English hard rock band, British Lion, have announced a 15-date UK and European tour. The tour will take place between May and July 2023. The tour includes 13 headline tour dates and festival appearances at Sweden Rock and Hellfest, which were announced prior to the tour. During the tour, the band will be supported by Airforce, Stray and DarkTribe. The band embarked on an 11-date UK tour in January of this year, where they toured in Glasgow, Nuneaton, Sheffield, Carlisle, Huddersfield, Swansea, Southend, Brighton, Dover, London and Norwich. British Lion founder, Steve Harris commented “We just had a brilliant time on the January UK tour and it’s great to be heading out again in 2023. I’m really looking forward to BOTH Summer tours this year!”
British Lion consists of bass guitarist and keyboardist Steve Harris, lead vocalist Richard Taylor, guitarist and keyboardist David Hawkins, guitarist Grahame Leslie and drummer Simon Dawson. The band are signed to German-British record label, Parlophone. Steve Harris is best known for being the bassist in award winning British heavy metal band, Iron Maiden. British Lion were founded as a side-project by Steve Harris in 2012 and have released two studio albums, self titled album British Lion (2012) and The Burning (2020).
The British Lion tour is designed around the Iron Maiden’s 2023 tour schedule, as Steve Harris will also be touring with Iron Maiden this summer. Iron Maiden’s ‘The Future Past’ European tour will also begin in May 2023 and carry on into the August. No support acts for their shows have been released as of yet. Steve Harris has appeared on all 17 of Iron Maiden’s studio albums, self titled album Iron Maiden (1980), Killers (1981), The Number of the Beast (1982), Piece of Mind (1983), Powerslave (1984), Somewhere in Time (1986), Seventh Son of a Seventh Son (1988), No Prayer for the Dying (1990), Fear of the Dark (1992), The X Factor (1995), Virtual XI (1998), Brave New World (2000), Dance of Death (2006), The Final Frontier (2010), The Book of Souls (2015) and Senjutsu (2021).
Iron Maiden was created by bassist, Steve Harris in 1975, taking the band five years to release their self titled debut album. The bassist was an architectural draughtsman, in London, before finding success in the band. In an interview in 2020 for Nights with Alice Cooper, Harris explained ”Well, straight after school, really, I went straight into that job. I did my college stuff and on the weekends, two nights a week, I made sure I got qualified to a certain degree because I thought, If the band don’t work, then I’ll have something to fall back on.”
Steve Harris has gone on to form great success in both Iron Maiden and British Lion and the upcoming tours for both bands are expected to be a triumph.
British Lion UK & European 2023 Tour Dates:
27/05/2023 – Cvetlicarna – Ljubljana
02/06 – Pakkahuone – Tampere
06/06 – Ole Bull Scene – Bergen
08/06 – Sweden Rock – Solvesborg
12/06– Kamienna 12 – Krakow
16/06 – Hellfest – Clisson
20/06 – Capitol – Hannover
23/06 – Opium – Dublin
29/06 – Rebellion – Manchester
02/07 – Rescue Rooms – Nottingham
10/07 – Q Factory – Amsterdam
14/07– Legend – Milan
19/07 – Garaje Beat Club – Murcia
24/07 – FZW – Dortmund
30/07 – Backstage Halle – Munich
Tickets for the tour are on sale now. To access tickets, click here.
