No Prayer For The Dying song by song: Tailgunner: Every time I hear those first notes, it gives me the chills! "Tailgunner" is such a good opener, I really like it - well, up until the verse sets in! I remember very well when I heard the album first time: my smile grew and grew in face of the tension built within the intro, and then fell apart the same moment the verse set in. Bruce's "new voice" had just hit me like hammer, but in a negative way. Where was the air raid siren? What had happened to my Maiden? This was... crap??? I think the vocals are delivered in a much too forced "let's do it differently!" way, they sound very unconvincing and somehow like a fake, not even convinced by themselves. The demo-like production surely doesn't help, either! But that chorus is great, I love it! Then, the next obvious change: There's just a glimpse of an instrumental section instead of a worked-out, glorious twin guitar attack, and we get shredding over a rhythm guitar instead. Then again, this is balls, indeed: Steve and the boys are riding their new wave full throttle, I must admit. Take it or leave it! Well, I took it. "Tailgunner" is to me one of the (very few) album's highlights. The intro reminds me a bit of "The Number Of The Beast" and "The Clairvoyant", which isn't a bad thing, the verse is as bad as the chorus is great, and the solo-section has a SSOASS-feel to it (sounds like a left-over, but I don't really think it is one): 8,5/10 Holy Smoke: Okay, now that's enough. This disturbed me even more than Bruce's voice in the opener. A harmless and tame hard rock song on an Iron Maiden album? A video with the band in a field of rapeseed? Welcome to the nineties, you old-fashioned metal-head! This and the opener is a one-two-punch of a bad kind and hit me straight in the stomach. Nope for me: 3/10 No Prayer For The Dying: Next song, next modification: the title song is not the typical anthem or epic, but a so-so kind of song. To this day, I absolutely don't have a clue what the lyrics are about, and the whole song sounds messy to me. I just heard the song again, and by now I'd say the first half of the song could sound like Maiden taking a bow before Jethro Tull if there wasn't the bad production which puts Nicko's drums much too much to the forefront. Bruce sings quite well and memorable, but the song goes nowhere somehow... The second half keeps being a mystery to me and sounds like a confused mish-mash. I don't need it anytime, and I feel the song, if nothing else, sums up the album (and therefore again, IS a fitting title track) in being bewildered, un-organized and sounding unfinished: 6,5/10 Public Enema Number One: I never cared much for this song, but as it's been quite positively regarded here, I gave it another attentive spin: Yes, it's okay. At least, it's free of faults or shocks like its predecessors on the album! While featuring old trademarks like twin guitar melodies, it also shows new facets that could have lighted the way for a modernized Iron Maiden. The demo-production does a good job in burying the guitars' aggressiveness during the verses (being ironic here), but the chorus gets a "nice!" from me. Unspectacular, but with a convincing street-wise rawness: 7,5/10 Fates Warning: Bad idea to take a rather well known band name for a song title, even more if that title isn't mentioned at all during the whole lyrics! Besides that, the lyrics' cheesiness always bothered me anyway. But I want to be fair, so I say this is all I don't like about the song. Apart from that, the song features the best instrumental section up until now on the album, and it has that same convincing street-credibility as "Public Enema Number One". Worth of mention is also the middle section at around 2.27, something new again in Maiden-county! Sadly, this song is an outstanding proof of the album's bad production: 7/10 The Assassin: Despite this song not being well regarded here, I always liked it. It lacks that harmless hard rock vibes and gives us finally something more exciting, albeit with a questionable moral point of view. Still, I don't get the nagging here, as "Killers" walks the exact same ground and always gets high praises! And yes, the chorus is the song's weakest part - but not as bad to me as to some others here. The build-up is great, and the part right before the verse is a high point of the whole album. The verses sound credibly sinister, and the solo is underlied with a skillful rhythm part: 8,5/10 Run Silent, Run Deep: An album's favorite of mine, which also reminds me of SIT-era Maiden. It's the only song with a gallop, BTW! The verses are good (I especially like the line "the thump of diesels hammer down - in the oily sea, the killing ground"), and the chorus is, yes, fantastic. I LOVE to sing along with it! The solo is introduced by a (then new, now trademark) lonely, very beautiful guitar melody by Davey, before Steve and Nicko deliver a spectacular rhythm work, and on top, we get some delicious guitar interplay at 2.55, reminding us of how good Maiden once used to be all the time! Good song, wonder why they don't play it live... maybe too old fashioned back then, but right now it would be a nice surprise to their set, wouldn't it? 9/10 Hooks In You: Adrian Smith's only contribution is a rip-off of his own "2 Minutes To Midnight"?! Gosh, this album is ill-fated in so many different ways... The satirical, Zappa-esque lyrics make the song even more uncomfortable and look highly exchangeable to me. I mean, the lyrics could be about any topic with the song's neutral feel, I just would welcome lyrics in a rhythmical and word-wise better sounding way. Put that aside, the whole song leaves me