Today’s single is one of three from the 2003 Dance Of Death album. Technically one of the others is an EP as opposed to a single, but a three-song EP is pretty much just a single. I don’t have it anyway so this three-song single will have to do.
The cover art is simply a shot from the music video. The video itself is, uh …. we’ll get to it in a minute. This is kind of a cool cover even though it’s not the most creative design choice. It was a far more daring choice than the cover of the Dance Of Death album, which I won’t stop complaining about until I leave this mortal realm.
There are several versions of this one, I’ll be going over the European CD release. There is a Japanese CD with two extra B-sides which would be cool to have but of course those go for a bit of a premium. This was also put on on 7-inch vinyl and, of all things, a mini CD. There’s even a DVD issue as well.
Rainmaker
First things first, just behold this music video. That is certainly something. There’s a lot going on there and, well, I don’t know what any of it really is. It does create a striking image and also it’s kind of a pile of shit. I honestly can’t make up my mind all the way on it, sometimes I dig it and other times I want to turn my eyes away from it.
The song though is a pretty good cut from the album. It’s a bit “meat and potatoes” Iron Maiden fare but there’s nothing wrong with a simple and effective song. The guitars come off with a “ringtone” vibe that puts some people off but I was never concerned with it. Dave Murray handles the solo on this one.
Lyrically the song is about rain as a symbol for washing away the grit of the past and renewing one’s self. To be truthful it’s just Bruce singing about rain for nearly four minutes, it’s not that deep.
Dance Of Death – Orchestra Version
The first B-side is a super cool one, it is the title track from the album done with an orchestra. It isn’t radically different from the actual album recording, it is the full song just done with a bit more accompaniment than the original. It’s not a total re-imagining like some metal-meets-orchestra versions are.
The song is nothing short of amazing and the orchestra only enhances it. This song was a Janick Gers contribution, along with Steve Harris. Gers seems especially keen to take a title track and turn it into gold, he did so both on here and The Book Of Souls. This B-side is absolutely worth the price of admission to this single, which in fairness isn’t that hard to get a hold of.
More Tea Vicar
It’s a good thing the single is good and the first B-side is awesome, because this turd also exists. It’s another Maiden joke track, which by this point in their career they’d done plenty of. There’s another one on the first single for this album but again I don’t have it, maybe someday later I’ll get to spin prose about that “masterpiece.” But for today I can have a go at its spiritual sequel.
The song is a some odd jam session where Bruce makes what might be a half-assed attempt at rapping. The lyrics are nonsense, the song isn’t great and Bruce isn’t getting any calls to make a hip-hop record. I don’t mind joke tracks, Maiden have had a few funny ones over the years, but honestly this one just stinks the place up.
That wraps up this one and the presence of Dance Of Death for this initial run of the series. Just three left now and everyone gets a bit of a break from Iron Maiden (maybe) before I get into the live albums.
This week in the Iron Maiden singles series it’s on to the album Brave New World from 2000. It’s a big one for what are obvious reasons to most, for those unaware I’ll catch you up in a second. Note that I don’t currently have The Wicker Man in my collection, it was the first single from BNW and I’m only covering the stuff currently in my collection.
The big news? The line-up shuffle hit Iron Maiden for the next and perhaps last (?) time. Blaze Bayley was excused from the group and in his place returned the band’s iconic frontman Bruce Dickinson. It was a reunion that Maiden heads had been clamoring for basically since Bruce left the band and the Blaze stuff fell flat with a lot of the supporters. While Iron Maiden have been an exceptionally talented band in several areas, there’s little doubt that their calling card was the Human Air Raid Siren Bruce Dickinson, and now he was back home to stay.
But Bruce didn’t come alone. He had been joined on his past two excellent solo albums by former Maiden guitarist Adrian Smith, who left the band in 1990. Adrian’s return did not displace anyone – the band decided to retain a three guitar line-up of Smith, original gangster Dave Murray and Janick Gers, Smith’s replacement in 1990. The three guitar attack has worked well for Maiden and the band’s roster remains unchanged 24 years on from the reunion.
Maiden had truly gotten the band back together, had toured and then recorded, then were out to unleash their new creation on the world. Today’s single is a 12-inch record picture disc with the lead track and two live B-sides from the actual reunion tour. There are different covers for the various versions, though each version of the single does contain the same tracks (one missing from the 7-inch due to science). The cover art was done by Mark Wilkinson, who has done extensive work with Marillion and Judas Priest, and was also the artist behind the past few Maiden album covers.
Out Of The Silent Planet
The single draws its inspiration from the 1965 sci-fi film Forbidden Planet (starring Leslie Nielsen!). In that film an alien planet was found in ruins. It turns out that the beings had created machines that could simply produce whatever the people thought of. As it happens, one thing people thought of were horrible monsters and so the monsters were created and tore everything apart.
