Legendary Rock Interviews has issued an interview with bassist Gary Shea (ALCATRAZZ, WARRIOR, NEW ENGLAND). An excerpt follows:

Q: Your musical history is pretty amazing, I know you went to Berklee like Frank from ANGEL and I was wondering what your early history was like prior to the band New England?

A: "Yes, I played in quite a few bands that were mostly regional bands around Connecticut before winding up at Berklee. When I got to Boston I ended up playing in a rhythm section with Barry Brandt who did wind up joining Angel. I introduced Barry to Frank (Dimino, Angel vocalist) actually and Mickie Jones (original Angel bassist, R.I.P.) was really pissed that I snagged Barry for my band. Mickie and I ended up being the best of friends of course but it was pretty funny at the time ( laughs). I ended up going to London because I decided I want to play in English bands and hooked up with Michael Corby who ended up forming THE BABYS with JOHN WAITE. Along the way in London I ended up forming a band with Peter French (CACTUS) and Herman Rarebell (SCORPIONS) and we did some recording but problems arose because Herman and I both had immigration issues in England. Herman went back to Germany and joined the Scorpions and I went back to Boston where I ended up hooking up with the guys who would eventually end up forming New England (laughs). Okay, I can take a breath now." (laughs)

Q: Yeah (laughs), I knew there was quite a bit of back story before New England even got going. It seemed to people on the outside to be something of an overnight success with the Top 40 hit ('Don’t Ever Wanna Lose Ya') and PAUL STANLEY producing the album but but it truly wasn’t.

A: "It was an amazing time for all of us, we worked SO hard prior to that. When I met those guys we had played together for some time with a slightly different lineup and gigged like crazy. Then we broke up, got back together and just rehearsed and worked on songs for like two years while we all worked odd jobs. The material we worked up was pretty good and we were in position to choose from several different record labels, we went with Infinity/MCA and management companies, we ended up going with KISS’s manager, Bill Aucoin. That first album we were able to pretty much choose anywhere on earth to record it and we chose Los Angeles and did the vocals back in NYC at Electric Ladyland and then finally to Trident Studios in London to mix it. It came out and we toured with KISS and AC/DC and basically had a BLAST."

Q: Did Paul Stanley ever treat you guys any differently on tour for better or worse as a result of him having worked on the album?

A: "No it was always good vibes between Paul and us. We opened up the Dynasty tour with those guys and Paul and all of them were great. I say that remembering though that we DID get kicked off the tour (laughs). It was a situation that arose at the Montreal Forum actually… a few weeks before that we played a few nights with them at Madison Square Garden which, of course as a kid growing up on the east coast is just a dream, and the Garden shows went really well. We got standing ovations and all that, it was just really, really cool because everyone knows that opening for KISS isn’t easy and people who open for KISS don’t always do so well. When we got to Montreal it was even more amazing because what happened was we were getting a LOT of airplay in Canada and we contributed to them selling 6,000 more tickets in Montreal. The show wasn’t sold out prior to that because KISS had kind of been out of the public eye in Canada and had just come off the solo albums and an extended absence. We really weren’t aware of all that when we got on stage to the usual, “Please welcome…. New England…” and what happened was the whole place stood up screaming and yelling. I looked 40 feet over on this MASSIVE stage KISS had and looked over at John (Fannon, New England vocalist/guitarist) and just gave him this look like 'Woah!!!'. It was easily one of the most amazing moments of my life and I will never forget it because we hadn’t even played the first note yet. We just came out and were standing there in awe watching people freak out!!! Well, low and behold, Gene Simmons was down below in the orchestra pit with his famous little notebook taking notes and soon after we got the word that we weren’t on the KISS tour anymore (laughs). It was like, 'Ok, well its kind of a backhanded compliment but we’ll take it'. I mean, to tell you the truth, Gene has always been good to us and always been straightforward and it wasn’t anything we took personally. It was just business but the one thing that did suck for us was that we were supposed to play a gig a week or so later in Massachusetts and we had about a hundred disappointed hometown people on our guest list (laughs). We were looking forward to that one show and it just didn’t happen."

Read the full interview at this location.