cold. It doesn't hurt, it doesn't add, it's filler: 6,5/10 Bring Your Daughter...To The Slaughter "It's a fine line between clever and stupid", and this song walks right along that line. Cheesy as hell, but also really catchy. In that way, the most commercial sounding song on the album and the absolute right choice for a single. I like it, but I feel stupid singing along with it: 8/10 Mother Russia: The album's epic closer. Epic? Well, it's the album's longest song, and the topic and the musical ideas give more than enough room for creating an appropriate, album-closing epic - but the boys decided against it and compressed it as much as they could. I think that was one more of those bad ideas to modernize Iron Maiden, and I really feel that the song could well take two more minutes or so. By today's standards, it might well have evolved into an over ten-minute-epic! But that doesn't mean "Mother Russia" is bad. "Mother Russia" is good, really good, and it also leaves the alienated Maiden-fan in a conciliatory state of mind, being the most traditional song on the album by far: 9/10 Overall album thoughts: When I heard it for the first time, I had a hard time liking it. "Tattooed Millionaire" showed Bruce's new interests, H had left the building, I strongly disliked the cover (still do, BTW), the sound was very... unusual, and I couldn't find any similarities to KILLERS (Nicko told the press how close to Killers NPFTD felt in the making - yes he did, although he wasn't in the band back then!) AT ALL! I saw them the first time on that tour (which was my first "professional" concert attendance at all), and they didn't impress me either... So, as much as i wanted, this was the last album I really tried to get into - without succeeding, I must admit! I think it's quite bad, an enforced try at something new with too much wrong ingredients. A better production would definitely have helped. And I don't only mean the sound, but also the conduction of the group. NPFTD sounds very loose and messy, it totally lacks a vision and is, in that regard, totally opposite to its predecessors. It was the first step down, and it was a very clear step down for me. Comparing this to mammoths like POM, POWERSLAVE, SIT or TNOTB almost looks unfair - but in fact, it isn't! I'm getting tired now, so I won't go into much detail with the B-sides: I'm A Mover: Maiden never could be Free, that's just two different universes. Put that aside, I think they do a quite good job and somehow even manage to get a glimpse of the original's atmosphere: 7,5/10 Communication Breakdown: No. Just no. While Zeppelin's version has the needed feel of chaos and anarchy, Maiden just play it. Not bad, but more than unnecessary: 4,5/10 All In Your Mind: I didn't know Stray's version back then and loved the song right away. Indeed, I liked it much better than some songs on the album! The raw Barnyard-sound fits all these B-sides like a glove, I must say! 8,5/10 Kill Me (Ce Soir): Meanwhile, I'm a big Golden Earring fan, but when I heard this, I barely knew "Radar Love"! Good song, but Maiden -and Bruce- can't hold a candle against the original. Sounds like an uninspired run-through: 5,5/10
Happy 15th Anniversary to the "Dance Of Death"-album, Maiden's 13th studio-album which was released on 8th of september 2003 (according to wikipedia it was released in Japan on 2nd). This was 2nd album by the reunited 6 and also it proved a few interesting points, for example "Journeyman" which was their first fully acoustic-song. Anyways, I think this album proved to be a grower for me, I liked it but definitely needed time to open and now it's great but among the very few first listens I didn't perhaps quite instantly dig it as much as some their other albums. But good and great albums need time. As I mentioned when we discussed the album, this is what said about the album and when I did little comparison to the previous album "Brave New World": I think I liked this one already when it came out but it still took pretty long time to fully open and comprehend it all. It had somewhat couple more lesser songs compared to the previous masterpiece and return to form album "Brave New World". The overall feeling and appreciation for this album is great for me, with time I've grown to like it even more but I think it still isnt't quite on par of what BNW had set, it's really close though. But the highest and best moments here are really great. They made really terrible choice with the album cover and as we talked, there could have been much better choices to be made. Dance of Death (album) - Wikipedia Dance of Death - Iron Maiden | The Iron Maiden Commentary | Albums | Dance Of Death | Commentary |
By the way, I saw Bruce's book tour show on thursday. It was great, entertaining and interesting show. I really liked it and was exactly what I had hoped it to be. Bruce was totally cool, relaxed and entertaining. It was great experience, even if I had to do 4 and half an hour train trip to get to the show, but of course I had booked hotel room, so didn't have to take trip to home after the show. Just makes me appreciate him even more, even if he has been my absolute idol for so many years. He's really got the words and knows how to use them, so it's really no wonder if he's wanted speaker for occasions like this. The show lasted over two hours and so it's hard to summarise it all here. Anyways, the solo-album is being worked on (with Roy Z), but no actual stuff such as titles, release-dates or tour-dates couldn't of course be mentioned yet. Adrian's supposedly working on his fishing book and nothing was said of Iron Maiden's upcoming stuff (tour or anything about future actually).