While the film is a highly rated classic, the song doesn’t get such lofty praise. It is very repetitive, even for Maiden, and in parts it’s kind of shrill. I don’t mind the song at all, it’s not something I skip when I play the album, but I wouldn’t call this a highlight of the catalog either. I like the story behind it and all that.
It was curious that this song got picked as a single when a song like Blood Brothers was sitting right there. It got a music video and everything, yet Maiden did not play it out a whole lot on a tour where they played songs from Brave New World heavily. But it wasn’t all that important in the end, Iron Maiden were back and everyone was happy.
Wasted Years
The first B-side is from a September 1999 concert in Milan, Italy. This was on the Ed Hunter tour which was Maiden’s big reunion shindig. None of this stuff was ever put on to one of the band’s many live albums so these B-sides are pretty cool to have. This Maiden classic is played a bit fast and loose, which honestly is kind of nice to hear. The essence of the song comes off just fine with this rendition.
Aces High
Same scenario as the prior B-side, though this song is from a set in Madrid, Spain on the same tour. Also a signature Maiden song, complete with Churchill’s speech for the intro. This one is also played very fast and loose, in fact it does nearly go off the rails a time or two. But the band keep it together and this one also works out pretty well in the end.
That does it for the first reunion single. This series is headed into the home stretch, four more after this and it’s all done. Again, I’ll revisit this series in a year or so when I’ve aqcuired more of the singles I don’t have right now. And after a two week or so break once this is done, I’ll kick off a look at the Maiden live albums, which will take to close to the end of the year to get through.
This week on the singles series is a big one. This is the first and only in my collection to feature Maiden’s singer from 1995 to 1999, Blaze Bayley. This one goes all sorts of different directions, in terms of triva and lore, as well as different versions and things like that.
Before I go into the single itself, I want to say that not having a lot of Blaze era stuff in my singles collection was not an outright conscious decision. No, I’m not a huge fan of the stuff Maiden did while Blaze was in the band, but there are songs I like, including others that were released as singles. In truth, these singles have always been a bit tough to come by, or at least have been since I’ve been collecting the singles in earnest. These aren’t usually the cheapest things around and that has been the biggest limiting factor on getting these into my collection. I do want all of the (obtainable) Maiden singles so the Blaze stuff will be a point of emphasis for me going forward.
On today’s single – this thing was released in a handful of formats with sometimes odd choices. My version is part one of a two CD set. I only have the first disc of the set, which I’ll detail when I get to the specific songs below. To be totally honest I find the two-part single thing kind of lame and I’m not in a hurry to pick up the second disc to this, which has (almost) the same title song and then two other B-sides also available elsewhere. But, this disc has that one (almost) same title song and two B-sides also available elsewhere, so whatever. The not cheap or easy to get vinyl version has two radically different B-sides, two tracks from the infamous Soundhouse Tapes EP, while another CD version collects a handful of other songs. I need a degree in Cdology to keep up with this crap.
Now into the real heart of the matter – this is, for purposes of my series, the introduction of Blaze Bayley. Blaze was the singer of British act Wolfsbane from 1984 until 1994, when he was essentially hand-chosen by Steve Harris to replace Bruce Dickinson in Iron Maiden. It was a strange and curious choice, one that many fans still question to this day. Again, I’m not the biggest fan of this period of Maiden but I’m also not out to shit on Blaze or just talk smack for cheap Internet points so I’ll keep to a somewhat more objective view of things here.
Virus
We have a very interesting case for a single release here, as this is the one and only Iron Maiden song that has truly never appeared on an album. While Sanctuary and Women In Uniform were non-album tracks, those two songs did appear on albums for certain territories. Virus is, in the truest sense of the word, a non-album track.
Virus was a new song recorded for the band’s first greatest hits set, 1996’s The Best Of The Beast. Maiden were probably overdue for a compilation by this point and the set was pretty well received. There are a few different versions of the comp, though all do feature Virus.
CD 1 of the single features an edit of Virus, which cuts out the 2 minute or so intro. I’d personally prefer to have the unedited track but I wanted these B-sides so I went with this. The intro is very long and weird and I know a lot of people don’t like it but I honestly kind of dig it. You’ll find that the posted video has the song in full.
When the song proper kicks in it actually starts sounding like Iron Maiden. Even then it goes into a bit of a different roll in the end, but it fits what’s going on. One of my criticisms of The X-Factor album is that it sounds very same-y in parts, here on Virus the band truly establish something that stands on its own.
Lyrically the subject could be taken a few different ways, all of which are relevant. There seems to be an admonition about the Internet, which was on a fast rise at the time of the single’s release. This is a warning that grift and corruption could increase as the landscape of information gathering and dissemination changes. Yep, nailed that one.
