SAXON Releases Lyric Video For 'Witches Of Salem'

British heavy metal legends SAXON have release the official lyric video for "Witches Of Salem", the fourth single from the band's critically acclaimed 24th studio album, "Hell, Fire And Damnation", which came out on January 19 via Silver Lining Music.

"Hell, Fire And Damnation" is an album which sees SAXON investigate all areas of history and mystery amidst ten of their most confident and thunderously powerful songs yet. In "Witches Of Salem", lead singer and founding member Biff Byford explores the unjust condemnation of the women victimized at the Salem witch trials and the sheer bigotry and mass hysteria prevalent at the time.

"This is an American story, but the witch trials started in Scotland, spread into England and across the sea to the colonies in America. Those poor women in Salem," explains Byford, "they weren't 'witches' more than just unfortunate women, really, blamed for everybody's ailments... whether your horse died, or the milk went sour, they blamed women. Maybe because they were jealous of them, or maybe it was because some guy had made some advances and she'd told him to piss off, so he'd declare that she was a witch. And once a person was declared a witch, I don't think there was any way back from that; very few of them were found innocent."

On "Hell, Fire And Damnation", Biff delivers his richest vocals in years, Nigel Glockler and Nibbs Carter on drums and bass, respectively, lay down the rhythmic law with bombastic power, and the guitars of Doug Scarratt and Brian Tatler are fresh and fiery, a perfect complement to each other, carrying an overall energy and fury which will have fans salivating. Musically, SAXON bring it all to the table. There's a furious tribute to actual heavy metal in the denim-and-leather-coated super-sprint "Fire And Steel", a wonderful nod to the NWOBHM's birth in the electric mid-pace "Pirates Of The Airwaves", but maybe the true treasure amidst the jewels is "There's Something In Roswell", with the sort of expansive groove and embrace which deserves arenas.

Produced by Andy Sneap (JUDAS PRIEST, EXODUS, ACCEPT) and Byford, with Sneap mixing and mastering, "Hell, Fire And Damnation" strides the perfect line between confident, current power, and gloriously irreverent flexing of the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal muscle which SAXON co-created.

"I think this album's one of the best he's done sound-wise, and he's done a lot of albums," Biff declared. "It has a really raw, vibrant sound... if you compress the total time making this album, it was four weeks tops… you can hear everything brilliantly, nothing's overcomplicated, nothing's over compressed. The guitar sounds are fucking immense, they're just great, raw guitar sounds. And we haven't done a lot of overdubbing on there, it's just playing. I really, really like it."

Early last year, SAXON guitarist Paul Quinn announced that he was stepping back from touring with the band. As a result of his decision, SAXON canceled its April 2023 South American tour as well as the appearance at the Monsters Of Rock cruise. Quinn has since been replaced on the road by DIAMOND HEAD's Brian Tatler.

Brian has already joined fellow guitarist Doug Scarratt, drummer Nigel Glockler, bassist Tim "Nibbs" Carter and Byford for a number of shows in late 2023 and early 2024, but will continue to be a member of DIAMOND HEAD.

Byford and Quinn are the sole remaining original members in SAXON's current lineup.

Originally from South Yorkshire, England, SAXON has gone on to sell about 23 million albums and has produced such classic songs as "Denim And Leather", "Princess Of The Night", "Wheels Of Steel" and "Power And Glory".

SAXON will join forces with URIAH HEEP for the "Hell, Fire & Chaos - The Best Of British Rock & Metal" U.S. tour, set to kick off on April 23 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.