First time i held a microphone in my hand was in 1981.At the time the first records from Saxon and Iron Maiden came out but apart from them i used to listen also Deep Purple and Kiss. I started to sing cause i didn't have enough money to buy a guitar or take any lessons.My girlfriend encouraged me and i tryed to learn by myself how to sing practising on songs like Wheels of steel and Child in time. In that period i met Maurizio Leone (Maury Lyon),a guy that was very much into rock music and used to led a radio program called "Rock stage",one of the first in our region,of wich i still remember the opening song: "Into the arena" from MSG. With him i decided to built up a heavy band (he played guitar at the period) and with many effort we found a drummer and a bass player."Metal road" was built,with few experience but the will to compose our music. We rehearse in some kind of dungeon in the center of our town Ancona. Find a good place for rehearsing always been a great problem!...no other bands played metal in our town,maybe only few punk bands were around at the period......but we were in 1981-82.

In1984 happened the big kick: we met Fabio Allegretto (Lord Blackcat) a very good guitar player interested in the thing. After few rehearsales to see if "could work", GUNFIRE (the name was given by Maurizio) was built. Maurizio left the guitar and move to play bass guitar while we composed our first song ever: "Thunder of War".......

 

Gunfire was on the move!

 

We never changed line up as Gunfire and after only two mounths we recorded our first demo tape that,despite the fact that was product in very few copies, was knewn worldwide!! We got a lot of attentions from many parts of the world including Canada, USA and so on. The demo was recorded in two days in a very small studio using a 4tracks Fostex but we were enough satisfied of it considering the obvious limitations and was never sold (it didn't even got a cover) but simply given in 50 copies to friends and magazines; this was enough cause with a chain-coping it spreads all over the world! In the same year we took part of an important italian festival near Mantova and for the first time we played in front of a big crowd in a big stage with very knewn italian bands of the period. It was amazing!

After a little while we got in contact with the guys of Discotto Irae records from Florence,first label of Litfiba, who asked us if they can take care of the distribution of our record. We decide to autoproduced our first record: we took an entire week for the recording sessions and it cost us about four millions lire of the time...many songs were available but for economical reasons we were forced to choose only 4. The record was published in about 2.000 copies only in Italy. The reaction from the press was very good and so among the fans,if the record would had been distribuited and supported better i think it would sold a lot more...

The situation of the italian metal scene during the '80s was really tough, the productions here weren't at the same standard of bands from USA,England or Germany and the lack of support and promotions from the labels made the thing even harder. We didn't had the chance to play as supporting act with famous foreigner bands although we became friends with the guys from Saxon. Gunfire concerts were really "killer acts": 1 hour and 40 minutes, no cover songs, only our music with a lot of headbanging below the stage. We played in many places around Italy (Bari,Torino,Bologna...) but never abroad unfortunatly.

Three songs of our second demo "The Fire Still Burns" were taken from the 1985 sessions, and choosen to be included in an album for Carrere label but nothing went right and after many troubles inside and outside the band, Gunfire split in 1986.

 

 

2002: The Return!

Two new members in the line up: Luca Calò on guitar (ex - Spread Mind) and Diego Romagnoli on drums. We have a lot of new material and we are now back in a good shape! "The Fire Still Burns"....after many years the spirit that moved us is still inside us and we are waiting new and old fans!!

 

 

2004: Change of Drummer

Marco Bianchella is the new powerfull drummer of Gunfire! (he's from Spread Mind too)...this guy really kicks many asses!

 

 

2004: "THUNDER OF WAR"

That's the title of long waited full lenght album available for BattleCry records! Watch out..this time we are back to stay!

 

- Robert Drake -