This could also be seen as a shot at the band’s critics and detractors. The song addresses the apathy and the need to lash out at anything, something which the band dealt with a lot of during this time period. Sure, the Internet in 1996 was absolutely nothing like today, but the same general kind of “hide behind a screen name and let loose cheap shots” thing was still in full effect. I also don’t know what parts the band members were taking as valid criticism or as shit-talking, I heard plenty of both during this time.
This honestly is one of my favorite tracks of the Blaze period. Each album offered up a few gems, but this song really stands out. It’s different enough to stand on its own but also still sounds a fair bit like my favorite band. It is odd and it does generate wildly different reactions, but I’m in Camp Virus on this one.
Doctor Doctor
Both B-sides on this single were already available as B-sides to the Lord Of The Flies single. Why the repackage them here is beyond me, though apparently the first run did not make the UK so maybe that’s why.
Doctor Doctor is a famous track from the fantastic rock act UFO. If for whatever reason you haven’t heard the original, you should probably pause reading, go rectify that, then come back. Make sure to come back. Anyway, Iron Maiden give a song they probably jammed out to a million times a run through here and they do a pretty good job of it. I’d say this is one of the better Maiden cover song performances across their catalog.
And for a bit more Maiden/Doctor Doctor trivia – Maiden plays the UFO song over the PA at live gigs just before they take the stage. If you’re out in the arena grabbing a beer or a shirt and hear Doctor Doctor hit the speakers, better get back in to your spot quick.
My Generation
The other B-side is also a cover, that’s probably obvious to most. This is one of The Who’s immortal hits and here Maiden have a crack at it. The cover is fine but it lacks that special something to put it over top. Not a bad performance but nothing here with any real urgency, this is a curiosity more than anything. Also it feels too long, they could have cut this off a bit earlier.
That wraps up the Virus single. The other CD has two B-sides that are very early cuts of Sanctuary and Wrathchild released on a compilation before the debut album was out. To be honest it’s more economical to get the full original compilation than to get the second CD of this single, though if I happen on a deal one day I might pull the trigger.
Since my collection is severely lacking in Blaze stuff, this will also be the point where we bid him farewell. Blaze’s Maiden run did not win over a lot of people, though this era does have its fans. Blaze has gone on to a very nice solo career and has just recently recovered from a very serious heart operation, so best wishes to him going forward. He has always seemed on good terms with his time in Iron Maiden and the band have respected his two albums probably more so than the two ’90’s albums preceding those.
But, with this time of the band now filed away, the next, longest and seemingly final form of Iron Maiden is to come, starting next week in the singles series.
This week’s Maiden single is the second from the Fear Of The Dark album. And given the missing singles from my collection, this one will be a major exit point for the band, but I’ll get to that later on in the post.
The cover sleeve lacks Eddie and is either a band shot from the video or Satan with a motorcycle and a bunch of people hanging out, which my version is. This was only the second time they’ve done a cover photo like that, though it does come up again here and there in the future. Note that there is a different cover for one of the many, many different versions of this single.
This one really has a lot of different variations and content across the differing formats. I have a 12-inch vinyl with the single and two B-sides. I would consider the 4-track CD single a great one to have as it holds a second special B-side, perhaps someday I’ll track that one down. There are also etched records and other vinyl variants with some different B-side content on them.
From Here To Eternity
The single is another hard rocking cut, it gives off a “biker” vibe which was not something you’d normally get with Iron Maiden. I do think it’s a case where Maiden succeeds in the hard rock arena. This one is simple and catchy, yet still sounds like Iron Maiden. They weren’t always “on” in the ’90’s but this is one example of them getting their new direction right.
The song is about a motorcycle ride, but not just any random one. This is the final ride of Maiden’s other character, Charlotte the Harlot. A lot of people are familiar with her song of the same name from the debut and also the sequel 22 Acacia Avenue from The Number Of The Beast. Not quite as known are Hooks In You from No Prayer For The Dying and this one, marking the final two chapters of Charlotte’s story.
And Charlotte goes out with a bang – she heads off into the sunset on the back of a motorcycle piloted by none other than heavy metal’s best friend, the devil himself, Satan. This doesn’t mark a “fall” for Charlotte as opposed to a match made in, uh, Hell I guess. The former resident of 22 Acacia Avenue heads off with her new lover into eternity.
At some future point I’ll have a post covering the Charlotte saga in its entirety.
Roll Over Vic Vella
This B-side is available across most versions of the single except for a few 7 inch pressings with a different cover instead. This song is a bit of a cover, obviously being Chuck Berry’s Roll Over Beethoven. The altered lyrics pay tribute to the band’s long-time roadie Vic Vella, and the spoken bits at the beginning and also interspersed through the song are a conversation between Vic and Steve Harris.
