THUNDER frontman Danny Bowes recently spoke to Komodo Rock about the band's current activities, including their upcoming UK tour featuring Lauren Harris, the daughter of IRON MAIDEN bassist Steve Harris, as the support act. The following is an excerpt from the interview:

KR: You've got Lauren Harris coming out on tour with you.

DB: "The daughter of Steve, yeah."

KR: Was that your choice?

DB: "Yeah absolutely. Basically, when we announce a tour we're flooded with potential support bands, because we've made a point of not necessarily taking out in the past the record labels or the agents choice. You get lobbied left right and centre, and we've always made sure we've taken who we wanted to, bands that we liked, and because we've been very proactive in those choices, I think people..."

KR: Have a go?

DB: "Well yeah, they think it's worth a go because you never know, the band might like what we do. It does mean we have to plough through an awful lot of stuff, so we do make a rod for our own back. Last year we ran a competition and bands got their mates to vote for them via text, it worked out really well. This year though, literally we looked around to see what was available, and to be perfectly honest Lauren could do the whole tour. Most bands wouldn't be able to do the whole tour because it goes up and down the country, it takes place of ten or eleven days, and you need the resources to be able to do that. So to find an unsigned band in a position able to do that wouldn't be possible. Lauren has the resources. I don't quite know where she gets them from! [laughs]"

KR: Does it really matter?

DB: "Doesn't really matter to me no, but she wanted to do it, and so we thought yeah. There's only one date she's not doing, the STONE GODS are doing the night in Norwich, they're the guys from THE DARKNESS. Hopefully they'll be good, and they're local boys so hopefully they'll sell us some tickets!"

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The UK tour schedule is as follows:

November

24 - New Castle City Hall - New Castle, UK
25 - Glasgow Academy - Glasgow, Scotland
27 - Wolverhampton Civic Hall - Wolverhampton, UK
28 - Bristol Academy - Bristol, UK

December

1 - Manchester Academy - Manchester, UK
2 - The Astoria - London, UK
3 - Sheffield City Hall - Sheffield, UK