Fear Of The Dark song by song: Be Quick Or Be Dead: A good opener, Nicko's furious here! It was good to hear a much more confident band than on NPFTD, and the production also wasn't as demo-like. As for the main riff, I'm not a fan of it or its several relatives, as I said before. Here, it was presented us for the first time, and I took it as new, modernized Maiden. The verse and the chorus are so-so... the chorus is memorable, but the background vocals sound strange to me. The song also has some nice touches structure-wise and rhythmically, but there are better songs on FOTD. During the solo, it's audible that the album could have been produced way better... All in all, I'm not very fond of "Be Quick Or Be Dead", but I welcomed the aggressive approach on the album's start quite much: 7,5/10 From Here To Eternity: FOTD's "Holy Smoke". Meh. Better executed than "Holy Smoke", but that hard rock stuff IS a bad place to be for Iron Maiden. Thinking about, the source for this all may well come from "Tattooed Millionaire", Steve liked it quite well... The chorus reminds me of AC/DC, but that doesn't make it any better - I also wouldn't want AC/DC to sound like Maiden! I'd call it a misguided try in a foreign country. It's all worked-out, the solo are rather okay, nothing terribly wrong here - except for the direction: 5,5/10 Afraid To Shoot Strangers: I used to like that one. Listening to it again after some years was okay, but not much else... If anything, this song is something like a meditation, as it meanders through its almost seven minutes without any real highs or lows. I listened to some live versions then, in hope that the lack of the cold and empty feel of the production would help, but no... The live version on "The Best Of The Beast" with Bayley singing is the most interesting, as it's finally a Dickinson-song he was able to nail it, but a new quality it has not. The song's ingredients are not bad, and Davey's melody, played unisono with Janick, is the clear highlight and one of the most memorable musical moments on the whole album. This is, as he put it, the outcome of his own style - beautiful, really beautiful. But in the end it's Maiden doing Emo. Even though it was a regular live back then, I don't miss it: 8/10 Fear Is The Key: Similar boring to "Afraid To Shoot Strangers", albeit the main riff is quite good - but totally overplayed. Bruce Dickinson also delivers an overplayed performance, I can't stand him howling that eccentric for long... The middle part, going from 2.45 - 4.30, is definitely the better part of the song. It starts energetic and, yes, also modern, before it segues into a fast and floating sequence - finally, here's modernized Maiden, sounding new, fresh and good! But of course, they settle back to that lame "main" part of the song. Yawn.: 6,5/10 Childhood's End: Oh boy, this is tough... it's very hard being objective through that nineties... See, this one sounds like a lost classic somehow and features the well-known top-notch worked-out guitar melodies all throughout it, carried by a demanding rhythm performance - or should I call it filler? Here on FOTD, it sounds lost. It's a highlight if you're a conservative fan and want classic sounds, but you also could describe it as Maiden-by-the-numbers and turn it down... I don't know how to judge it... What's for sure is that this one screams out loud for a warm and fat production, not this hollow and extremely separated sound FOTD has. Sorry boys and girls, I give up. I can't decide how to take it and simply rate it lukewarm: 6,5/10 Wasting Love: No. Would this song be covered by a band like, say Dokken, Europe or Scorpions, it might even have been a hit. But here, it sounds wrong - as does so much! A band working like clockwork, doing something so highly emotional simply doesn't work. This song needs a far looser approach. It surely sounds cheap writing that heavy rock bands would suit that song better, but I can easily imagine Joey Tempest singing this and turning it into a monster hit, really! That, of course, speaks for the song. So, another failed experiment. In this case, it would have been better to give the song away and make money out of it - from a commercial point of view. From Maiden's perspective, I'd say it's a desperate try in the wrong direction, and I really give my kudos for that: 7/10 The Fugitive: Rather similar to "The Assassin", but more than enough different to stand on his own. "The Fugitive" lets shine the old qualities of the band, but this time, I find it to be much more convincing (or simply better) than "Childhood's End". The pounding drums in the intro, a wonderful vocal line in the verses with good lyrics, an interesting chorus - why not simply more of that? Oh, yes - it's the alternative nineties... A prime example of how they can when they want - or how good they sound when they're in homeland: 8,5/10 Chains Of Misery: Another hard rock song. Not as insulting the casual Maiden fan as "From Here To Eternity" or "Holy Smoke", but still unnecessary. The gang vocals are done -again- in AC/DC style, and there are some musical parts that remind me of "Bring Your Daughter... To The Slaughter". Maybe they had something similar commercial in mind when they wrote it, but being more serious now? Hm. Well, for me, it doesn't hurt, I even like it. Maybe because it's made up so comfortably within the standard hard rock rulebook. Highly exchangeable and faceless, but also enjoyable: 7/10 The Apparition: Nerve-wracker par excellence! Maybe it would sound better as an instrumental, but like this, you can drive my insane anytime with it. The only moment that doesn't suck are 30 seconds from 1.50 up to 2.20: 4/10 Judas Be My Guide: Just before FOTD starts feeling like everything is lost, there's some light at the end of the tunnel: "Judas Be My Guide" is a flawless, melodic gem with a great feel and flow - a definitive favorite! At this point, I don't care how old-fashioned it might sound, but I simply enjoy the band doing what they do best instead of painfully watching them failing while looking for new ground. This has a SSOASS-feel to it, and I put it on (almost, there's the "H-factor" and the subtle complexity missing) the same league with "The Evil That Men Do" or "Only The Good Die Young": 8,5/10 Weekend Warrior: hard rock song No. 3. As complete different the atmosphere is, there are hints of AC/DC - again. I don't hate this song like others here do, but I definitely can live without it. Here's an observation of mine, and while not the first time nor the last time the band does "this", "this" will always be a mystery to me: How can the same band paint pictures with their sounds and enhance the lyrics in unbelievable wonderful ways on one hand, and deliver topics so meaningless and throwaway-like on the other hand? A hooligan's life is maybe a strange, but not per se bad topic. IMHO, it could well suit a much more aggressive metal song without any problems - I mean, it's about fights and struggles and passion and emptiness - it's got it all, somehow! But no, we just get this half-acoustic, satirical-sounding thing instead... I'd take it as an original B-side anytime, but not as an album track: 5,5/10 