While this comes off like a cheap gimmick, as the band had been having a run of through the ’90’s singles, this one actually works pretty well. The song itself is pretty good, a pretty high octane rendering of the original that won’t win awards but also gets the job done. And it’s a nice tribute to a long-running crew member, it’s a pretty cool thing for the group to do.
No Prayer For The Dying
For the real treasure of this single, we get a live cut of the title track from the prior album. This was recorded at the Wembley Arena in London during December 1990. It’s a great sounding performance and was captured very well.
The great thing about this B-side? Unlike most other Maiden B-sides, this one is truly not available anywhere else. This is the only place to get it. The band with almost as many live albums as studio records did not issue an album of this tour and this song was not included on any of the three live albums that came out after Fear Of The Dark. This is a true rarity among B-sides and makes this single release very special.
And the CD version I mentioned earlier has another cut from the same album – Public Enema Number One, one of the better cuts from No Prayer… It makes that CD version very special.
There is one other single from Fear Of The Dark and also a few singles from the following live albums. However, I don’t have any of those and that means for the purposes of this series, it’s time to say farewell to Bruce Dickinson. Bruce would leave Maiden after the touring behind Fear… in order to dive fully into his solo career. There are indications that Bruce wasn’t happy in Maiden and Steve wasn’t always happy with Bruce, but a lot of that is secondhand information that I won’t go much into.
It would mark the band’s most drastic shift, only behind when Bruce first joined and gave Maiden a voice to match their musical ambition. Bruce would go on to a critically acclaimed yet not commercially glamorous solo career. For Iron Maiden, their story after Bruce can be told on the next single of this series. And while Bruce was gone for six years, in terms of this series he’s only gone for one single. Until then.
This week we are on to the album Fear Of The Dark. It would be Iron Maiden’s second in the 1990’s and it would mark a final album for a band member, at least for awhile. This stuff is the end of an era but Maiden went out swinging.
There are a pile of different versions of this release. I am holding a US CD copy that is almost “complete,” we’ll get to that later. The cover art was done by the band’s long time artist Derek Riggs, though it’s worth noting that he did not do the art to the full album’s cover and was soon on the way out. In fact, as far as I can tell, this is Derek’s last appearance in this singles series. Some of that is due to me not having a few live ones that come just after this, but for the purposes of this series it’s worth noting that Eddie’s iconic artist did his final work. There has been use of and involvement with Derek since then so I’ll correct this if I find I’m wrong down the line.
Not a whole lot else to say before I get into the music, but it is worth mentioning that the single did very well on the charts, getting to number 2 in the UK and charting in many other countries. While this period of Maiden is generally regarded as their weakest, they did have their biggest chart success during this time and also had strong album sales. Things are weird sometimes.
Be Quick Or Be Dead
The single is a tune penned by Bruce Dickinson and Janick Gers. It is based on a series of scandals and frauds that were all over the news at the time, mainly British and European stuff that I’m not terribly familiar with. But it’s all the same, we’ve always had our share of garbage like that in the US.
As for the song, this one is HEAVY. Sure, Iron Maiden are a metal band, we all know that. And yeah, they have heavy stuff, many parents couldn’t handle what they were hearing when Maiden made their rise in the ’80’s. But this song is just on another level heavy. It’s fast, ferocious and will absolutely rip your throat out. The band did more on the heavy side during the Blaze Bayley years but I’m sure they got up to a lot again that went like this.
While Fear Of The Dark will forever be known for its title track, this song is one of the highlights of an album that is a mixed bag of tunes but offers some quality cuts. This was always one of my favorites from the record and its vitality didn’t make the ensuing years any easier to digest.
Nodding Donkey Blues
The “all versions” B-side is just what the title suggests – Iron Maiden are playing the blues. This is an original composition that is credited to each band member, I suppose as a way to share the blame. The song is a laughable and crude one about picking up a hard luck woman. Obviously the song is a total joke and should be discussed in that context, this isn’t competing with Rime Of The Ancient Mariner for lyrical analysis. It’s one of those things that’s funny to hear the first time but any entertainment value wears off quickly. To borrow from the British, Maiden are having a wank here.
Space Station No. 5
It is again a Montrose cover, Maiden previously covered I’ve Got The Fire (two times even). This time, Maiden chug out a serviceable version of the song.
For the first two minutes, anyway.
After the first bit, Bruce goes into some extended sequence of gibberish on the mic. No telling what he’s up to there. Then there’s a solo and as the song picks up pace toward the end, Bruce decides to announce a horse race between gems like Wanker and Prick, as well as Metallica.
