Metal Express Radio correspondent Mick Burgess recently caught up with guitarist Fast Eddie Clarke for an in-depth interview covering his careers with Motörhead and Fastway. An excerpt is available below.

MER: Your debut Fastway album raised a few eyebrows when it came out. I guess many people were expecting Motörhead Mark II but you produced a fine blues based hard rock album. Were you looking to show a totally different side to your playing than you were able to do with Motörhead?

Eddie: "At the time I`d felt really betrayed by Phil and Lemmy. I said to them if they were going to do the thing with Wendy O`Williams then I was leaving. I didn`t expect them to go and do it and tell me to get lost. When I went back to them the following day I said that it was ridiculous but they told me where to go. I thought we were brothers. Motörhead was my band too. I left with nothing. I got no money, no instruments, nothing. I didn`t have a pot to pee in. I just thought I`d break my ties with all that Heavy Metal stuff, I dumped my leather jacket and decided to do something that was more Blues based. I often look back and wonder what happened to my hair and leather jacket and I think in the haze of it all going on I lost faith with them and just wanted to do something else. I actually thought I`d die in Motörhead, I never thought I`d leave Motörhead."

MER: What did you make of Another Perfect Day, the album Motörhead did with Brian Robertson after you`d left?

Eddie: "I thought it sounded like Thin Lizzy. There was nothing really original about it. I didn`t really care and didn`t listen to it that much. I was pretty furious about it at the time. Phil actually called around to my house a couple of years later and he said sorry for everything that had happened which was fair enough, so we patched things up after that and were on good terms again right up until he died last year."

Go to this location for the complete interview.

Back in January, Clarke commented on his absence from Lemmy's funeral on January 9th via a post on his Facebook page. It reads as follows:

"I have been a bit quiet lately. I was unable to get a visa to go to Lemmy's funeral. I have past sins, which means it takes longer for me to get a visa and with being Christmas, there wasn't enough time...

I watched it online last night. I thought everyone did very well.

Todd did an amazing job as compere. I thought his son Paul spoke magnificently and Mikkey Dee followed up well. It all reminded me of what a great man Lemmy was and how much he lived for his music and Motörhead and the fans. It was great to see the picture of the old band with Phil in the middle. They were great days and I miss them both.

I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did. It was very sad but the message got across about the great man.

Rest In Peace, my old friend."

On January 9th, the world came together to celebrate the life of Motörhead frontman Lemmy Kilmister at Forest Lawn Memorial Cemetery in Hollywood, California.

With almost almost 300,000 watching on YouTube and millions more thinking about a man that changed the face of heavy metal. And what a face … an image. An icon. Kinda like James Dean … but for us metalheads, much more of presence in life. Manager Todd Singerman led the ceremony: “Man, I hate using these words in past tense!”

He proceeded to pass the mic to Lemmy’s son Paul: “He had a feeling something was wrong in August. We will know the pain he was in … all of his years he was a stage warrior. Having moved mount everest, the show would go on. He wasn’t just a musician and songwriter … he was a figurehead. He set the bar. It was about keeping it real. Performing was everything to him. He was Lemmy all the time. He wasn’t a poseur. He paid his his dues. Motörhead’s last album was a struggle … it never revealed his frailed health. Born to lose, live to win. He wasn’t religious, but he was profoundly spiritual. He never tolerated anybody talking over music … especially his! Music wasn’t a background to him. Nobody on this earth posed his brand of of humour. He was 100% real. I won the lottery when I got Lemmy. You were perfect. You are on the road to the great great gig in the sky.”

Check out the BraveWords tribute to Lemmy here.