Fear Of The Dark: Finally. The song that single-handed salvages both, this album and Maiden's whole nineties-output by delivering the only enduring classic from that whole era: "Fear Of The Dark"! It's much better when played live, but even on record, it's on a class of its own. It's a somewhat simple song with three basic motifs: The verse, the chorus, and that guitar line, first introduced at around 3.40. As inconspicuous as every of these ingredients are, they're not only very memorable, but presented with slight variations every time, thus creating an effective earworm and fan favorite. I must admit I'm not THAT crazy about it, but I appreciate it's value as a stone-cold classic nonetheless. Nuff said: 10/10 Overall album thoughts: I was quite wary with FOTD after the shock of NPFTD, but I was still believing in the band and wanted my Maiden to be good. Nonetheless, I was prepared for everything and found it to be better than NPFTD. Today, I'm not so sure... The production is one major point: While NPFTD sounded like a demo ("unproduced"), FOTD sounds hollow, empty and lonely. The separation is much too strong, and the other thing I noticed is the difference of the guitar interplay: I don't know why, but Janick and Davey play simply unisono very often instead of creating dual melodies - are they incapable of doing so? On top, they didn't see a need of recording a rhythm guitar when they're playing their lines, thus narrowing the soundscape. Bass and drums are just not enough when creating a full sound, even not when your bass-player is Steve Harris. Of course, I'm talking about studio-tricks - but no one will ever tell me they didn't ever "use" the studio before!!! Apart from its faceless and sterile sound, FOTD is a typical example of how well-established bands struggled with the demands of last century's nineties: Taken out of their comfort-zone with the mandatory requirement of being different or being labelled cheesy. How on earth shall that work?? A band usually searches for its way to sound good (and, if possible, unique), and when they reached that goal, the success is up to the fact if fans find that sound attractive or not. "Being different" means not only ignoring, but avoiding these achieved qualities! More or less, a suicidal attempt - and that's exactly what happened, isn't it? Yet another problem on FOTD is the quantity. Up until now, this is the album I get fed up the most, even though it's under an hour - this to me is a definitive proof of bad quality! To be good, they should have left out "Fear Is The Key", "The Apparition" and "Weekend Warrior" - but that would have resulted in an album-length under 3/4 of an hour, which is more or less a no-go. Damn... FOTD is the band at the abyss. It's soon to become even worse, as the Blaze-Days were a band swallowed and lost in darkness... Thankfully, the reunion-era exists. It's like the phoenix, risen out of the ashes, allowing the band to give all they got left in the can the way they want and like it best. Nodding Donkey Blues: Crap. Not as annoying as "Roll Over Vic Vella", but I feel played for a sucker paying for stuff like this. "The Sheriff Of Huddersfield" at least meant something, but here, they're just fooling around. Also, I'm not good in taking Bruce Dickinson's comedic moments: 2/10 Space Station No. 5: Wow, this makes two covers from the same band! Apart from Dickinson's nerving goat-like rubbish talk, a decent cover. I guess Bruce had already spent his last drops of serious comitment during the proper album sessions... 5,5/10 I Can't See My Feelings: If you don't know Budgie's original, this is not bad, but yet strange... Ultimately, it just doesn't work out; feels and sounds just wrong, but the band won't let anyone mislead them: 5,5/10 Roll Over Vic Vella: Another story about a groupie, I guess. Okay, so we get bits of recorded dialogue between band members, and the crowing achievement of that happening with the girl in form of "Roll Over Beethoven" with different lyrics. Cheap'n meh: 3/10
Happy 28th Anniversary to the the "Holy Smoke"-single which was originally released on september 10, 1990. Cool, catchy little song and it was the first ever song to feature the new kid of the band, Janick Gers as he joined the band in mid-90. Great little song, and I've always loved it. The video is great and for sure, it's probably their most funniest video to date. Having fun and replying to concerns regarding real life is good, this is just essential and mandatory answer intended as Maiden's take on to the ever-growing number of Televangelist movement of the late 1980's. The song mentions Jimmy Reptile, who is in fact, Jimmy Swaggart, the most famous US TV preacher of the time, scoring some $150mil per year from religious freaks. Jimmy Swaggart - Wikipedia He used to organise record burnings. he went down in flames when he was caught red handed with a hooker! The story is too funny. Jimmy went from TV station to TV station, crying and begging god for forgiveness. The hooker made the Penthouse cover! Here's the video for the song, I hope you like it:
Just for the fun, I've posted those little anniversaries.. I was going to post "Running Free (Live)" single anniversary for today, but came to realize that wikipedia might have incorrect date.. Anyways, does anybody here know place where I could find correct release-dates for the singles, albums and such? It seems that wikipedia might be having few problems or even not so accurate info there.. I think these pages should have correct dates: Official: Iron Maiden - Studio Albums Singles and Live Albums - Iron Maiden DVDs - Iron Maiden This one hasn't been unfornately updated since 2010-11: | The Iron Maiden Commentary | All Iron Maiden Releases | Albums | The very old FAQ: IRON MAIDEN Frequently Asked Questions, part 1/2 (monthly post) FAQ: IRON MAIDEN Frequently Asked Questions, part 2/2 (monthly post)
September releases keep going: Happy 37th Anniversary to "Maiden Japan"-ep, which was originally released on september 14, 1981. The live-ep was recorded in Aichi Kosei Nenkin Kaikan in Chikusa-ku, Nagoya, Aichi, Japan on the 23rd May 1981. This is excellent live recording and essential document of those times (their first tour in Japan), and of couse I would like to have official release for the whole show or even few shows, maybe someday it will happen. I have some recordings from this tour and full show from this particular date, so can atleast listen to those while I might have to wait for so long time until we might see official release someday, maybe it could be included in some Eddie's Archives II or such.. The original cover depicted the band's mascot, Eddie, holding the severed head of singer Paul Di'Anno. The replacement cover was done on very short notice after Iron Maiden's manager, Rod Smallwood, received a proof for review, and became agitated at Di'Anno's depiction because the band were looking to replace him. Maiden Japan was released in Venezuela in 1987 with the original cover and has become a collector's item By the way here's the rare Venezuelan version of the cover: Maiden Japan - Wikipedia Maiden Japan – Commentary Iron Maiden - Heavy Metal Army - Maiden Japan Live !!
