LAST IN LINE bassist Phil Soussan spoke to the “Pat’s Soundbytes Unplugged” podcast about the progress of the recording sessions for the band’s third album. The follow-up to 2019’s “II” is tentatively due later this year via an as-yet-undetermined record label.
“The new album is, of course, subject to a lot of whatever everyone has been going through,” Phil said (see video below). “So we have a couple of challenges. We’re in between record deals at the moment, so that’s something we’re working on; we have meetings about that, actually, tomorrow. In the meantime, we have written about half the record. We’ve written six songs, I think. Four are definitely completed, and the other two are in various stages of completion. We will have to get together for a session or two to write the remainder of the record. And we are working on — right now, as we speak — a very, very special song that we’re gonna be putting out fairly soon. I can’t tell you any more than that, but it is something in the interim between us coming out with a new album, or releasing a new album, and now. So we’ll do this as a video single.”
As for the musical direction of the new LAST IN LINE material, Phil said: “The songs are another progression from the last album — the difference between ‘Heavy Crown’ and ‘II’, and now ‘II’ and whatever this next album is gonna be called; we don’t know yet, by the way. But it’s definitely evolved even more; it’s gone into even more of an evolution, but we are always trying to keep the characteristics of LAST IN LINE there. I mean, you can’t shake those things — you can’t shake Vinny‘s [Appice] drumming, you can’t shake Vivian‘s [Campbell, guitar] playing. And I’d like to say the same thing about myself, and, of course, Andrew [Freeman, vocals].”
Some of the early recording sessions for LAST IN LINE‘s third album took place in January 2020 at Steakhouse studio in North Hollywood, California.
Formed in 2012 by Appice, Campbell and bassist Jimmy Bain — Ronnie James Dio‘s co-conspirators and co-writers on the “Holy Diver”, “Last In Line” and “Sacred Heart” albums — LAST IN LINE‘s initial intent was to celebrate Ronnie James Dio‘s early work by reuniting the members of the original DIO lineup. After playing shows that featured a setlist composed exclusively of material from the first three DIO albums, the band decided to move forward and create new music in a similar vein.
LAST IN LINE‘s debut album, “Heavy Crown”, was released in February 2016, landing at No. 1 on Billboard‘s Heatseekers chart. Initially, the release had been preceded by tragedy when Bain unexpectedly passed away at the age of 68 on January 23, 2016. LAST IN LINE, honoring what they knew would be Bain‘s wish to keep the band moving, brought in Soussan and committed to sustained touring in support of the album before beginning work on the follow-up release, the aforementioned “II”.