The bit itself is amusing but it’s not something that really elevates the song any. In and of itself I don’t really care, again Maiden have a trillion singles out and if they want to jack around here and there, that’s their business. It does kind of suck because Space Station No. 5 is one of my favorite Montrose songs, both from the band and from Sammy Hagar’s early solo career. I wouldn’t have minded a bit more reverence toward the original, but in the end it’s a pile of whatever.
On my US version of the single, this is the end of the line. But, on international editions and the 12-inch vinyl, there is yet another track to behold. I’ll go ahead and include it here since I don’t feel it’s worth the effort to post a new entry to this series if/when I do get the record.
Bayswater Ain’t A Bad Place To Be
On some versions this track is hidden and a part of Space Station No. 5. On most vinyl that I’m aware of, the song is actually on the A-side after the lead single. Here, Maiden again have a go at their manager Ron Smallwood. Janick plays a bluesy acoustic riff while Bruce imitates Ron ranting about various things. For eight minutes.
The premise here is funny but holy hell does this drag for way too long. This is the first time I’ve played the entire thing since the mid ’90’s and this might be the last time I play the whole track in my life.
I don’t have every single and I can’t recall some of what’s to come, but this collection is probably the worst pile of B-sides Maiden did in their career. They started having a wank and didn’t stop until the tape ran out. Thankfully we get something better next week – well, mostly.
That does it for this single and its lukewarm bonus offerings. Yes, that is a stock photo up top rather than the actual single from my collection – this CD is somewhere in with the roughly 800 other CDs I own and I’m not sure exactly where. I’m tired and want a nap and I’m gonna do that instead of looking for it. I’ll update this someday when I bother finding the disc.
It’s time for a new series. I do an album of the week so it’s obvious and fitting to also do a song of the week. It wasn’t something I originally planned on but after thinking about it a bit I figured why not? It provides a way to do some more quick content (this one will be a bit longer for various reasons) and it allows me to cover a pretty wide range of stuff the album of the week might not get to.
The Song of the Week will start running on Tuesdays next week and thereafter, this one is going live today because I wasn’t planning on starting it yet but the perfect subject for the first one fell into my lap. To the shock of no one I’m sure, the first Song of the Week entrant is from my favorite band.
Iron Maiden – Alexander The Great
Today’s song is the final track from Maiden’s 1986 album Somewhere In Time. It is a rolling epic that goes for 8 and a half minutes. The music fits the vibe of the synth-driven album pretty well but also firmly camps itself in “epic Maiden” territory with the signature galloping riffs and a few movements and changes to keep things from being stale. The song ventures a fair bit into some different moods through its run. And while I don’t think Maiden have ever fully “gone prog,” there’s a bit of stuff in here that at least borders on that territory.
The song’s theme is probably very easy to extract from the title – Alexander The Great was an ancient ruler who conquered a vast range of territory in 320-something BC. Alexander was a genius military commander who won many against the odds battles. His exploits were legendary and have been passed down to military commanders even today. His empire was insane for the time, though it quickly fell apart after his unexpected death.
One aspect of Iron Maiden’s appeal is how a fair number of fans know their history from Maiden songs. That might make a history teacher cringe, but it’s pretty well true. And this one is a great song for that – the lyrics really are a recounting of what he did, with a bit of flavor added in here and there.
The song was not released as a single though it’s held as a beloved and perhaps underrated part of the Maiden catalog. It also holds the same distinction 50 other Maiden songs do – it has not ever been played live on a stage…
This is the part where people who wish to avoid The Future Past tour spoilers should leave. I don’t really know why or how one would avoid such news, but I’ve seen people out there that don’t want the setlist spoiled for them, so here is your warning.
SPOILER ALERT
….
….
….
….
….
….
….
What I just typed above the spoiler portion is no longer true – as of May 28, 2023, Alexander The Great has joined the list of songs Iron Maiden have played live. It saw its live debut in Ljubljana, Slovenia. This was largely expected as of the announcement of the Future Past tour, since Somewhere In Time was going to be a focus of the tour along with Senjutsu. It’s widely speculated that Alexander The Great is the real reason for even giving SiT some stage time, though in fairness that album hasn’t gotten a ton of live love beyond Wasted Years anyway.
Alexander The Great was the holy grail of unplayed Iron Maiden live songs. It was the popular request of many fans, dating back to 1986 honestly. It’s difficult to think of what a new number one would be for that, I doubt there will be a true consensus pick out of the remaining unplayed songs.
This does alter a few posts I did back in October of 2022 – in two posts I ran down all of the songs Iron Maiden had not played live. That number went from 51 to 46 over the weekend, as four songs from Senjutsu also got a live debut. I’ve updated those posts to include the new information – head here for part one or over here for part two of that brief series.
That will do it for the debut of the Song of the Week series. This one had a bit extra with it, future posts won’t go this hard but one might pop up now and again. Look for future SotW posts each Tuesday from here on out.