Apart from the delicate topic of the original cover, I think the common version is more iconic. I also wanted to say better executed, but while examining the details I changed my mind: While it's strange to position Paul's head behind the logo, the picture looks fuller and not as empty as the better known version. The nod to the "Killers"'s axe is also a nice touch. The lightning and Eddie himself are painted on the same artistic level. Well, they both work much better than the cover of this 1993 single:
The X Factor song by song: The Sign Of The Cross: New album, new singer, first song: Steve, you have got my attention! "Gloomy" is the first impression, the monk's choir sets the scene, and the snare's march reminds me a bit of "Alexander the Great". Strange choice for an opener, as this is the most epic song on the album, and it's also constructed in that complex way Harris likes his album closers... It works, as it sets the tone for the album and carefully prepares you for the inevitable: almost three minutes go by before we're finally allowed to hear Blaze Bayley in full force (before that, we only get almost whisphered outings). Hm... this guy is somewhat glued to the given rhythm and melody, as he stiffly soldiers on through the vocal lines. Only when Bruce returned I came to fully comprehend the majestic grandeur and brilliance of this song. He gives the song the dramatic note to bring the song to life. Blaze's take lets the song sound like an empty case. I won't go into details, but "The Sign Of The Cross" is one (if not THE) favorite song of the band's whole nineties-output - as long as Bruce sings it! And I rate the song here, not this version: 10/10 Lord Of The Flies: Funny - here, Blaze is the only one to shine, while the band sounds totally uninspired... But still, that intro is really cool, and the twisted rhythm also works nice. I take the whoa-whoa part without problems, but the repeated choruses after that tend to destroy the song's likeability: 6,5/10 Man On The Edge: Another song inspired by a movie - "Falling Down", but you all know that. The song is one of the most memorable Bayley-era songs and fits his voice rather good: It's all so fast and packed that anything apart from a straight job would lessen it (very audible on "The Wicker Man"'s B-side, where Bruce also stands as-close-as possible to the given path). Worth to mention, the verse-riff is similar to the one in "Be Quick Or Be Dead". All in all, a simple song with quite forgettable solos but a fun chorus: 8/10 Fortunes Of War: The first real low on the album. One can say what he wants here, but I wouldn't buy that tune from anybody. It's just boring and feels endless. Every other band would have left it in the cellar. The only reason to get away with it is to be included on a sub-par album like this: 4/10 Look For The Truth: Two losers in a row. It's a bit better than its predecessor because of the interplay setting in a 3.30, but the whoa-whoas sound much too formulaic and take down this advantage. You know, these who-whoa-parts used to be the icing on the cake instead of the sole melodic part of a song! Highly repetitive stuff. This album is starting to hurt... 4/10 The Aftermath: Have we passed the bottom of the valley? This is better. Not very distinctly, but still. I like the way the rhythm of the vocals are complementing the band's rhythm, especially on the line "war horse and war machine curse the name of liberty". Still, it's all very formulaic... I don't have a clue why the whole band plays so restricted and bare-boned, but with a little more meat and Bruce on vocals, maybe this one could be elevated to yet unknown heights... It features some really nice melodies on the guitars, but what really bores me is that almost every vocal melody line is just repeating them without adding anything new: 6,5/10 Judgement Of Heaven: The verse is lifeless Maiden by the numbers, the chorus is quite good, the guitar melodies introduced at 2.50 are nice, but again the vocals don't enhance but simply repeat them: Boring, but with a nice chorus: 5,5/10 Blood On The World's Hands: One of the better songs on TXF, but that doesn't mean much. It's a shame that one has to imagine Bruce singing it to get a better apprehension of the song, that speaks volumes of how wrong it was to put Blaze in the band! But let's just move on: the song features some complex rhythms, a rather good chorus and so-so guitar interplay: 7/10 Heart Of Darkness: A high point? Sort of... Blaze pulls it out quite good, the line "What I wanted was a mission, and for my sins they gave me one" is well done and fits his singing style. The song shows hints of higher class, but the production and the execution sucks out every drop of blood again... The boys really should give it a try these days! 8,5/10 2 A.M. I was curious about this much hated song, but I don't think it's inferior to "Fortunes Of War" or "Look For The Truth". In fact, I really like the guitar melody at 3.06 and think it's one of the better ones on the whole album - albeit sounding lonely and hollow, as does the whole album... intro and outro reminds again of Dickinson's TM, so it must be from Janick: 6/10 The Unbeliever: Not as nerve-wracking as "The Apparition", but a close cousin during the verses! The chorus (is it a chorus?) is one of the best on the album. The different parts almost feel competitive and opposite instead of organic - I guess Steve wanted it that way. The whole song breathes loads of classic rock air (Budgie comes to mind), served with progressive gusto. I see it more like an experiment than like a song, as it's so different and ambitious. But it all works quite well, and finally, here's another high point on the album. One other