“Wheels of Steel” by Saxon

"Wheels of Steel" is the title track of Saxon's second album, and the 1980 record on Carrere became the English heavy metal band's first to crack the UK Albums Chart, climbing to 5, still their highest placing there, and eventually going gold. The writing credit is split five ways, among Biff Byford, who sings lead and adds percussion, Graham Oliver and Paul Quinn on guitar, Steve Dawson on bass and Pete Gill on drums. Pete Hinton produced it with the band, and Will Reid-Dick engineered.

The riff sounds a lot like the closing stretch of Black Sabbath's "Rock 'n' Roll Doctor", but Oliver says the real spark was Ted Nugent's "Cat Scratch Fever". The song later found new ears in the video games Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City and Brütal Legend.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz.