Airforce
Strike Harder

04.07.2026

The name of Doug Sampson is known to most of Iron Maiden fans out there, as he played drums on the band’s legendary “Soundhouse Tapes” demo and departed in late 1979 to make room for Clive Burr. But the story of Doug did not end there – he found a new home with Airforce, which has been on and off the scene since as early as 1987. In the last decade they have been more active than ever, with three full-length albums, gigs all over Europe and collaboration with over Iron Maiden alumni, including Paul Di’Anno. We got in touch with Doug as Airforce was about to open yet another chapter of their career – they signed a new deal with BraveWords Records and released a video for their rendition of Iron Maiden classic “Strange World”. At 69 years of age, the drummer shows no signs of slowing down…

The latest news from Airforce is that you’ve got a new record deal with BraveWords Records. What happened to your previous deal with Rock Of Angels Records, and how did you end up getting signed to BraveWords?

We had some problems with them, we couldn’t seem to get in contact with them. We were trying to get away from them, because we wanted to go with Giles (Lavery) of BraveWords. In the end we got a message from them saying that they had some financial problems and they were willing to let us go from that contract. With that, we signed up with Giles, it was a stroke of luck really.

What releases are you planning to put out via BraveWords? Are you already working on a new studio record? 

We’ve got “Strange World”, it’s coming out as a video at the moment. And the next album we’re gonna do is gonna be with the new company. We’re working on that at the moment, we’ve got more or less all of the songs, it’s just a matter of taking them into the studio. We’ve written all the material, it’s just a matter of getting them recorded, and that will be the next album.

Is there a chance that Bravewords will re-release any older Airforce recordings? For instance, the first album (“Judgement Day”, 2016) is quite hard to get on CD at the moment…

I don’t know, they might do it, but we’ve never spoken to them about it. If you’re having problems, it might be something they’d look into for us. That would be something we’d like to think about, definitely.

You’ve already mentioned the video for “Strange World”. Could you say a few words about the way this video was developed? Who came up with the storyline, and who actually did the animation?

It’s a strange one, because we’d been discussing it for some time, we were looking at ways of doing it, and we came across a relative of Chop’s (Chop Pitman, guitar), I think it’s his nephew. We explained the situation to him, we told him briefly what we wanted, and he came up with this idea. He first did a mini-film, we watched it, and we said, “This is brilliant, carry on what you’re doing”. That’s the way it happened. He saw the song through his eyes, he’s a lot younger than us, and we thought this was really good. With “Strange World” itself, we didn’t want to do a copy of the original, as I felt the original was perfect. That’s why we’ve done a slightly different version – the lyrics are the same, but we’ve done a different version, so it doesn’t clash with the original version which I think should stay as it is.

As far as we understand, quite a lot of artificial intelligence was used in the making of the video. What’s your opinion on the growing use of AI in videos and music?

Well… It’s crept up on us, isn’t it? It’s sort of taken over. I think if it’s used in the right way, it can be an advantage. Obviously there are disadvantages to it, like to any modern technology, especially of this caliber, but if it’s done wisely, I think it can be a good thing. And this is a prime example – the animation in this manner can be a really good effective thing.

There is another former Iron Maiden member playing on “Strange World” – Dave Sullivan did a guitar solo. As far as we understand, it’s his first appearance on a recording in decades. How did you get him to do it?

When we’d first done the track, we spoke to Steve (Harris) first, because we didn’t want to do it behind his back, with it coming out and him not being happy about it. So we discussed it with him first, and he said it would be a good idea if we’d got Dave Sullivan to do a bit of guitar on it. With that, Chop, our guitarist, got in touch with Dave and asked him if he’d be willing, which he was. Yeah, it’s been quite a few years since he last done any recording, and he jumped at the chance, he was very pleased with the idea.

Has he been doing anything musically lately?

I don’t think so. I don’t think he’s in a band or doing anything at the moment. I might need to be corrected on that, but I’m pretty sure he hasn’t done anything for some years.

“Strange World” was obviously an Iron Maiden track that you originally played on. Have you considered re-recording other early Maiden tracks, for example, “Invasion”, as it is the song that never went anywhere past the “Soundhouse Tapes” demo?