thing that pleases me here is that it sounds as if the band is finally having a good time! Overall album thoughts: This was even harder than I thought. Listening to it is one thing, reviewing another... I feel I'm much too harsh on Blaze's vocals, where I really don't want to. Let me put it this way: He has a good voice without a doubt, really - it's just that Maiden's compositions need a singer who puts on a lot more of dramatic/theatrical turnarounds on the basic vocal lines to elevate the music to the level we're accustomed to, and Blaze just won't do that. One could say he was extra-nervous during the recording of TXF, but he didn't alter anything when it came to tour the songs... So, we witness lots of lame and highly repetitive vocal lines, delivered in a technical succeeding, but emotionally lacking way, leaving Blaze looking like a *****. Please don't get me wrong, I think this is a really unfair situation for him! Just give the man some good melodies to sing on, a musical surrounding with less focus on an eccentric frontman, and you're pretty well served, I think. But the voice isn't the only problem. Like FOTD, the interplay of the guitars leave a lot to desire and don't complement each other at all, they seem much more interested in following their own, differentiating paths. The production enhances this with its hollow sound and endless space between the instruments, and of course the much too often non-existent rhythm guitar. I always thought Maiden lost their edge and bite during the nineties, but most of my thinking came from the simple fact that there's almost nothing I'd call a riff. Why is it so? Don't ask me, I'm just glad this phase is over! Last but not least, there are three songs ("Judgement Day", "Justice Of Peace" and "I Live My Way") from the sessions released as B-sides which would have changed the album's pace easily. Adding these three while leaving out sleeping pills like "Fortunes Of War", "Look For The Truth" and "Judgement Of Heaven" would have bettered the fans' impression of Blaze's talent by far. They must have wanted to give the album a dark and pessimistic mood somehow... This was the last album I bought before the reunion. I was curious, and I wasn't about giving up without trying. Well, I gave up. These were hard times being an Iron Maiden fan. It's one thing to be outdated, but another to be straight bad. It was the ultimate signal for me that I had to broaden my musical horizon and get satisfaction (no, not the Stones - not yet!) somewhere else. Judgement Day: Whoa - what is this?! The album's fast rocker, hidden on a B-side! The similarity to "Be Quick Or Be Dead" on the verse riff is striking obvious again, so that might well be the reason it was left out - one brother's enough! Still better than the album's lows, and, even more important, it shows us a capable Blaze Bayley! The other reason it was dropped must be the failed middle part, but that could have been worked out: 7/10 Justice Of Peace: Another one showing Blaze in a good light, albeit it also shows a weak spot: The chorus would benefit infinitely from background vocals in a tonal shift, but nobody came up with the idea for doing them! The way it's done now sounds a bit strange. Maybe it was because H wasn't in anymore to do background singing (no that's bullsh**t, "better watch out!"), who knows... The song has a positive vibe, maybe it was dropped because of that? One other crucial thing is the similarity in the vocals close to the end to what he does near the end of " Judgement Of Heaven". Nonetheless, a breath of fresh air and also better than some other songs that made the final cut: 7/10 I Live My Way: The third and last of the songs that didn't make the album, the third in a row that would have bettered it! Soundwise, it's more like a demo - topicwise, it foreshadows "The Journeyman". And, guess what, Blaze sounds fine here again! Besides that, we get cool interplay and classic-but-smart rhythm-work. The song's chorus is somewhat cloddish, but so is "The Journeyman" - so what? 7/10 My Generation: The slaughter of the holy cow to me, I try to take it as best as I can: Maiden do a fairly chaotic version and put some fun into it, which is a good thing. Blaze sometimes reminds me of David Lee Roth (which is bad in case you want a reputation as a good singer!), and Steve makes sure he's able to do "The Ox" anytime. All in all, highly unnecessary, but could be worse: 5,5/10 Doctor, Doctor: Steve pays tribute to one of his all-time-faves in executing a note-per-note take on UFO's original - Hell, he even uses the same organ sound like on "Strangers in The Night" and lets Nicko duplicate Andy Parker's breaks! Surprisingly, even Blaze pulls out some emotion for this (maybe, he simply was also forced to be as close as possible to Phil Mogg?) Does anybody know if they used this version as pre-intro to their live shows when with Blaze? To not anger Steve and honor his tight but succeeded demands: 8,5/10
Oh my god, where's my mind?! Of course it's called "The Edge Of Darkness", "Heart Of Darkness" is the name of the novel, sorry! ...and "The Unbeliever" gets 9/10!
Just read through your posts on TXF - wow, you're equally mercyless with Bayley, but have also some respect for him. It's cool to notice I'm not alone! As for the album's songs, there are slight variations, but that didn't change my mind... I understand that "The Unbeliever" is hard to swallow, but maybe I just see it different: something musical finally comes in. The 9/10 rate is because of the succesfully executed adventure - I never would want to hear it done live, nor do I see it as a worthy Iron Maiden song. Hm... where am I going here... maybe that TXF review was too much for me to take...
