Page 24 - Classic Rock (January 2020)

Phil Lynott (left) and
“I was never happy with it,” he says. “I always thought when
I had the time and the money I would go back and record these
songs properly. And I wanted to carry on. I wanted to write new
Grand Slam songs. I wanted it to be a real band.”
His first opportunity came in 2016 when Grand Slam were
asked to appear at the Sweden Rock festival. This version
included original keyboard player Stanway, but bears little
resemblance to the band it would become.
“We did a couple of warm-up gigs and then we did the festival,
but it was really just a project band,” he explains. “In fact we didn’t
even really play very many Grand Slam songs. So it was different.”
t that point, Archer’s retirement from music
was clearly over. He had recently played with
Aa revamped Stampede, and with Juicy Lucy, “I actually wrote
and even with members of his era of UFO called, Dedication for
sensibly enough, ex-UFO.
“It wasn’t too much of a shock playing music again,” Stampede, and they
he says. "It’s not like I was coming out of a deep, dark used it as this ‘lost’
hole. I saw the opportunity to finally do Grand Slam the
right way.” 1976-era Thin Lizzy
A year later, he had solidified a new line-up of Grand
Slam, including former Praying Mantis drummer Benjy track for the music
Reid, former Quireboys bassist Dave Boyce, and vocalist video. I had no idea.”
Mike Dyer who had previously played with Archer in
a band called Rhode Island Red.
Laurence Archer
“I first got the call from Laurence on Christmas
2017,” Dyer recalls. “He said: ‘We have some unfinished business.’ I
figured he had lost the plot, maybe. I think he had heard my voice,
but not seen me for awhile, because at that point I was twenty-
one stone. And my little boy said: “Dad, you’ve gotta go do this,
but you’ve got to lose weight because you look like an Easter egg
[laughs]. So basically I’ve spent the past four hundred days going to
the gym, getting in shape, because the set warrants that, the pace of
it. It’s so bloody powerful.”
Dyer is best known at this point for theatre, not rock’n’roll, but
Archer was sure he was the man for the job.
24 CLASSICROCKMAGAZINE.COM
Laurence Archer with
Grand Slam in 1984/5.
“He was in Phantom Of The Opera, all kinds of things,” says
Archer. “He had really developed his voice. And I didn’t want a Paul
Rodgers or a Bruce Dickinson for this. I mean, Phil didn’t sing like
that. Phil had his own thing. He had a great voice, great phrasing,
and it was very melodic. That’s what I was looking for. I thought
Mike was the right man for the job.”
“When I did theatre, people would go: ’This guy thinks he’s some
kind of rock’n’roll madman,’” Dyer says, laughing. “And honestly,
it’s true. I’m a born rocker.”
Just as well, as Dyer is, after all, replacing perhaps the greatest
frontman there’s ever been in rock’n’roll.
“My first run-in with Thin Lizzy was when I went
backstage at their show at Liverpool Empire as a chubby
fourteen-year-old kid to get Phil to sign my copy of Black
Rose,” Dyer remembers. “They were all really kind to me.
But yeah, I have lost a lot of sleep just thinking about
how to fill this role. When Laurence first asked me to
do it, I said: ‘I can’t do this. I can’t fill his shoes.’ Then my
little boy said: ‘Dad, you’ve got loads of shoes, you’ve got
loads of boots. You can just wear your own’ [laughs].
I thought about it, and I thought, you know, he’s right.”
“I didn’t wanna have a band that lasted for nine
months or one tour then it was over,” Archer explains.
“I wanted it to be a proper band. I said from the start
I wanted a four-way split, where everybody has equal
input. And I’m very happy with it. I think the band looks
great, I think the band sounds great, and I think the new
songs are great. This is four guys that are really dedicated to being
in a band called Grand Slam. I’m bringing in the heritage with
the old songs, but we’ve also got new songs. In fact we’re halfway
through writing the second album right now.”
In the meantime, Grand Slam plan on touring far and wide.
“I feel deep in my heart that Phil would be proud of this band,”
says Dyer. And on the strength of Hit The Ground, he most surely
would be.
Hit The Ground is out now via Marshall Records. GETTY