THIN LIZZY Guitarist Says Name Change 'Takes A Little Of The Pressure Off'

RockFusion recently conducted an interview with THIN LIZZY and BLACK STAR RIDERS members Ricky Warwick (vocals) and Damon Johnson (guitar). A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

RockFusion: Damon, you've worked with some huge acts in the past. How does playing with THIN LIZZY compare with the likes of ALICE COOPER?

Damon: Alice is arguably one of the greatest showmen of all time. I didn't know that that would be such an incredible learning experience for me. On paper, I just thought I was going to go in and be his guitar player. The guy had 20 guitar players throughout his career. But Alice really makes a point to get the guitarist upfront, he's not precious about his area of the stage. I'll always feel like Alice prepared me for an opportunity like this. I don't think I would've been ready for this five years ago. I grew up on Alice's music as well, but it was just a different intensity with LIZZY and Alice knew that. He was my first phone call after the guys called me about joining and he knew that THIN LIZZY were truly a massive influence for me and he was truly supportive. It's pretty awesome, man, to have ALICE COOPER and THIN LIZZY on your résumé; it's not something you'd even dream about.

RockFusion: Recently, you announced you won't be continuing full time under the THIN LIZZY name anymore. What's happening with the new band and the new album? Is there anything you can tell us?

Ricky: Well, we're not going to tour as constantly as we have been as THIN LIZZY. There's a good chance we will do a few shows every year as THIN LIZZY. Basically, we'd decided we didn't want to put the album out under the THIN LIZZY name. It's something we'd thought long and hard about. We'd spoke to Phil's [Lynott, late THIN LIZZY frontman] estate, friends, family, Scott [Gorham, guitar] and Brian [Downey, drums] and we just came to the conclusion there was something not right about it. I think we made the right decision when we decided to go under a different name. The people that still want to tour and do 125 shows a year will be in [BLACK STAR RIDERS] and we'll be playing about 60-70% THIN LIZZY songs in that set with the new material, to start with. There'll be a four-page spread in January's Classic Rock and we'll be heading into the studio on January 3rd with Kevin Shirley and it'll be out on Nuclear Blast. All the pieces are put together and ready to go.

Damon: For every single classic rock band, there's still that need to continue to tour, and to continue to grow as a band to reach your fans, it's important to put out some new music. In the instance with THIN LIZZY, it's an incredibly unique situation, I mean, you're talking about a band who hasn't had an album of new original material since 1983. That's a long time! And now we've changed the direction of the ship a little bit, we're really excited! It's just right, man. It takes a little of the pressure off. There's no way this new record would be able to stand up to these timeless classic records. That's such a tall order, and Phil was such a massive part of the songwriting; he was a songwriting wizard. As Ricky said, we're really elated that everything has just come together in terms of the recording, the schedule and we're hoping to have it out by May next year.

Read the entire interview from RockFusion.