Fastway (band)

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For other uses, see Fastway (disambiguation).

Fastway were a NWOBHM heavy metal band formed by guitarist "Fast" Eddie Clarke formerly of Motörhead, and bassist Pete Way formerly of UFO. In 1983 both players had been disgruntled with their own bands and decided to work together in a new outfit. They recruited drummer Jerry Shirley formerly of Humble Pie, and then unknown vocalist Dave King . They took their name from a combination of the founding members' names. However, Way then discovered that he could not escape from his contract with Chrysalis Records, and then received a tempting offer to play for Ozzy Osbourne, so abandoned the project. Bringing in session bassist Mick Feat, the band then recorded debut album Fastway.

A critical and commercial success, the band toured to promote the album (with Alfie Agius^[1] as session bass-player). The band then recruited Charlie McCracken of Taste as "permanent" bassist and released another success in the form of All Fired Up the following year. After the hardships of touring, Shirley and McCracken subsequently left. In 1986 Clarke and King reformed Fastway with a new line-up. Recruiting Shane Carroll (2nd guitar), Paul Reid (bass), and Alan Connor (drums) from Dave King's first band Stillwood. This lineup released Waiting For the Roar. The record took an album-oriented rock approach instead of the driving bluesy-metal of the previous albums. The success of the record was limited and it disappointed many fans. In 1987 Fastway was approached to make the soundtrack for the heavy metal horror flick Trick or Treat. Unfortunately the film flopped, but the soundtrack re-established Fastway as a hard hitting metal band. The soundtrack was a moderate success and stayed on the Billboard top 200 for 11 months. The success of the soundtrack and the very little money the band received caused massive infighting and the band disbanded. Dave King took most of the band with him and started Q.E.D., a more AOR styled band. They released a 2-track single. Dave then got a call from David Geffin and Jon Kollodner to come to America to head up a sort of heavy metal supergroup called Katmandu. Katmandu also featured Mandy Meyer from Krokus on guitars. The band was rounded out by Cain Carruthers of the punk rock band The Untouchables, and Mike Alonso of the punk band The Meanies. Eddie Clarke decided to restart Fastway again from scratch using vocalist Lea Hart and session men, quickly releasing On Target in the same year.

In 1990 this duo released Bad Bad Girls, employing various session musicians including members of Girlschool. It was widely ignored and sold poorly. After struggling on for another year, in which they released a live album Say What You Will LIVE (curiously, with Dave King on vocals), Clarke and Hart gave up and the band was defunct. In 1997 however the pair reunited and released a reworked version of On Target, but there was no commercial success. Very little has been heard from Fast Eddie or Lea Hart since, aside from a few "tribute" or best-of albums.

Vocalist Dave King later returned to his roots in 1997 with Flogging Molly, an Irish inspired punk band who have sold over a million and a half copies of recorded output. The last studio cd "Within a Mile Of Home" hit #20 on the Billboard Top 200.

As reported on MelodicRock.com on February 26th, 2007: An updated line-up for Fastway will appear at this year's Sweden Rock Festival. After a long time of silence the band is now back in action. Besides guitarist Fast Eddie Clarke, the band features among others John "Harv" Harbinson (Stormzone), Steve Strange and John McManus (Mama's Boys).