LILLIAN AXE guitarist Steve Blaze is featured in a new interview with Guitar International. An excerpt is available below.

Q: I read somewhere that the big question is “When’s Lillian gonna get there big break?” And personally, I think you have had great success. I mean, you didn’t sell as many albums as METALLICA did last year, but have you checked out the comments on your YouTube videos?

Steve: "Yeah, I do."

Q: You guys have so many fans talking you up. I think that’s a success in itself.

Steve: "Thanks, man. And that’s another thing, to me, success is relative, and we’ve had great success to be around 22 years and putting out our tenth album. And the fans and stories and dedication, it’s success at a commercially lesser level than I feel we deserve or than I’d like, and that really stems from just wanting to continue to do it.

A lot of people don’t understand that bands just don’t wanna sit back and have this lavish life style and make billions of dollars and live it up. No, it’s because they wanna be able to do things like pay back their record company, tour, make another record, be able to give 100 percent at their shows. Some people don’t understand the expense just in touring and the way the live scene is now.

If you don’t have tour support, you’re screwed. I’d like to have the commercial success so that we’re ensured that we are gonna be able to continue to do everything we wanna do musically. That’s a big, big, big ‘if’ there because if you don’t sell enough records and your label doesn’t have enough money you don’t get to do another record. Those things are important, but you’re absolutely right, success is relative and we’ve been successful on many different levels, and that’s been a major fuel behind our fire. We’ve got people that really get it out there. Now let’s get more people to get it. That’s the goal here."

Click here for more.

Blaze recently spoke with Bravewords.com correspondent Deb Rao about the band's new album, Deep Red Shadows:

"I really like beginning and endings. Even at concerts. My favorite parts of concerts are when the band starts to run at the very end of it. I like drama. I like the big finale and the big intros and those emotional type things. I always try hit them hard in the beginning and tie up everything nicely at the end. So that after they finish listening to the record they can sit back and take a deep breathe. And soak in what they just experienced."

Steve Blaze on upcoming tour: "It is going to be a little bit from each album. We are going to be doing 'Under The Same Moon', 'The Quenching Of Human Life'. '47 Ways To Die', 'Waters Rising', 'Show A Little Love’,’ Nocturnal Symphony’,'Misery Loves Company', True Believer.' It is about 18 songs that cover the entire career of the band. Derrick finishes up on July 31. So all of the July shows he will be doing."

Steve Blaze on the rebirth of the band: "A couple of months ago we were inducted into the Louisiana Hall of Fame. Which was a big honor for us because we were the first Hard Rock band to be inducted ever. We got our awards and we played and performed. We were alongside JERRY LEE LEWIS, AND LITTLE RICHARD, CHUBBY CHECKER, FATS DOMINO, LOUISIANA LA'RUE lots and lots of great artists from different genres but no hard rock. We were the first band to get inducted and I am very honored by that. The album comes out July 20th. The single is '47 ways To Die.' I am very excited about getting out on the road not only with Derrick but also with the new member Ronny Munroe. It is a nice boost and a new shoot in the armed force. I can't wait to see everybody out on the road."

Steve Blaze Dissects Deep Red Shadows Track-By-Track

'Under The Same Moon': "It tells a story of an actual individual being transformed into a vampire. The whole physical and emotional changes that he goes through as he watches his last sunset and realizes that all of his loved ones will now be gone from him. His entire life will change. The pains of falling in love with people that going through life that will already die as you go on. The curse of immortality. It is a very dynamic, passionate roller coaster ride of a song. Actually, my personal favorite on the record."

'47 Ways To Die': "Is about mankind’s penchant for trying to kill itself all of the time. We have become a society that we do so many things to get ahead. We are so greedy and selfish that we don't care and the reality is that we sell ourselves and we hurt ourselves in getting to that one goal. So many people around the planet have turned so selfish. There are a lot of wonderful people on this planet but at the same token, I see us at a downward spiral because quite frankly, individuals in all societies have started to become really self indulgent and self absorbed. As we get like that everybody is trying to be the best looking, the richest, the best in their field. You see people going to no ends to get to those situations for themselves. In the meantime, they leave a wake of hurt people behind them. Basically, they kill themselves physically and spiritually at the same token. 47 ways is just an arbitrary number showing there is so many different ways that we can kill ourselves and there is only really one-way to live. If man can screw himself up, he will find a way to do it."

'The Quenching Of Human Life': "This song is about how frail this life is and how easily we can lose it. Time waits for no man. Time is going to go on. You make the best of it with what you will. It is all up to us to do what we can do to make our lives better. You can't blame other people. You have to move forward because life is so fragile and so easily extinguished and taken from us."

'A Minute Of Years': "It is about the curse of immortality. You can't appreciate life if you don't have death involved. You can't appreciate goodness with bad. There is no reference point. What if we were given the gift of immortality and we could live forever? What kind of pains would that put you through?"

'Nobody Knows' (acoustic): "This was on the first album. A lot of people thought that was going to be a big single for us. I wrote this song a long time ago. We did it acoustically because I really wanted Derrick to get the shot of singing it. Because he did such a great job on it. It is always such a big crowd pleaser. Because our first album it is not the easier thing in the world to find. It felt like it was a song that needed to be re-done. The method in which we record acoustic songs and utilize the keyboards. If you take the acoustic songs on this record and crank them up especially with headphones they sound so good. Derrick did such a great vocal job. It sounds like you are sitting in the room with three or four guitar players. They just sound so nice. We wanted to take a few of our catalog songs that were fan favorites and re-do them a little modernize and give them a different kind of feel to them. I thought it was time it got rejuvenated."

'The Day I Met You' (acoustic): "If this song was on Top 40 radio, I think it would be one of our biggest songs in our career. This song has gotten so many hits on you tube. Even metal heads listen to that song and get choked up. I wrote this song. It is on Psychoschizophrenia. Once again, I thought that it needed to be rejuvenated. Recorded it a little differently. The original version is just one guitar and vocal. Added some strength with cellos. I had Derrick sing it his style. It is one of those songs if I hadn't written I would have been jealous of who wrote the song. It came to me very quickly and it was very pure. I think it is probably the most liked of all Lillian ballads."

'Sad Day On Planet Earth' (acoustic): "This was the title track on the last record. I wanted to see how it would be done with all acoustic parts. It is about how beautiful this planet is but how we keep screwing it up. Like the oil spill we are dealing with here in Louisiana. Every time I write a song it seems like people prove me right in my ideas."

'Nocturnal Symphony' (acoustic): "This was on the last record too. In a heavier version. It has been one of the fan favorites live. Being that this album had kind of a vampiric overtone to it. This song is a vampire love song. It is about an individual offering immortality to his love interest. We wanted to do this al acoustically as well. When you do a song acoustically it allows you to approach the vocals a little differently. It allows you to utilize keyboards in a different way when you can get them in a mix and they are not drowned out by drums and bass. We took a different approach to this song,"

'Deep Red Shadows' (instrumental): "That was the last thing I wrote for the record. I have a lot of acoustic ideas. I wrote it and recorded it. I had no idea what I was going to do with it. But I just started playing and that is what came out. I was happy with it so I did the overdubs and layered it and tried to make it a beautiful ending to the album."