(13 On The) Wheels Of Steel: Biff Byford Of Saxon's Favourite LPs | Page 14 of 14 | The Quietus

Baker's Dozen

Artists discuss the 13 records that shaped their lives

13. SaxonSaxon

If you listen to the first Saxon album, you can hear where the band was at that time, and what we were talking about earlier, with Free and Yes. That album is split three ways: the songs we wrote together that were fast and aggressive; then the more proggy tracks, longer and more musical; then blues riffs. So if you listen that album you can see there were three things that could have happened – we could have been like Free or like Yes, or we could play a new, aggressive kind of music, singing about motorcycles, and those were the songs we wrote together. If you listen to that album you could see where our influences came from, and how it all came together to create ‘Wheels Of Steel’. If you listen to ‘Backs To The Wall’, that is where I was coming from – try to get away from where you’re supposed to be and drag yourself out of that to become a musician. ‘Stallions of the Highway’ is maybe the forerunner of ‘Motorcycle Man’ and the songs that Metallica and Megadeth took from and then invented a new kind of music

Previous

Don’t Miss The Quietus Digest

Start each weekend with our free email newsletter.

Help Support The Quietus in 2025

If you’ve read something you love on our site today, please consider becoming a tQ subscriber – our journalism is mostly funded this way. We’ve got some bonus perks waiting for you too.

Subscribe Now