Yeah, I don’t think they’ve ever recorded that again. But we’ve never thought about doing any other Iron Maiden songs. We were just happy to do “Strange World”.

In a few weeks Airforce will take part in a huge event called “EddFest” together with Iron Maiden and a few other bands with a Maiden connection. Could you tell us a bit about this event? 

Again, Steve got in touch with us and asked if we’d be interested. We jumped at the chance, we were taken aback to be invited along. It was just us at the beginning, and then they asked Gypsy’s Kiss if they could do it, and I think Blaze is gonna do it as well. It looks as it could be a really good show. 

Will all these bands just play their regular sets, or are you gonna do jam sessions, guest appearances or any other special moments?

With us, we’re just gonna do our normal set, we’re not gonna do anything different than basically what we always do. Not sure what the others are doing, but as far as we’re concerned, we’re just gonna do or normal set.

Your connection with Iron Maiden goes back to the years predating the actual creation of the band, as you played with Steve in a band called Smiler. What kind of music were you playing back then? Did the band write any original material, and did any of that go into Iron Maiden?

With Smiler, we were playing blues rock, it wasn’t heavy metal really. It was a good band, but it wasn’t Iron Maiden. There were a couple of songs, I think “Innocent Exile” was one of them, we played that, but, as I said, it wasn’t done in an Iron Maiden rock way, it was more of a blues rock style. With that in mind, I think Steve thought to himself that it would be best if he’d left and done exactly what he wanted to do. 

We have to ask you about Paul Di’Anno, since he also recorded with Airforce on a few occasions. How did your cooperation on the songs “Sniper” and “Don’t Look In Her Eyes” happen? Were you always in contact with him, or did you re-establish the connection after you came back with Airforce?

We lost track for a long time, and when we started recording with Airforce, we got in touch with him. It was great seeing him again, he was in good form, and as you can hear, the songs came out really well. Yeah, it was a good experience.

Did you get him into your studio, or did he record at some separate location?

No, we got him down in the studio. If you watch the film, “The Lost Iron Maiden Singer”, you’ll see it, how he actually came to the studio.

We haven’t watched the film yet unfortunately. Does it mean that you appear in the film too?

Yeah, I’ve seen the film, and we’re in the beginning of it. It shows you him recording with us.

How do you remember Paul? Was he a difficult person to get along and to work with?

No, he was a great bloke, he just had his funny moments really. He could have a bit of a temper. But overall he was a great bloke, a good laugh, Jack the Lad… what could you say? Paul was Paul. You couldn’t really take offense from him, especially if you’d known him for a long time. 

As far as we understand, Airforce had a lot of problems with finding a proper singer in the early days. How did you eventually get Flavio Lino, and what makes him the perfect fit for Airforce?

We had a few singers, and they ended up leaving or doing different things and wanting to go, move on. Chop went down to “Cart & Horses” (a legendary London pub often referred to as the birthplace of Iron Maiden – ed.) to see an Iron Maiden tribute band, and Lino was the singer for them. Chop told Lino, “Can you go to…” -I think we were doing a radio show in Poland, and we didn’t have a singer. So he said, “Could you go to Poland with us? Would you be prepared?” It was about a week or so. He said, “Yeah, I can do it”. So he learned all the songs, we went to Poland, did the live radio show, and it was so good that it ended up as a live album (“Live Locked n’ Loaded”. 2021). And we only had two rehearsals. So we told him, “Do you want the job?” He’s Portuguese, obviously he’s not local, but he said, “Yeah”, and that’s how he joined us.

How did Ivan Giannini get involved with Airforce in 2018-2019? We actually saw him live with his band Derdian in our home city about a year ago…

The thing was he was in another Iron Maiden tribute band that played in “Cart & Horses”. He joined us for a little bit, but he couldn’t do certain shows, and I think eventually he joined Vision Divine, so he left. But he’s still great friends with us, we’re still keeping touch with him. He’s a great bloke. He gets on well with Lino, they get on really well. 

Your older brother Sam was also a singer and he sang in Airforce back in the 80s. How is he? What is he doing at the moment?

He doesn’t sing so much, he plays harmonica. He does a lot of session work and he plays in a band called The Gutter Brothers, so he’s doing alright, but he just does it more or less as a hobby, I think. But he’s still doing it. (Sam is currently 77 years old – ed.)

