Interview: Former Motörhead Guitarist Phil Campbell Talks Australian Tour – Spotlight Report

Get ready, Australia – rock and roll royalty is heading our way. Former Motörhead guitarist Phil Campbell is bringing the noise down under with his powerhouse band, Phil Campbell and the Bastard Sons.

In this exclusive interview, the legendary axeman talks about what fans can expect from the upcoming tour, the enduring legacy of Lemmy Kilmister, and his unforgettable memories of sharing the stage with the iconic frontman. Whether you’ve banged your head to “Ace of Spades” or are just discovering Campbell’s hard-hitting new chapter, this one’s a must-read for rock and metal fans alike.

SR. Your band and the Kings of the Asylum album are an absolute powerhouse. The album is a ripper, it has old-school raw energy but with a fresh twist. How did you put this album together – How is the Phil Campbell musical process?

PC. Yeah, it’s a really good one. Very proud of that one. We just sort of wrote the songs, in like rehearsals and, when we were happy with them they make the cut.

Luckily, we’ve, got our own studio. My son’s got a recording studio, so we can go there whenever we like. It’s cool because you know, there’s no time limits or anything or no pressure. We just go in and and just bring the songs down over a few weeks, you know?

I’m there playing guitar and Joel (Peters) do the vocals and stuff. Todd (Campbell) produced
the album as well. I think he’s great production on The Kings of the asylum, and I’m really pleased.

I was looking for with this band. You know, the heavy metal, the, you know, classic hard rock. You know, well played, well written, well produced.

SR. The raw energy is there in tracks like “Schizophrenia”…one of our favourites of the album!

PC. We want it to make it as if you are listening to a live band playing, with pure this raw energy as you said. Glad you feel that way.

SR. How excited are you to bringing your live show and the “Kings of the asylum” tunes live on stage here in Australia?

PC. Yeah, we will do some songs from that album, and we’ll do some old rad Motörhead songs as well for people to hear, so it’ll be, it’ll be a good mixture.

I don’t think anyone will go away disappointed (Laughs).

SR. So you’re going to play a lot of Motorhead hits I assume then? How are you going to balance that set-list?

PC. It will sound more like a Motörhead legacy show. We have worked it out. It would be a good a good balance. Maybe a half Motörhead, maybe half, half hour songs like we put a workout,
Which ones go best together and everything.

So, Yeah, we would do it like that, it would be a good set.

SR. You have played some of the most iconic riffs in rock history. Are they any lesser known Motorhead songs that you wish could get more love?

PC. Yeah, it is quite a few actually. I can name them off like, you know, you turn on the radio and just eight times out of ten is Ace of Spades, which is a great song, you know, but there’s so much more
else in the back catalogs, which is really cool as well, which sort of gets overlooked. It’s a bit of a shame really, you know, but there’s not a lot of good songs that get to kind of get overlooked like “Snaggletooth” for example.

SR. As a guitarist, do you still have that one guitar that marked your life, that you still own and you still can’t make let go?

PC. Oh, there’s a lot of them, I won’t let go my original LAG explorer guitar, which I used on a lot of the Motörhead albums and, live a lot. I’ve got so many guitars now and I like them all and some I don’t much. But, you know, I very rarely let that one LAG go.

I’m using some nice Les Pauls at the moment, some Slash’s Les Pauls. Really cool and really good.

I’ve got also an original 57’ custom which is amazing. I don’t really want to take them on
the road in case they got stolen, you know.

SR. In the Australian tour you will get to play these kind of old school intimate venues. Is that your favourite thing to do, does it feel like the old days?

PC. It pumps your heart, your blood…Just jumping on stage and getting a great reaction. You know, given the given the audience the energy we have, you know, and getting the audience giving us the energy back to us…That’s what keeps you going, because of the traveling sucks (Laughs).

You could be in a wonderful place like Australia, but you’ve got no time to go visit anything nice. I mean we; I tried to go to a museum now and again you know, something historic when I can but many times it, there’s no time to do these things, you know. So you’re basically just traveling all the time. But, definitely being on stage is the best.

“Lemmy always wanted the ticket price to be for everyone. He always wanted a working man to be able to afford one of our tickets”

SR. Let’s talk legacy and influence. Obviously the legacy – your legacy – with Motorhead is unmistakable. How do you feel about the fact that Lemmy is sadly not with us anymore, the band still remains hailed as one of the biggest in history and still has this ongoing influence, with new generations?

