VIVIAN CAMPBELL's LAST IN LINE Returns To Studio To Record More Songs For Debut Album

LAST IN LINE — the band featuring DEF LEPPARD guitarist Vivian Campbell alongside fellow founding DIO members Vinny Appice, Jimmy Bain and Claude Schnell, plus singer Andrew Freeman, who has previously fronted HURRICANE and LYNCH MOB — has returned to the studio to record several extra tracks for its debut album.

Says Vivian: "We delivered 10 songs for the LAST IN LINE album, but it turns out the contract requires a couple more. Next time we'll actually read the contract before signing it."

LAST IN LINE's CD will be made available later this year via Frontiers. In a recent interview with Eddie Trunk, Campbell stated about a possible release date for the effort: "The original release date that we were looking for was sometime this spring — April, May kind of thing — but, to be honest, I don't know. We're in discussions with Frontiers now when to possibly release the record, because it doesn't make a lot of sense to put it out there if we're not available to support it. And I've got a really, really big schedule with DEF LEPPARD this year, 'cause LEPPARD have a new record coming up also, backed up by a world tour. So I literally don't have a lot of availability to do LAST IN LINE shows. And it would be a real shame — especially because the record is sounding so much better than we all anticipated — it would be a real shame to just put it out there and let it die. So we are talking with them about possibly trying to find whatever holes there may be in the DEF LEPPARD touring schedule this year to maybe see if it's worthwhile putting together a small run of dates for LAST IN LINE or some press stuff. And if not, we'll just kick it down the road until everyone's available to do it."

Regarding LAST IN LINE's decision to write new material and record an album after initially only playing early DIO classics during their live shows, Vivian said: "It was never really the intention [to write new songs] from the start. Originally, we just wanted to do some gigs and go out and play again, 'cause it was just exhilarating to play with Vinny Appice and Jimmy Bain again. So… I don't know at what stage it changed. But we started jamming some song ideas. And it feels very effortless to create with these guys."

He continued: "The way that we did [DIO's classic debut album] 'Holy Diver' was, for the most part, Jimmy Bain and myself, we were roommates at the time, we would go in the rehearsal room with Vinny, and the three of us would just kick around riff ideas and we'd come up with what we would think would sound like a good verse, a good bridge, a good chorus, and we'd kind of do a loose arrangement. Ronnie would come in. If he liked what we were playing, he was very, very quick in coming up with a melody and a lyric idea, and within 48 hours, we'd have a song done. It was very organic and very, very quick. And the same process is what we employed for this record, and it's worked amazingly. I mean, Jimmy and Vinny and I in a rehearsal room…. Andy's been doing the '[Raiding The] Rock Vault' thing out of Vegas for the last year or so, so he wasn't always available to us. It wasn't that we were excluding him at that initial process, but he just wasn't literally physically there. So we'd do stuff, Vinny'd record it, he'd send MP3s, and next day Andy would show up and he'd have a melody and a lyric. And it's so easy and so effortless to do it. It just kind of seemed like the [natural] progression for us to actually go in and make a record. And then having [producer] Jeff [Pilson] do it was just like a Godsend."

Asked if the LAST IN LINE material sounds like the classic DIO albums, Vivian said: "The majority of it… Well, actually, I wouldn't say the majority of it… I would say a good 50 percent of the songs would sound right at home on those first three DIO albums, and the others have a bit more of a modern edge to them. I mean, when you get Vinny and Jimmy and I playing, it sounds like the early DIO records, 'cause that's what it is. Obviously, Andy is a very, very different singer, he's got a very different instrument, and he writes lyrics very differently. I'm very, very impressed with where Andy has gone lyrically on the record, too; that's another thing. So it's great. It is so epic sounding. We've got some amazing songs on this, and I'm hyper excited about it, as you can probably tell."