Iron Maiden is a British Heavy Metal band. They are one of the most successful metal bands in the world and were a major part of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal.It was founded in 1975 by bassist Steve Harris. The band went through a lot of lineup changes before the release of their first album, simply called Iron Maiden, in 1980, recorded by Harris, singer Paul Di'Anno, guitarists Dennis Stratton and Dave Murray, and drummer Clive Burr. In the follow-up, Killers, (1981) Stratton, due to Creative Differences, was replaced by Adrian Smith, from the band Urchin. This was also the last album with Di'Anno, who was sacked for being a drunkard.The real success came a year later, in 1982, with The Number of the Beast, which marked the debut in the band of Bruce Dickinson, Di'Anno's replacement. The band's classic lineup came full circle in 1983 with the arrival of drummer Nicko McBrain, replacing Clive Burr, for personal problems. With this lineup, the band recorded four studio albums (Piece Of Mind, Powerslave, Somewhere In Time, and Seventh Son OfA Seventh Son) and a live album, (Live After Death) which marked the climax and end of the so-called "Golden Years".Unfortunately, from this point onwards, the things weren't going so well for the band. Adrian Smith left the band due to Creative Differences (although it was in good terms, it was just that he wanted to play in a softer mood than that one of Maiden) and he was replaced by Janick Gers, who played in the band White Spirit, and with Fish (former singer of Marillion) and Ian Gillan. The follow-up to Seventh.., No Prayer For The Dying, was considered inferior to the former albums, despite having the band's first #1 hit. ("Bring Your Daughter... To The Slaughter") The follow-up, Fear of the Dark, charted in #1, but after it, Bruce Dickinson left the band.He was replaced by Blaze Bayley, who wasn't well received. Not only that, but the band also changed their Record Producer, and thus, everything was set for the band's Dork Age. The two albums released in the Bayley-era (1995's The X Factor and 1998's Virtual XI) weren't so well received, and it seemed that the band was going to broke......but 1999 brought the biggest news: Bruce Dickinson and Adrian Smith returned to the band, but only Blaze left, thus making Maiden a sextet with three guitarists. Not only that, but the follow-up to Virtual, Brave New World, was a big hit, with a lot of people claiming the album as another classic album of the band. This lineup (Dickinson-Smith-Gers-Murray-Harris-McBrain) continues to our days, having recorded other three albums: 2003's Dance of Death, 2006's A Matter Of Life And Death and 2010's The Final Frontier, the band's most recent #1 album.Their sound is characterized by twin guitar (later triple guitar) harmonization and galloping bass, as well as the operatic vocals of Bruce Dickinson. Their most notable songs fall into three themes: ominous ("The Number of the Beast", "Fear Of the Dark"), historical (war songs such as "The Trooper" and "Aces High", historical events such as "Run to the Hills" and the biographical "Alexander the Great") or derivative ("The Wicker Man", "Flight of Icarus", "Brave New World").
Special mention to "Heaven Can Wait", from Somewhere In Time, where they invite some fans to the stage.
"Fear Of The Dark", from the eponymous Fear of the Dark, is a song that's been particularly adopted by the fans as an audience participation song, but is interesting in the fact that the fans don't sing along much to the lyrics, but vocalize to the guitar. It's become such an audience participation staple that pretty much every Iron Maiden compilation will have a live version of the song. Here it is for your perusal.
Badass Native: "Run to the Hills", from The Number Of The Beast, averts this.
There's also "Fear of the Dark", from the eponymous album Fear of the Dark, where the order of the first two lines is reversed at the end of the song, for a truly symmetric feel:
Averted: while most fans are not at all enamoured of Blaze Bayley's run, the band continue to perform the best and most memorable material of that era, namely "Lord of the Flies", "Man on the Edge", "Sign of the Cross", (All of them from The X Factor) "Futureal" and "The Clansman". (From Virtual XI) All of these live versions appeared in live albums or singles.
Averted again with No Prayer For The Dying and Fear Of The Dark, thanks to From Fear To Eternity. Up to that point, with the exception of the eponymous song from the latter album and "Bring Your Daughter To The Slaughter" from the former, every other song wasn't placed in the setlist. Said album contains several songs from these two albums.
