British Lion

Explore the band's historical lineups, musicians, and studio albums.

Active1 formation2 studio albums

Formation chronology

Newest first

Formation 1 of 1

2012 – Present

Members

Steve Harris
Bass, Keyboards
From Jan 2012
Richard Taylor
Lead Vocals
From Jan 2012
David Hawkins
Guitar, Keyboards
From Jan 2012
Grahame Leslie
Guitar
From Jan 2012
Simon Dawson
Drums
From Jan 2012

Formation facts

British Lion's story began in the early 1990s, when Grahame Leslie and Richard Taylor were writing and recording demos and managed to get one into Steve Harris's hands. Harris liked what he heard enough to meet them, and soon found himself helping with rehearsals, recording, management and bookings. The original band eventually fell apart, but Harris thought the songs were too good to disappear with it.
When the original British Lion imploded, Harris told Richard Taylor that one day he would do something with their material. Taylor says that even while Iron Maiden toured the world, the two would reconnect, Taylor would bring songs, and Harris would write with him while repeating that promise. Some of those very early songs ultimately survived all the way to British Lion's 2012 debut.
EMI introduced the 2012 British Lion album as Steve Harris's first solo/side-project record. Richard Taylor later explained that using Harris's name initially helped an unknown project get noticed, while Harris said he never felt comfortable thinking of it simply as a solo album. As the same five musicians toured together, British Lion evolved into what both Taylor and Harris wanted it to be: a band in its own right.
British Lion's first-ever live performance took place on February 20, 2013, not in a major British venue but inside the Moto Clube de Faro's new 600-capacity clubhouse in Portugal. Harris had longstanding ties to the club through his late friend Manu DaSilva, and British Lion donated all profits from the show to the Red Cross. The concert became the warm-up for their first full European club tour.
British Lion deliberately returned Steve Harris to rooms Iron Maiden had outgrown decades earlier. Before the first tour, Harris said he wanted the heat and immediacy of clubs, with fans directly in front of the band, describing it as going back to his roots. He later said those tours also keep him mentally and physically ready for Maiden, giving him both stadium shows and intimate gigs rather than forcing him to choose between them.
Harris says the first British Lion album was made before the five musicians had really played together as a band. Years of club touring transformed them, and for The Burning they recorded live together, with some sessions taking place directly after tours while the performances were still fresh. Richard Taylor also says they had already been playing some of the new songs onstage, letting the audience help prove the material before it was recorded.
Richard Taylor's lyrics on The Burning are often autobiographical rather than fantasy. British Lion's official site says he wrote "Land of the Perfect People" about abandonment and the experience of growing up in a children's home, while Taylor has described songwriting as a way to express experiences he could not easily explain in ordinary conversation. That personal approach became one of the clearest ways British Lion established an identity separate from Iron Maiden.
When Dover's Booking Hall faced the possibility of closing in 2024, Steve Harris and British Lion offered to perform a fundraising show free of charge, allowing the proceeds to go toward buying the building and preserving the venue. It was an unusually literal expression of British Lion's commitment to the small rooms where the band had built its identity. The venue survived, and British Lion officially announced a return there the following year.
British Lion's 2024 schedule took the band into territory it had never played before. They made their first appearances in Australia and New Zealand, debuted on the U.S. West Coast with dates including the Whisky A Go Go, and later that year played Mexico and Colombia for the first time. Harris said the established lineup had already been together for twelve years, making the expansion remarkable for a band that still operated around Iron Maiden's calendar.
Simon Dawson first teamed up with Steve Harris in British Lion in 2012, playing on three tracks of the debut before becoming Harris's rhythm-section partner through The Burning and years of touring. When Nicko McBrain retired from touring with Iron Maiden in December 2024, Maiden chose Dawson to take over its touring drum chair for 2025. The move turned a twelve-year British Lion partnership into one of the most consequential personnel connections between Harris's two bands.
Steve Harris had spent decades recording in Nassau with Iron Maiden before ever performing there. Maiden made Piece of Mind, Powerslave and Somewhere in Time at Compass Point Studios in the 1980s, then returned there for The Final Frontier in 2010. On April 8, 2026, British Lion finally gave Harris his first live performance in the Bahamas, playing at John Watling's Distillery in Nassau before joining the Monsters of Rock cruise.

Studio albums

The Burning (Jan 2020)
British Lion (Sep 2012)