Canadian rock icon Lee Aaron is featured in a new interview with Jeb Wright at Classic Rock Revisited discussing her new album, Fire And Gasoline. It's the first album of her 30 year career to be released in the United States....

Jeb: This album is your return to rock. You have done hard rock and you’ve done other stuff. I don’t think this is a hard rock album, but it is a rock album. 

Lee: "I would say this is my return.  I always knew I would make another rock record and this seemed like the right time. I’ve never really considered myself hard rock. I sort of got - at one point in time in the early to mid-80s - I got embraced by a real heavy metal audience. I always considered what we were doing to be almost like hard rock, melodic hard rock. It was melody-based. I think this is an extension of that in a more mature way." 

Jeb: Let’s talk about the record and getting it out there. America tends to think this is the only place that matters, but you have had a huge metal following outside of this continent. You’re not metal though. This album reminds me more of Heart. 

Lee: "Are you kidding? Hellfire and brimstone is alive and well all over Europe. There is a big huge market for it over there. I’ve had some kind of mixed feedback from over there. Some love it, but some are confused because it is not a metal album. It is not. The nicest compliment you gave me is that you see it more along the lines of Heart. They were hugely influential to me when I was young. They were not trading on their sexuality, and they could write songs and sing amazing and perform amazing live. That is who I wanted to be." 

Jeb: At this point in your life would you even consider a return to heavy metal?

Lee: "Oh boy… you are totally putting me on the spot.  No matter what I say I am going to piss somebody off.  You know, I’ve been asked just recently, actually, to do an album by a label. They were asking me to do a more traditional hard rock or metal album, but I felt it would be a real conflict to do this with the one I am releasing now. They didn’t want me to write the songs. My heart is not into that. I’ve never done an album where I was just a singer and I didn’t write any of the songs. That is not what interests me when it comes to making music. If I was to do an album of covers, I would even have to pick the covers. They would have to be songs that meant something to me."  

Go to this location for the complete interview.

Lee Aaron recently checked in with the following update:

"Hey All, I've recieved quite a few messages asking me about the Fire And Gasoline video, so here are a few answers:

* Yes, it was filmed in our home in the multimedia room with the crazy vinyl/CD/movie collection. We rehearse there too :-)

* The image on the big screen is Sister Rosetta Tharpe: gospel singer, badass guitarist, Godmother of Rock 'n Roll.

* Yes, it's my actual band John Cody, Sean Kelly and Dave Reimer.

* It was filmed on an iPad just before rehearsal one day without the intention of being an official video, but what the heck, it's fun.

* Dave Reimer and I did the amateur camera work. Dave's thumb appears in the upper left corner at 47sec... nice one Dave!

* Dave could not stop dancing while filming and that's why some of the camera work is shakey...lol...

Here it is again...enjoy, laugh, share!"

The clip below features behind-the-scenes footage of Lee Aaron and her band during pre-production and laying down tracks in the studio for the new album, Fire And Gasoline. The clip includes interviews with Sean Kelly, Dave Reimer and John Cody, as well as Lee's take on the writing and recording process and more.

BraveWords scribe Carl Begai recently spoke with Lee, who released Fire And Gasoline on March 25th. Following is an excerpt from the interview that does not appear in the feature story.

"Sometimes I think it's a miracle I haven't lost my voice after all these years in rock n' roll and having bad monitors," says Lee. "I finally caved about a month ago and bought myself a set of in-ear monitors. I used them for the first time on a weekend away in Saskatoon and Regina, and it was like 'Where have you been all my life?' (laughs). It's so nice because with music that has powerful guitars, a lot of the time I wasn't hearing the nuances in my vocalizations. No with the in-ears it's like 'Man, this is amazing...' The funny thing is I always stay after the show to sign autographs or take pictures with the fans - meeting the fans is one of my favourite parts of performing - and at those two shows I received extra comments on how good the vocals sounded. I'm so glad I took the plunge."

"There's no guessing. When you're in a rock band the guitar player starts turning up a little bit two thirds into the set, the drummer plays louder, the bassist turns up, the whole sound system gets turned up, and before you know it your ears are shutting down. There have been some nights where I've been guessing and really hoping I'm actually hitting the notes, so the in-ears are a nice thing to have."

Go to this location to check out the BraveWords feature story.

About the album she says: "Fire And Gasoline is a rock n' roll record, and I think it would have been a huge mistake to make an album that sounds like something I did before."

“Tomboy” video: