Label: Parlophone
Release date: 17.01.2020
Album length: 60.16 min
Production: Steve Harris
Genre: Heavy Metal
Rating: 6.5 / 10
Anyone who knows the debut from British Lion, the project Iron Maiden bassist Steve Harris wanted to get off the ground back in the first half of the nineties but which only came out in 2012, probably got a reality check, because the album served up mixed feelings, precisely thanks to its patchy vocals, and so they didn’t have overly high expectations for the new album either.
And indeed, what its successor »The Burning« delivers didn’t let those expectations down in the slightest. British Lion write music that will definitely appeal to all the die-hard Iron Maiden devotees, but not necessarily to those who count themselves as Iron Maiden fans but wouldn’t exactly go to the wall for them, since they can be critical of the band’s music too, if need be.
It’s great to see Harris so full of burning ambition and creative urge in his later years, creating instead of treating himself to some downtime between the two legs of the »Legacy Of the Beast« tour. He used that time for recording and releasing a new »British Lion« album too. There’s about an hour of new music, running along the lines of seventies heavy rock and the Iron Maiden way of writing songs. Tracks like Spit Fire or the title track could have come out on any of the post-millennium Maiden albums.
So. Three-part harmonies soaring above classic metal phrasing, heavy rock »looseness«, the classic seasoning of middle-eight passages with split solos from both guitarists. The execution is very good, the songs written on the back of extremely long mileage and experience, and for that reason they sound pretty routine, though as compositions they leave no room for blunders. The production largely follows that of the Iron Maiden albums too, and you’ve already guessed that Harris’s bass clearly »stares« out of the sound picture, but British Lion are a noticeably softer-sounding outfit than Iron Maiden.
The problem is Richie Taylor again, since his singing, already on the opener Citiy Of Fallen Angels, suits a »U2 tribute« more than a heavy metal band. The melodic lines he picks are very well chosen and carry the potential to take the songs to a bombastic crescendo in the chorus hooks. The Burning would fire on all cylinders, say, if Dickinson were singing it. Taylor is simply too weak a singer, and that has to be admitted. He’d be better off singing in an alternative rock outfit if he loves it so much, but here the old buddy network comes into play, sticking together and shielding Taylor within the band like a hockey team protects its goalie. So the songs carry nice potential, but Taylor’s »meowing« simply can’t take them where decisive, authoritative and explosive melodic singing would. Sadly, Taylor just doesn’t reach the vocal standards of most of today’s bands in the genre, and that’s the tipping point that decides British Lion will never win any real appeal or interest from the more demanding fans of classic heavy metal, who of course listen to Iron Maiden among other things. Only the biggest Iron Maiden fanatics. Maybe that isn’t even the basic point of the project.
In short. There’s too much music in the world that’s better than what British Lion have put out on both albums. It’s been made, it’s being made and it will be made. So the verdict stays the same as with the debut. Worth a try, and after that, whether you take the album or leave it comes down strictly to your criteria, and yours alone.
author: Aleš Podbrežnik
