In a recent interview with BW&BK; scribe Carl Begai about his new B-Sides compilation, Toronto-based rocker Danko Jones discussed his band's recent UK tour supporting MOTÖRHEAD with SAXON.

“It ranks up there in my top two tours," Jones says of the tour, which ran from the beginning on November 2008 and finished in December in Europe. "It was great, and one of the reasons why was that we’d do a 30 minute set and then get to hang with Motörhead (laughs). It was almost like a vacation because we’re used to going 75 minutes a night, there’s a lot of pressure being the headliner, but when you open up for two bands you actually like – Saxon and Motörhead – and you get to hang with the bands and the crew for the whole day leading up to the show, it’s a luxury. It was awesome, I’ve gotta say. If there was any other band than Saxon it would have been a cool tour, but having Saxon next door to you backstage for five weeks is great."

As for how the tour came about, it was a matter of time and fate playing nice for a change.

"We’d been running into the band and crew at festivals and stuff over the years. We know some of their crew and for a while they were trying to get us on a bill with Motörhead, Lemmy came out to see a show in 2003, we’d run in to Phil Campbell here or Mikkey Dee there, so there’s always been this thing with us and Motörhead. They’d asked us to tour a couple times before but for whatever reason things fell through, but this time it worked out."

And how was it opening for two of the UK's finest long-standing rock acts at home?

“We’re known in England, but not enough to fill the venues we were playing with Motörhead. There were a lot of people in the crowds that had heard of us, but there were also a lot of people who hadn’t. The thing is, England is home turf for Motörhead and Saxon, and doing three weeks with them I noticed that the audience gives support acts three songs. During those three songs they’re looking at you like you can go fuck yourself, and if you don’t win them over they’ll tell you to fuck off. We got ‘em every night. We did ‘Code Of The Road’, ‘Samuel Sin’ and ‘Play The Blues’ as our first three songs and by the end of the set everyone kinda had a smile of their face and were loosened up. Right up to the last show, though, it was scary going out to face that kind of crowd (laughs). I like that, though, because they were fair.”
“I love that as long as it’s fair," Jones continues. "We’ve been in front of audiences where they start booing even before we started playing. I remember this one show – it was actually in Toronto – where we were opening for this big band at the time, and it was last minute so we weren’t advertised as playing the gig. The audience didn’t know who we were, I was setting up my guitar, and they started booing. They didn’t even know who was playing. It’s like, if we suck that’s one thing, but you don’t even know who sucks (laughs). The Motörhead crowds were tough but always fair, and if you won them over you won them big. By the end of the set it was always great and the crowd was very respectful."

“There were a couple moments when we were tested, though. There was a guy at one show, he brought his Saxon flag and he was in the front row. In between the songs of our set he’d yell out ‘SAXON!’, so I looked at him and addressed him straight up, and he was cool. By the end of the set he was trying to show me that we’d won him over by yelling ‘DANKO!’. Message received, thank you (laughs).”

Watch for the full story in BW&BK; #114.