Old Shame: Most of the Iron Maiden "best of" albums either omit the first two albums (which had Paul Di'Anno as lead vocalist) or replace them with live versions sung by Dickinson. The band still averts this, by playing almost all of the first album sans "Strange World" and "Transylvania", and "Wrathchild", "Murders In The Rue Morgue", "Another Life" and "Drifter" from Killers. Of note are "Wrathchild" and "Iron Maiden" (the song) being part of their concerts even on our days. The latter, also, serves as the song where Eddie appears.
The way of the warrior, you took it as your right.
Whether or not this is an example depends on whether the child was forced to kill the man, but judging from the lyrics, he was probably put in that position.
Creepy Child: "Children of the Damned", from The Number Of The Beast.
Crystal Ball: "Can I Play With Madness?", from Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son.
Darker and Edgier: Compare Fear of the Dark and No Prayer For The Dying with any of the previous albums.
Compare the vocals, for example - less operatic, more raspy.
Some songs also work as Darker and Edgier counterparts of earlier songs. Compare "Charlotte the Harlot" to "22 Acacia Avenue" & compare "The Trooper" to "Paschendale".
The entirety of A Matter of Life and Death is quite a bit darker musically than previous albums, though the lyrics are still pretty much what you'd expect from Iron Maiden with possibly a more focused emphasis on Humans being bastards. The album's dark feel is largely due to the complex and melancholic melodies, and the quality of Dickinson's voice as he gets older.
Doomsday Clock: "2 Minutes To Midnight", from Powerslave.
Downer Ending: Maiden just seems to love this trope.
"Hallowed Be Thy Name" is the last track on Number of the Beast, about a man on death row.
" To Tame A Land" ends Piece of Mind with a very unhappy sounding final part.
Likewise "The Thin Line Between Love and Hate" (Brave New World)... if you ignore the Studio Chatter.
The last line of "Alexander The Great" (the final track on Somewhere in Time) is "He died of fever in Babylon".
Seventh Son of a Seventh Son is a concept album based on Orson Scott Card's book Seventh Son. The final track, "Only the Good Die Young", is about the devastation of a town from a disaster, and Lucifer planning to cancel the rest of mankind.
Virtual XI ends with "Como Estais Amigos", about the Falklands War. It even sounds depressing.
The Final Frontier ends with "When the Wild Wind Blows", about a couple who commits suicide mistaking an earthquake for the start of a nuclear war. This could also be played for dark comedy, as it is based off a darkly comedic graphic novel When the Wind Blows.
Dystopia: "Brave New World", from, well... Brave New World, is inspired in the book of the same name by Aldous Huxley.
Epic Rocking: All their albums have an epic, usually as the closer. The following are their longest songs.
"Rime of the Ancient Mariner", (13:36) from Powerslave.
"Seventh Son of a Seventh Son", (9:53) from Seventh Son of a Seventh Son.
"Sign of the Cross", (11:16) from The X Factor.
"The Angel And The Gambler", (9:52) and "The Clansman" (9:02) from Virtual XI.
"Dream Of Mirrors" (9:21) and "The Nomad" (9:06) from Brave New World.
"For The Greater Good Of God" (9:24) and "The Legacy", (9:23) from A Matter Of Life And Death.
"When The Wild Wind Blows", (11:01) "Isle Of Avalon" (9:06) and "The Talisman", (9:03) from The Final Frontier.
There are some crazy long ones in "Children of the Damned" and "Seventh Son of a Seventh Son" (the song, not the album).
Intercourse with You: "Bring Your Daughter... To The Slaughter". Though Bruce also said it's about menstruation.
Also, most of Charlotte the Harlot songs.
Instrumentals: "Transylvania" (which Bruce Dickinson once introduced as "a song I've never sung before, and probably never will"), "Genghis Khan" and "Losfer Words (Big 'Orra)"
Last Chorus Slow Down: "Powerslave", the last phrase of "Run to the Hills", "Fear of the Dark".
Last Note Nightmare: "Phantom Of The Opera", in the pre-remaster release, where after 10 seconds of silence, Di'Anno shouts the song's final line again.
Due to a production error, the intro to "Powerslave" haphazardly got stuck onto the ending of "Back in the Village" on the 1998 remaster of the album of the same name. So when one listens to Back in the Village, the song ends with the spooky intro to Powerslave.
Meaningful Name: Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, The X Factor and Virtual XI were the seventh, tenth and eleventh albums of the band, respectively. The Final Frontier, the fifteenth, opens with an instrumental titled "Satellite 15" (which segues into the title track).