Today it’s time to get back in order for the third or fourth time this series, I’ll be going over the first single from No Prayer For The Dying even though I did the second one last week. This one, as promised will also be super quick because of the version I own and I covered the band’s changes and background info last week as well.
As will most of the band’s 1990’s singles there are a pile of formats and versions. The one I have just so happens to be a single-song promo CD release. This was a US version and I got it without having to sell a vital organ so I went for it to get the spot taken up in my collection. There are full versions of the single with B-sides that are worth mentioning, but I’ll save that discussion for another time if/when I get a 12-inch record of this or come across a different version with the B-sides.
As a further note – there are censored versions of the song running around – Bruce says “shit” twice on this one, a rarity for Iron Maiden. But this single is uncensored, I’m not sure if any actual censored singles are out there. Radio stations had some but I don’t know the story behind it.
The cover art is another Derek Riggs piece that showcases Eddie holding a TV, while other TVs are on various programming while a huge fire engulfs everything. It ties in well with the theme of the song, which is the ills of televangelist preachers.
Holy Smoke takes direct aim at the hypocrisy of televangelist preachers, those who clogged the American airwaves begging for money and preaching against sins, while also committing those same very sins. Jimmy Swaggart, who was the main televangelist figurehead who was disgraced in a prostitution scandal, gets a near-direct mention as “Jimmy Reptile” in the song, and the “TV Queen” is most likely referencing Tammy Faye Baker. They and others were involved in shady dealings of all kinds through the 1980’s and saw their empires fall in various ways, though all would recover and keep grifting, and lead a new generation of shady TV and Internet preachers to billions in tax-free wealth.
The song is not a condemnation of religion by any means, but a shot specifically at the televangelists and their hypocrisy. Iron Maiden and religion were never really friends, owing mainly to backlash against the group for The Number Of The Beast and other perceived transgressions. Maiden were just one of many metal bands to point the accusing finger back at the TV preachers once their own sins came to light.
The video for Holy Smoke is worth a bit of discussion and at least a chuckle. The group are clearly goofing off with some silly and odd things filmed, including Bruce jumping around in a field of flowers looking so happy that one wonders what kind of substances might be involved. The fun wasn’t confined to the band, either – the fella in the bondage/assless leather pants getup is legendary producer Martin Birch. I’m sure the video was a defining moment of his career.
That about covers Holy Smoke. At some future point in time I’ll revisit the singles series and hopefully have a full version of this so I can get into the B-sides, but for now I’ll just let this roll. Next we are on to the stuff from Fear Of The Dark, which was Bruce’s final stint with the band until 1999. A lot of firsts and changes are coming for the group as they weather a down period in their career.
This week we move on to the ’90’s era of Iron Maiden. It is their least-heralded decade but there’s some stuff worth going over here. We are onto the band’s eight album No Prayer For The Dying. The album itself does divide opinion but its not widely hailed as one of their classics, the stripped down approach after two synth epics left an odd impression on many listeners.
We are also, once again, out of order in this singles series. Well, I am, no one else really is. Today’s single is actually the second from the album and next week’s will be the first. This honestly works out fairly well since there’s a lot to talk about on today’s single and next week’s will be super quick, so I can include the line-up change and additional lore here.
There is a new member of Iron Maiden on this album – replacing Adrian Smith is Janick Gers. Janick had played with Ian Gillian as well as in a project with Paul Di’Anno and Clive Burr, among other acts. He would hook up with Bruce Dickinson for Bruce’s first solo album Tattooed Millionaire, which, well, it has bearing on the lead track today so I’ll save that. After Smith departed Maiden, Gers was in and he remains a part of the group today, staying on even after Smith returned in 1999.
Today’s single was available in several versions and had two different covers – the one I have pictured is the “main” copy and another one featuring Eddie in Grim Reaper garb is an “alternate” cover. There are 7-inch, 12-inch, cassette and CD versions, and several of each. Mine is a 12-inch vinyl and offers a second B-side, so that’s what we’ll stick with today.
The cover art is kind of crazy and very busy, featuring Eddie holding a woman, presumably someone’s daughter being brought to the slaughter, and a whole lot of stuff in the background. Derek Riggs was still the artist for these, but his time is coming close to an end as Maiden’s illustrator, and subsequent single covers will highlight that.
Bring Your Daughter … To The Slaughter
The lead track here is the second single from No Prayer…, the first single will show up next week because time is just a human invention and not real anyway. This song has a lot to discuss in its origins, its real and perceived quality, and in its commercial reception.