Virtual XI song by song: Futureal: Up until now, the best song featuring Blaze Bayley on vocals. A fast, straight opener in the vein of "Man On The Edge" or "Be Quick Or Be Dead" with a memorable and likeable hook for the chorus. I just compared it to the live version with Bruce (on "The Wicker Man"'s B-side) and can't detect any alterations in the singing - in fact, I think Blaze sings it better than Bruce: This song is perfect for Blaze's voice, and the vocal lines are so tied-in in the rhythm that his to-the-point-deliverance serves it better than Bruce's "enhancements". Ha, put it this way, you can see the song as another showcase for Blaze's limited imagination regarding his vocal performance - only that this time, it's fitting! While the solos are not worth to mention, during the live version, two of the three amigos (Murray and Smith?) dual the first solo to amazing effect - kind of virtual reality shifting back and forth against pure reality. But that might just be me. 8,5/10 The Angel And The Gambler: I think this is the third (the others being "Holy Smoke" and "From Here To Eternity") attempt at a casual hard rock song by Iron Maiden - hopefully their last! I must say, from its individual sections, I like it better than the other two, as it has a nice melody in the verses. The chorus also is absolutely okay. On top, Blaze sounds fine on "The Angel And The Gambler" to me again and even manages to own the song. But of course, there's that unforgivable, merciless and endless repetition of the chorus which again features repeated lines in itself... a top candidate for torturing terrorists in case it's wanted to let them go bananas! Not to forget the painful sound of that instrument during the verses. What is it? An organ, or an accordion? Or an unholy mixture of both? Another rather inexcusable feature is the sub-par quality of the solos, given the length and simple structure of the song - I mean, if there ever was a playground for letting it all out, than it's right here! But no, opportunity is missed in favor of repetitive madness... All in all, I'd rate it my favorite hard rock song by Iron Maiden if it just would be edited down to 3 minutes or so. But I rate it as it is: 4/10 Lightning Strikes Twice: Lame. The first, slow half, breathes the monotony of most of TXF's compositions, and the second, faster half, sounds very half-baked and throwaway-like. And that chorus is impossible to sing live! Steve has edited it to fit the guitar lead and left out any pauses for a singer to take a breath! Or am I wrong here? Is there a live version of the song? Solos are forgettable, too, so: lame. 5/10 The Clansman: Uuh, the second classic coming from the Blaze-days (the other one being "The Sign Of The Cross"). "The Clansman" isn't overly complex, nor is it very original - but it's a hell of a fun to sing "FREEEEEDOM!!!" with all the other brothers and sisters at stadium-sized concerts! It just happens to be a good, catchy song, almost feeling like Steve simply had the luck of "finding" it - all he had to do was to arrange the parts and put it on record - which he did without compromise, as it is very audible how Blaze struggles to sing the low intro. Bruce masters this without any problem... The song is designed to be payed in a live environment, that's what stands out when listening to the studio version (which is something I didn't do for ages!). There are nice, little touches all over the song, which to me is a sign of how well the song was received within the band. The intro is also one of the most memorable in Steve's whole repertoire. Easily the highpoint of the album: 10/10 When Two Worlds Collide: That intro is great, really. Sets a nice mood, also the vocal work enhances here. But it's all over when the verse sets in - there will never be a time I will NOT be annoyed when Iron Maiden put a happy-go-lucky melody on dramatic lyrics and give their quality of painting pictures within music the stab in the back! The chorus is divided in two parts: the first part is bad and in the vein of the verse, the second part is great and gives us the needed drama for the topic - well, it WOULD be great in case we had Bruce singing it, because he'd take out the monotony of the chorus' melodic repetitiveness... The instrumental part is worked out well, but sadly (as usual in the 90ties), we don't get any twin-guitar-attacks, just the plain melodies . They don't sound so lost and lonely like on TXF, but still, there's almost always something missing somehow... If Maiden would take the time and rewrite "When Two Worlds Collide", it could be a really great song. But Maiden is no such band, and in its actual state, there are too many flaws, so: 6/10 The Educated Fool: What is this?! I completely forgot about that song, and I hopefully will return into that state of mind! Total crap! It's worked out and meant the way it is, but it speaks large amounts of nothing to me. Is it filler? I'd say no, because it's been treated more carefully than, say, "Lightning Strikes Twice"... No matter what, I don't get it: 4/10 Don't Look To The Eyes Of A Stranger: I really like the song's chorus, it works great and would even more in a live environment. The orchestration also serves the rhythm, but the verse is more on the so-so-side of things. Lyrically, it hints to "Fear Of The Dark". The "main" song ends at around 3.30, which is quite adequate. Then, the songs starts building up again with a different take on the chorus' lyrics. Would it have been me, I'd have reserved that as a "surprise" when played live, but Maiden put the songs on their albums in the exactly same way they end up playing them live in 95% of the cases, so there's that. It's not bad at all, and Blaze is able to show a rather unused quality of his own here: the hypnotic impact of his monotone deliverance - no, I don't mean that in a bad way! But at 5.30, all is lost: I hate this kind of ska-rhythm, I just plain hate it! It always sounds so dumb, I absolutely can't take it. I more or less tolerate its use in Thrash Metal because of the diminished possibilities when playing really fast parts, but I don't like it nonetheless... Apart from that rhythm, the rest of time the song takes to end is pure repetition, like they wanted to get over the 50 minute mark for the album or so. No. For me, cut the song at 3.30, or fade it out just before the 5.30 mark, as the rest is just painful. 1st part of the song: 8,5/10, 2nd part: 3,5/10 makes an average of: 6/10 Como Estais Amigos: Another one I forgot of, and another one which is quite forgettable! AFAIK, the song is a tribute to the South American fans, but it is so lame, Iron Maiden should apologize to them! The only moment worth to mention is -surprise, surprise- a musical mini-gem, to me even a musical highlight of the whole album, going for sweet 20 seconds from 3.17 to 3.37. The rest is meh, filler quality, reminds me of "Look For The Truth" and nowhere near an appropriate end for the album: 5/10 Overall album thoughts: The shock of TXF was too big, I didn't buy VXI the time it came out. I must also admit I wasn't keen on writing this review after the drag that TXF is... Well, it turned out that TXF is the nadir of Maiden's discography. Fortunately, VXI lacks the painful hollow production of TXF, and the band sounds more homogenous with its new singer - it's much more of a working entity than it was before. Still, the playing sounds uninspired much too often, and the minor quantity of songs is another proof of a lack of ideas. On the other hand, this makes VXI also manageable and, ultimately, better than TXF. I don't know how many or which studio tricks were used on Blaze's voice (on "Lightning Strikes Twice" it's all too obvious), but he generally sounds fine here. Yet nothing detracts from the fact he was a bad choice for the band, mostly visible (or better, hearable) on "The Clansman" which sounds as if written with Bruce in mind and instantly illustrates the limitations of Blaze's abilities. Blaze Bayley simply hindered the band from being as good as it could AND should, point! Virus: I know, this belongs much more to the TXF-timeframe than here, but I somehow forgot it... As for the song, I don't understand the love it gets. To me, it sounds strange, with its parts being put together like on Frankenstein's monster: clumsy and ugly: 5/10
Boys'n girls - I did it. I rated every single song in Maiden's discography. I also have put together an Excel sheet to have an overview. There, I "corrected" some of my ratings I did here, because sometimes you're in a certain mood, or rate something different the next day. The other reason to do so was to have more comparable ratings, meaning being able to compare the class of, say "Where Eagles Dare" to the mediocrity of, say "Face In The Sand". Resulting from the average within the albums I got album-rankings, but as these didn't reflect my felt opinion, I also ranked the albums by "feel". Dun!
