Iron Maiden’s Steve Harris Talks About Bass Solos

It’s not very rare to see musicians reacting to other bands’ and musicians’ work. And when the reacting person is a very important and famous face in the industry, people really like to see that sort of reacts. And today we are going to talk about that kind of situation. During an interview with Metal Hammer, Iron Maiden’s Steve Harris -known as the bassist, keyboardist, backing vocalist, primary songwriter, and founder/leader of the heavy metal band Iron Maiden– shared his opinions on some bass solos. During the conversation, Steve Harris talked about his all-time favorite bass solo and more.

First, he talked about his favorite. For all the time during the conversation, Harris talked very highly about Mr. Big from Free. (Transcribed by Ultimate Guitar)

“I absolutely love Free, they were a massive part of my life, and I have all their albums.

“‘Highway’ is probably my favorite, but ‘Free Live!’ is great too. They’re one of the few bands that I loved growing up that I never got to see live, so I listened to this a lot.

“Bassist Andy Fraser was a big influence on me, and I’m not usually a big fan of bass solos, but the bass solo on ‘Mr. Big’ is amazing.

“I actually saw him play with the Andy Fraser Band, with Martin Turner’s brother Kim on drums, on their first album, and he could sing just like singer Paul Rodgers, but it wasn’t the same as seeing Free.”

Free is not the only band Steve Harris talked highly of during the conversation. At a different point in the same conversation, he also talked about Genesis and their 1972 studio album Foxtrot. He explained how he first got introduced to Genesis, how he admires them, and how magical they are:

“My introduction to Genesis came when someone at school recommended the ‘Trespass’ album to me. I got into that and then bought ‘Nursery Cryme’ and ‘Foxtrot’ after that.

“‘Supper’s Ready’ is the closing track on ‘Foxtrot’ and the band threw everything bar the kitchen sink into it: it’s an incredible piece of music. I saw Genesis live on the ‘Foxtrot’ tour and they were amazing.

“The Peter Gabriel-era albums still give me goosebumps, and I was devastated when he left the band.

“‘A Trick of the Tail’ was a great album to be fair, and ‘Wind & Wuthering’ is decent too, but when guitarist Steve Hackett left too it wasn’t really the same for me. They’re still a good band, but those early albums are magical.”