The song also did not actually have its origins in Maiden itself – it was the brainchild of Bruce Dickinson, who wrote and recorded the track and put it on offer for the soundtrack to A Nightmare On Elm Street 5: The Dream Child. I personally don’t remember the movie much and even though I was a huge Maiden fan around this time I didn’t pay it much mind. Dickinson chose not to include it on his debut solo album Tattooed Millionaire, though re-issued copies feature it as a bonus track.
Well, Steve Harris heard and liked the song so he brought in Bruce’s guitarist Janick and the track. Maiden improved upon the original song by a fair bit and wound up releasing it as a single. It featured a video with performances spliced in with footage from an old movie called The City Of The Dead. The movie footage shows a lovely young woman being kidnapped for part in some evil ritual, which I guess is in keeping with the song.
And for the song? It’s a pretty good one. It is no frills and basic, which was something of a comedown for us Maiden fans after the several years prior. But this track is decently enjoyable, I won’t shit on it just to be elitist or anything. This album isn’t my favorite but I also don’t mind putting it on, many of the songs are goofy but enjoyable. This one certainly fits that concept.
One other note of trivia about this song, and it’s a big one – Bring Your Daughter … To The Slaughter is the first, and to date only, Iron Maiden song to top the UK Singles Chart. I don’t really know how or why it happened, especially with a lack of support from entities like the BBC who did not care for the song’s theme, but Iron Maiden scored a number one hit with one of the least heralded songs of their catalog. The singles market is funny and is usually not where heavy metal dwells, so for this of all songs to top the charts is pretty funny. And hey, good for them, it’s still an accomplishment worth having.
I’m A Mover
Both B-sides today are covers, the first one is an early, somewhat decent hit for the band Free. This would be a few years before Free’s massive smash All Right Now.
Maiden perform a very serviceable version of the song. It does get the feel of the track right, though done a tad harder as would be expected for Maiden. It might miss some of the finer points of Paul Rodgers and the blues-based rock of Free but this is a pretty good job done and it’s a very interesting cover song among the several Maiden have done over the years.
Communication Breakdown
The 12-inch bonus B-side is obviously a cover of the early Led Zeppelin standard from that band’s first album. While Maiden did a fair job on the Free song, this one doesn’t really get on track. It’s played decently enough but it does sound like a bar cover band doing Zep. Bruce is a great singer but one thing he is not is Robert Plant, and the absolute insanity of Plant’s original is lost here. I’d say this isn’t “bad” but honestly it might be, it just doesn’t hold a candle to the original.
That does it for today’s single. Next week will go quick and easy and then it’ll be on through my last remaining handful as I cross through a few eras of the band.
Today’s single is a pretty straightforward one, it’s all live and all songs are available on the larger album so there’s nothing really exotic here. The song is Infinite Dreams from the Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son album, and the live album in question was Maiden England. That was originally released as a video, so this is actually a single to a long-form video. But the full album has been released on its own so it’s available in a variety of formats.
The cover art is another Derek Riggs piece and is essentially the same cover as the Maiden England live release – Eddie on a motorcycle with a Union Jack in hand. The cover was changed for the 2013 re-release of Maiden England but this original art is pretty cool.
This was released in several formats – 12-inch and 7-inch records, CD and cassette. There are a few shaped picture discs and things like that. Mine is the typical 12-inch record and thus we get the third song. Just a note that after this, the singles started getting released with a billion versions and I won’t be out to keep track of all the differences, but for today it’s still straightforward.
Infinite Dreams
The single’s main subject is a track from the Seventh Son… album. It is one of the album’s more memorable cuts and features a few musical movements from the band, a step into a prog-lite direction they would explore again in the 2000’s.
The song works incredibly well with its quiet moments and builds into more epic passages. Bruce showcases the full force of his vocal range through the song and everyone in the band gets a chance to flex their chops. It’s a very compelling arrangement and a showcase that the band had arrived at a new point of creativity in their landmark seven album run.
The song is the album’s second and has some bearing on the sort-of concept album going on – the main character has very strange dreams and visions and winds up stuck in those, with dreams so crazy and life-like that he doesn’t know if he’ll ever wake up again. Though the band did not fully flesh out the story beats, last week’s single The Clairvoyant gives a fairly grim answer as to the ultimate fate of the dreamer and his visions.
The live rendition here is wonderfully executed. The Maiden England live album runs smoothly as a whole, if not maybe just a hair off of its predecessor, the mighty Live After Death. But the cuts here are a huge part of Maiden lore being the end of their golden 80’s era and it’s a worthwhile experience overall.
Killers
The first B-side is the familiar title track from the second album. We’ve had this song a few times from both singers so I won’t go over in depth, but as is expected this version is well done. The song wouldn’t get a ton of stage time after this tour so it’s still nice to have another live representation from the earlier years.