Happy 33rd Anniversary to the "Running Free (live)" single which was originally released on 23rd of september 1985. Also on this same date, in 1996 they released the compilation album "The Best Of The Beast".
Find of the day, wow I was a bit surprised of what I found from youtube. You know, Iron Maiden did the Beat Club show in Bremen in 1981. Iron Maiden - LIVE | complete gig - 1981-01-22 Intro/Ides Of March Prowler Charlotte The Harlot Wrathchild Remember Tomorrow (1st try) (Break for Technical Issues) Remember Tomorrow (2nd try) Transylvania Running Free Innocent Exile Sanctuary (1st try) Killers Another Life Phantom Of The Opera Iron Maiden Sanctuary (2nd try) This show has been available on different quality recordings through the years (I got few different editions) that were recorded from the tv-broadcasts, but 2 days ago The Beat Club released this full show on their channel, there's plenty of songs that weren't broadcasted in 1981. This is definitely the best quality so far I have ever seen of this show, they even have some sort of technical problems during "Remember Tomorrow" and stop playing, drink beer while waiting for the Killer-crew to solve the problem.
Hah, already saw it as it was mentioned by a friend of mine yesterday - good one, great documentary value!
Hopefully others here who aswell contributed to the thread will watch that Bremen-show. Outstanding, great quality and nice to see this full show at last. And great piece as it features Clive Burr. The band is on fire, really literally as they pound that energetic set. It was treat to watch this show, as was weird to hear Charlotte The Harlot played with such energy also the technical problems during "Remember Tomorrow" was odd. Anyways, I just feel that I can't too much praise this little piece of video, this has been actually one of the best finds of the last few years concerning any Iron Maiden-footage. If you told me when I first saw that video-tape that I would be seeing pristine quality full proshot from the show with added songs and stuff I wouldn't have simply believe it at all. Of course, the footage of the songs that were already seen earlier is familiar but this whole package seems to have come out of nowhere and feels like almost little holy grail. I just wish that there would be some further cool footage to be found from some other tours aswell..
So time really feels like it goes fast or something: Happy 32nd Anniversary to the album "Somewhere In Time", which was originally released on september 29th, 1986. For me, this is really among their finest albums and works to date. It's remarkable album which still sounds so good and hasn't at all loosen it's grip on me. I just simply dig the whole atmosphere, the soundscape, it's just all very unique like ethereal. SIT just has it's own charm and character for me. It's surely been in my top5 (if not even top3 actually) for all the time, as with feeling some albums and songs tend to change places a bit but some remain always.
Happy 28th Anniversary to the "No Prayer For The Dying"-album, which was originally released on october 1st, 1990. Wow, as I said earlier, time really does fly fast or atleast feels like so. I remember it so good when NPFTD was released, I bought it from the local record store (which unfornately closed it's doors in the later years). This album received similar mixed reactions as their other 90's albums. Sure, this album was different, like watershed, since the musical approach was more back to the their earlier sound, to the more basic-grounded and stripped-down after they had done those highly ambitious concept albums. Also Bruce's voice also had notably changed towards the end of the 80's, to much more raspy and unpolished which even befitted the new sound of the band really good. Also, as Adrian Smith had left the band earlier to pursue his solo-career, luckily the helping hand came near and this was Janick Gers first album with Maiden. There's some good moments here, but I think this is still somewhat underrated and often overlooked album (if not even forgotten a bit?) which of course has it's own highs and lows, problems (like their other 90's albums aswell), but it still leaves to wonder what this could have been if it was recorded in real studio-enviroment and Martin Birch on board. I think I've always liked NPFTD and FOTD, since they were in different stage and feeling of their career (this was talked around this thread earlier), both albums get the usual blamings, and people pick them for sometimes unfair reasons, even if you feel that there's some shortcomings on the albums, they aren't as complete disasters/flops as some of their contemporaries have released. I can keep posting these little anniversaries, if you want. There's few albums, singles and such released coming so maybe I will keep doing these. Not sure how long this thread will be alive, kicking and going..until they release some new material for us to review here.
Today is 23 anniversary of the album ”The X Factor”, which was released on october 2nd, 1995. Dark album which has divided opinions among the fans and really serious and dark mood is present (different approach for lyrics on some songs), which clearly was affected by the dark times that Steve lived through around that time. I won’t be posting the album cover as I don’t like it that much..
This was my first day-of-release purchase for a Maiden album, as I became a fan in Summer '89. I still remember getting that red vinyl and the liners confirming that H was no longer in the group. 28 years ago today (since it came out a day later in the US)...I listened to that record all the time after getting it while straining my eyes trying to find Riggs's signature. Even with its issues, I still love this album.
