THE mighty Big Country got off to a great start, blaring down from Scotland with a smash album, The Crossing, with their barn storming anthems Fields of Fire, Chance and Harvest Home.

With electric guitars rigged to sound like the skirl of Highland bagpipes and Stuart Adamson’s iron lungs, Big Country briefly, in the 1980s, had a rock profile measured alongside U2 and The Alarm.

While Sassenach pop puritans have a tendency to grumble about a band’s current line-up not being the original one, Adamson’s death at the tender of 42, robbed Big Country of their leader, lifeblood and inspiration.

Adamson had kept his band going, song-by-song, album-by-album, but the glitz began to fade.

But the toughest struggle of all was occurring in his personal life — a deadly combination of alcoholism, depression and musical disappointment eventually took Adamson’s life and seemingly drew a line under the Big Country narrative for good.

“I never thought we’d play together as Big Country again after Stuart’s passing. It didn’t really seem possible,” said Bruce Watson, the only original member of the Big Country family still with the band.

“It’s very hard to speak about Stuart because to me he wasn’t this rock star.

“He was the mate who never lived any further than a mile away.

“While Big Country is a new line-up now, nobody is replacing Stuart in the band and nobody ever will.”

Big Country’s last album, The Journey, the group’s first offering for 14 years, is fronted by The Alarm singer Mike Peters.

“Mike has brought a different dynamic to Big Country,” said Watson.

“We wanted to make it sound exactly like the record or how we sounded 30 years ago and the first person I thought of was Mike.

“We have had to dig deep to make this record and it has given us a new real lease of life.

“It’s been gratifying to see and hear the fans welcoming our new music alongside the old.

There is also a key member crucial to Big Country’s reinvigoration, Watson’s son Jamie.

He joined the band four years ago — and will give Big Country, hopes Watson, a chance of being remembered for generations to come.

“My two sons, Jamie and Bruce, would come to the studio and go to gigs when they were small so Jamie has grown up with Big Country.

“It keeps the flame burning bright.”

And thanks to the recent high-profile cover of The Skids’ The Saints are Coming, Adamson’s band before Big Country, by U2 and Green Day, all eyes were back focused on the Big Country name again.

“I played at The Skids reunion gig a few years ago and the lads were just amazed when U2 covered Saints,” said Bruce.

“I know a lot of that has to do with The Edge. The Saints are Coming was one of his favourite songs.

“Apart from the fact that U2 and Green Day covered the song for charity, it gave the rest of the guys in The Skids some recognition for something they did 35 years ago.”

Big Country, Preston 53 Degrees, Tuesday, October 22. Details from 01772 893000.