Nightmare Sequence: Quite a few songs are inspired by Steve Harris' nightmares, such as "The Number of the Beast", "Infinite Dreams" and "Dream of Mirrors"
Non Appearing Title: 5/8 in Piece of Mind; other albums have it as well, mostly for self-describing titles, such as "The Prophecy", "The Mercenary", "The Reincarnation Of Benjamin Breeg".
Protest Song: Sometimes they go into current world problems, such as the televangelists ("Holy Smoke"), the high crime rate ("Age of Innocence") and the current economic crisis ("El Dorado"). And then there's the war-inspired songs...
Pun-Based Title: Piece of Mind and "Public Enema Number One", from No Prayer For The Dying.
It's rumoured that Patrick McGoohan himself, when the band asked for permission to use lines from the show, said "What was the band's name again?...a rock band, you say?...do it!". Picture those words in your mind along with that trademark cadence to Patrick McGoohan's voice and you're spot on.
It's a shame Frank Herbert wasn't quite so accommodating regarding Dune - the song had to be renamed To Tame A Land. This lack of accomodation was "mentioned" by Bruce in the 1983 World Piece Tour:
Next song is all about a gentleman who wrote a science-fiction book called Dune(...). He's an American called Mr. Frank Herbert, this particular gentleman, alright? And Mr. Herbert, as it turns out, is a bit of acuntactually, because he... among other things he said that if we called this track that we wrote on the album "Dune", that he'd sue us and stop the album coming out, and all kinds of very unpleasant things... So we had to re-title the track which is on the new album, and we had to call it To Tame A Land.
Shown Their Work: Possibly not all of their great many songs based on history, literature, or whatever it is are entirely faithful and accurate. The number that are, the shear volume of them, and the actual possibility of discussing whether a metal song is historically accurate mean they more than qualify anyway. Bruce Dickinson having a degree in history from London University doesn't hurt.
When the lyrics of "Alexander The Great" talk about the Scythians fleeing across the River Jaxartes, you know they've done their research.
Title Only Chorus: A few, such as "Caught Somewhere in Time" and "Seventh Son of a Seventh Son"
The subversion became more frequent as band matured, as many choruses included others phrases along the title. I mean, the song isn't called "Live to Fly, Fly To Live, Aces High". Also, in "Hallowed Be The Name", the song title is only sung twice, repeated towards the end as "yeah, yeah, yeah...hallowed be thy name..."
Refrain From Assuming: "Your time will come (4x)", in "The Wicker Man", from Brave New World; "Freedom (4x)", in "The Clansman" from Virtual XI; and "Falling Down (4x)", in "Man on the Edge", from The X Factor''; all choruses. And considering their tendency for Title Only Choruses, sometimes people call the songs by the chorus line.
War Is Hell: Many of the war-inspired songs ("The Trooper", "2 Minutes To Midnight", "Afraid to Shoot Strangers", "Paschendale", "The Longest Day" "Mother of Mercy" - for that matter, all but "Different World" in A Matter Of Life And Death).
Animated Music Video: "Wildest Dreams", from Dance of Death; "Different World", from A Matter Of Life And Death; and "The Final Frontier", from, well... The Final Frontier.*
Just for the sake of it, the video is named "Satellite 15... The Final Frontier", but the only part which is played is that of "The Final Frontier".
Brain Food: Piece of Mind{{'}}s inner sleeve◊ and CD art◊ (probably referencing the cover with a post-lobotomy Eddie).
Catch Phrase: The fans themselves have a Catch Phrase of their own — the phrase "Up the Irons" is pretty much the Maiden fan salute.
The band was known for their very distinctive album artwork courtesy of Derek Riggs throughout most of their career, and he provided at least some artwork for most of their album covers until his involvement eventually waned entirely after the release of Brave New World (reportedly due to them being difficult to work with). After having these painted scenes for nine (studio) albums, fans were slightly surprised when the album cover for Dance of Death was revealed to be an episode of◊ ReBootgone horribly wrong◊.
Likewise, a previous 2-D to 3-D jump, The X-Factor◊ (though not hand-drawn to CGI, but hand-drawn to statue) was not well received.
Inverted with the hand-drawn coverart◊ for the single El Dorado, which many fans saw as a bad depiction of the Garbage Pail Kids. The Final Frontier◊ may be playing this straight as well.
0 reviews 
