bullet Belt Club. So, yeah, it was very leather jacket and jeans and bullet belts and studs. It was very rock and roll but metal, really. What can I say?”
Saxon is going on tour, starting in Bremen, Germany on February 4. The tour is to wrap up in Düsseldorf, Germany on March 6.