Speaking about the 80s – a lot of people call that decade the golden era of heavy metal. But for you personally that era was not very productive or successful. How do you look back on the 80s? 

I think it was quite hard to get a record deal in that time. Things were moving on, and I don’t think it was… If you were established by the 80s, it was good, but with us, we were just coming up, and it was not that brilliant time. A lot of venues were closing down, but we still managed to get work and had a bit of a following. We just couldn’t seem to jump up to the next level. It was very hard getting any bigger than we were at that time. After a while we decided to call it a day, singer problems as well, and we went off to work, things, families and stuff. We reformed 10 years ago, I suppose.

There were periods in your life when you did not do anything musically, for instance, in the beginning of the 21st century we didn’t hear anything from you for about 10 years. What were you doing back then, and was it difficult to stay away from music?

No, we’d still done a bit. It was me and Chop, we were still jamming, keeping our hands into music, but we weren’t officially in a band at that time. We were still doing different things and different projects, but Airforce as a band wasn’t working. It was a quiet period. We actually planning to bring the band together by rehearsing and working things out, but we never actually did it seriously.

It’s no secret that a drummer has probably the most physically demanding job in a rock or metal band. How do you keep yourself fit for playing drums? 

Yeah, I have to look after myself. I’m keeping me exercised, I’ve got two greyhounds, so I do a lot of walking. I’ve just bought this new property I’m living in, and I’m always working on that. So I just keep myself reasonably fit, I don’t drink too much and definitely don’t smoke… You just have to look after yourself, especially as you’re getting older, just keep an eye on things.

Now, coming back to Airforce – how does the songwriting process in the band go? Is it a collaborative effort, or do songs come from individual band members?

Someone will come up with an idea and will take it down the rehearsal studio, and we’ll go over it. That’s when we start to work as a band - add things and take things out. When it gets to a level that we’re happy with, we send it over to Lino, and he will listen to it. He might want to change different things, and then he puts his lyrics to it. It works out for us, it really does – writing when you want to do it. It’s been quite successful on the last two albums, and that’s the way we should do this one as well. 

What are your aspirations with Airforce? What would you like to achieve with this band that you haven’t achieved in your career yet?

We’re quite happy with the things that have happened to us. We’d just like to be more internationally known. We’ve been to Columbia in America, and we’d like to just put the name around and let everybody hear what we do. There’s a lot of people that just enjoy the basic heavy metal music, and that’s what we do – straight heavy metal stuff, New Wave of British Heavy Metal, if you will. 

The Iron Maiden connection – is it a blessing or a curse for Airforce? Or maybe a bit of both?

I would say it’s an advantage for us, because it has opened the doors that would have never normally be opened. Everybody loves an Iron Maiden connection, and this has worked out brilliant for us. It’s a bit of history, and they can get involved with it. We’re not that big and people come see us after a gig, and they love it that there’s not a big façade around us. It’s been a great help for us, it’s been a great advantage. 

What’s your opinion on the present-day metal scene? Do you have any ideas as to who will be the able to replace Iron Maiden on top of festival bills in, let’s say 15 years? 

I couldn’t help you, I really wouldn’t know what to say. We often speak about it, me and the rest of the boys – who’s gonna be there in 10 or 15 years’ time, and to be honest, we just haven’t got a clue. I can’t see many bands coming up through the ranks at the moment that’s gonna fill auditoriums and big arenas. That’s a difficult one. That might be Airforce, but we won’t be around in 15 years (laughs), we ain’t gonna worry about that.

So what’s the future timeline for Airrforce? You’ve got this “EddFest” in July, but when shall we expect the next album? Or is there anything else that we shall expect from the band in the near future?

In November we’re going on tour with Alcatrazz, Girlschool and Raven, and next year… who knows. Hopefully Giles will come up with something. I’d love to come see you boys where you are… 

Airforce on the Internet: https://airforceuk.co.uk 

Special thanks to Michael Brandvold (Michael Brandvold Marketing / BraveWords Records) for arranging this interview

Roman Patrashov, Natalia “Snakeheart” Patrashova
June 23, 2026
© HeadBanger.ru