PC. I think it’s great to be influenced by bands, you know, that’s a good thing.

We just did our thing, you know? We didn’t we didn’t set out to try and influence people. We just did our jobs. All we wanted to do in Motorhead, was to be a bit different. We did sound a bit different and, our attitude was a different,

I guess people appreciate the honesty of, of the group and, it goes it goes a long way.

We’ve always wanted like Lemmy said, he always wanted the ticket price to be for everyone. He always wanted a working man to be able to afford one of our tickets, which is very important.

Now we have like $350 tickets, you know…it’s crazy! He (Lemmy) always wanted a regular working man to be able to come to one of our shows. You know, stuff like that it’s really cool and, that’s all we were about.

I saw what Lemmy was about, and he saw what I was all about too…it was great. It was, it was a different type of band, you know, which I think is quite unique, as you probably know as a whole.

SR. I would never forget seeing you guys in 2011 at Luna Park here in Sydney and one of the things that really stayed with me was me is the fact that Lemmy keeps pumping the speakers up and up until they were about to explode saying “WE ARE MOTORHEAD AND WE PLAY F** ROCK AND ROLL!”. That was probably one of the greatest shows I seen live.

PC. He loved to do that…you know plenty of times the speakers blew out (Laughs)

SR. Speaking of touring with Motorhead. What would you say are your most fond memories you have about touring and working with Lemmy?

PC. Every day was great. Really. We’d, first of all, like, we’d have a blast on stage. We’d have a giggle.

Even the times things would go wrong we just laugh about it on stage and we give it our best. We’d give it our best every night.

“Lemmy was a unique person. There’s no one who will ever be like him”

On the tour busses, we’d have some fun and, you know, play jokes on people. Yeah, we had all of us in, in the band, you got to have a sense of humour in this business, especially if you’re in Motörhead.

It was, it was just great hanging out with them every day. Lemmy was a unique person. There’s no one who will ever be like him it was an honour and a pleasure. I was lucky to be one of the guys to be able to do that job alongside him.

SR. I personally had the pleasure to meet Lemmy once too. One of the things I remember about him is how true he was as a person, no egos, very humble and generous with his time despite his status as rock god.

PC. Yeah, I loved that about him too. Anyone could go and say hello and talk to him. He was never surrounded by bodyguards or anything, you know.

“Look at the so call Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. That’s a joke!, there is barely rock and roll
in the Hall of Fame, though.”

SR. What do you think Lemmy would say about the current state of the rock industry if he were here today?

PC. He would probably say “there is some good stuff, but mostly everything is shit”. There’s a lot of Auto-Tune for money. We never use auto-tune and we are proud, we were our own auto-tune (Laughs).

Look at the so call Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. That’s a joke!, there is barely rock and roll
in the Hall of Fame, though.

People like Beyonce getting there? I could not believe that! It’s like a popularity contest now.It’s getting worse every year and.

Imagine seeing like rappers getting inducted before the likes of Judas Priest and things like that. It’s bad really bad. I don’t think anyone, anyone takes it seriously any more!

SR. Just to start wrapping up. What fans can expect about your shows here Down Under?

PC. Every night will be loud and if the tour goes well, maybe in two years’ time we can come back and do slightly bigger places, but I don’t, I don’t mind the place we play.

You know, you can have a, you can play a stadium but you can be horrible and you can play a little sweaty club and it could be fantastic.

As long as, as long as the energy from the fans is there It doesn’t matter where you play really…and obviously we will play a lot of Motorhead hits.

SR. What will you say is your favorite Motorhead song to play live.

PC. So hard, as I just enjoy playing good old songs. Obviously, Ace of spades always got everyone going crazy. There’s too many to say. Really.

SR. Can you share with us some of the weirdest items you have signed for fans alongside Lemmy?

PC. Funny one was when we got ask to sign someone’s ass. We signed quite a few breasts from all sizes (Laughs). We also signed prosthetic leg a few times.

We also signed motorbikes. You never know what’s going to show up.

SR. Just to finish, do you have any message for your Australian fans ahead of the tour.

PC. It’d be our first time coming down. So, get your tickets early, okay? And, we’re going to rock your asses off, and we’ll see you then. Just make sure you’re there!