Still Life
The other B-side is a very interesting track to have, even if it’s not “special” since it’s also on the full live album. Still Life hails from Piece Of Mind and wasn’t a song that got a whole hell of a lot of stage time. It’s one of its album’s more interesting cuts and it’s splendidly presented here. It’s a very nice cut to have as the song didn’t quite get the attention it might have deserved.
That wraps up this single and also marks the end of a run for one member. After this album guitarist Adrian Smith would depart the group, unhappy with the band’s intended musical direction after he contributed a lot to these “synth era” albums. Smith would make a few cameo live appearances through the 1990’s but would otherwise be gone until 1999, which is a story for that point in this singles series.
Losing Adrian was a huge blow, and the 1990’s were not Maiden’s greatest decade in their history. He had a good bit to do with the group’s success to this point and was integral to the past few albums these singles came from. But nothing lasts forever, and Adrian had to step away and do his own thing for awhile. He’d get some company on that front a few years down the line, as most are aware.
Next week it’s into the ’90’s and No Prayer For The Dying. The singles start getting different with a wide array of versions and also I’m missing a fair chunk of this time period. But there’s still plenty to go over so we’ll get into that next week.
The Iron Maiden Singles Series is now on to Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son, the band’s seventh album. As noted previously and also via the list below, I don’t have the first two singles from this album so they aren’t part of the series at present. Today I’ll get into the third one, which actually represents live material and is a bit of a gem in that the songs aren’t from a full-length live record of any sort.
The cover art today is pretty trippy – it’s Eddie’s head in some kind of occult/crazy configuration. Out in left field for sure but you gotta do something off the wall once in awhile, and it does fit the song’s theme. Don’t drop acid and look at this (I wouldn’t know, just seems like good advice)
There are several versions of the single available – the usual 12-inch and 7-inch versions, as well as some picture discs, clear vinyl and even a shaped picture disc. The singles from this album were also issued on CD, which as far as I know are the first CD singles for Maiden. My single is a typical black vinyl 12-inch version, though it is housed in a very nice gatefold sleeve as opposed to the thin paper stuff many of the singles came in. And, in a change of pace, there actually is a pretty big difference between the 12-inch and 7-inch singles as it relates to the lead track. That’ll be covered in a minute.
All of the live performances on the record came from the Monsters Of Rock festival in Donington on August 20, 1988. That was the day after I turned 11 for anyone wondering. These are the only songs I know of from the performance that were released in an official capacity. I’d guess this has bootleg versions but I honestly have never looked for them.
As usual with these, this first video has the two sides from the 7-inch single. We’ll get to the difference between versions right in the first track, though the fact that the lead single doesn’t sound very live should tip most people off.
The Clairvoyant
The feature song today is one of the pivotal moments from the sort-of story being told on the Seventh Son… album. The title character has gained the gift of clairvoyance but becomes troubled by it, and also very ironically cannot foresee his own death. The music is pretty spectacular on this song, as it is throughout the album. Very nice, almost prog-lite guitar work on here and the chorus is very nicely done even with being a mouthful of words.
Steve Harris has said that the song was inspired by the death of British psychic Doris Stokes. This person seems to have been a giant fraud and died just when the band was cooking up new song ideas, and Steve came up with the central premise of a clairvoyant being blind to their own death.
Now, here’s the kicker as far as different versions of this single go – on most 7-inch pressings of the single, The Clairvoyant is the studio track. On the 12-inch versions and a very few 7-inches, the live cut from Monsters Of Rock is present. To add to the confusion, the band shot a video featuring live shots from Donington but the song is the studio track with bits of live crowd noise rather badly cut in. So to have this single with the more desirable live cut on side A, a prospective collector should seek out a 12-inch record.
The Prisoner
The first B-side is a cut from The Number Of The Beast and is a more low-key favorite of quite a few fans, myself included. The song was inspired by the late ’60’s British sci-fi drama of the same name, and the show was also the inspiration for Powerslave’s Back In The Village.
This one flies a bit under the radar on the hierarchy of Maiden songs but in my view it is an excellent song. This live performance is well captured and presented without any issues. The Prisoner would get more time on the Maiden England tour, which was presented as a live album.
And it’s worth noting that all versions of the single have the same live cut of The Prisoner – unlike The Clairvoyant, there are not different presentations.
Heaven Can Wait
The 12-inch “bonus” B-side is a nice cut from the Somewhere In Time album. It is also live from Donington and also the same across all versions it appears on. It too is well done and nicely presented, no crappy live audio or anything. It’s nice to have live versions from this album because any official presentations are few and far between. I assume that will change once the next tour and inevitable live album from it is presented.
That wraps up today’s pretty interesting single. On deck is another live cut, this time from the Maiden England tour and album. And also next week we’ll have something we haven’t had in quite some time – a departing band member. Until then.
The Crooked Wanderer 