Its quite possibly the most awaited reformation in metal ever (except Black Sabbath);the reunification of Bruce Dickinson (vocalist) and Adrian Smith (guitars) back into the fold of Iron Maiden, and it brought high expectations for the metal community. Especially those that remembered how great things seemed to be in 1988. Now bolstered with an unwieldy three guitar line up, these shows are either gonna be awful or magnificent, depending on the length of your memory.
Supported by the new band from Rob Halford (ex Judas Priest) this was always going to be a show steeped in nostalgia. Especially with the vast majority of Halford’s set being culled from his Judas Priest days, he’s playing to his audience expectations. His band are tight, competent – and dated very badly. The old-school metal of his set is fine for nostalgia’s sake, but when playing his new material it seems like the worst of 1986 all over again. The most interesting record hes made in his career – “two” by his industrial project Voyeurs is totally ignored in favour of guitarists in spandex, flying Vs and throwing silly shapes simply because they know nothing better to do, while looking like people who failed the auditions for WASP. I’m beginning to think that wearing a Spinal tap t-shirt was a good idea. The musical content is hackneyed metal by numbers, and whilst Halford remains an engaging frontman, nothing he played tonight could make him appeal to anyone whose introduction to metal came later than 1994.
Iron Maiden come on and seem from the off determined to establish themselves as the godfathers of metal, a position they rightly deserve. As the slogan went, ”forget nu-metal this is tru-metal”. If that’s the case, then Iron Maiden only continue to prove themselves a decade behind the times. After spending much of the 80’s setting the pace for the metal scene, they now find themselves outclassed and outmoded. Their new triple guitar line up promises heaviness, yet delivers the same chunky sound, indiscernably different from before: due to duplicate guitar parts. If anything, the old songs don’t seem anywhere near as heavy as before. While Pitchshifter and Slipknot take metal into previously uncharted waters, by comparison Maiden are quite content to tread musical water. Last year they toured this new line up in America and Europe to re-establish themselves as a musical and commercial force, having lost their US record deal and playing to ever diminishing crowds and ever diminishing record sales, as if to reinvest interest in the band again, and when an unsigned band are able to call upon Monster Magnet as a support, people tend to notice. Having restablished themselves abroad, Iron maiden made a deliberate decision to come back with their new album (“Brave new world” – a musical misnomer, as the album retreads the same territory as ever before) before touring the Uk, so that they would not be written off as a reunion cash-in. This cynically calculated move appears to have worked –this line-up proves that the band know which side their bread is buttered commercially, selling out venues 10 times larger than they were with Blaze Bayley. But, alas, it’s a predictable run through of Nostalgia. I guess that’s what people want.
The opening “Wicker Man”, for all its supposed offspring-esque chorus, is the most modern sounding song of the night, yet the guitar riff is right out the 70s’. Bolstering a setlist with huge chunks of the new album (which is very prog rock at the best of times), is never a good idea. It is easily noticeable that the audience seems particularly responsive during the older material- 1980s’ “Wrathchild” gets the crowd moving more than any material in the set up to that point. The ponderous and over extended, frankly boring “Sign of the Cross” bears much of hallmarks of the later material – over complicated, over long, and uninvolving. The set again picks up for the “Trooper”, and lulls during the ponderous “Clansman”. But the last 6 numbers show exactly why Iron Maiden deserve their place in the history books of metal: quite simply Iron Maiden were the finest British metal act of the 80s’, without exception, and this seminal material stands head and shoulders with any of the recent crop of US metal bands. Whilst It may not sound contemporary, the quality of the songwriting is certainly comparable with anything Sabbath or Zeppelin did. However, as Iron Maiden have a frankly ludicrous mascot in the shape of Eddie, a comic book 20 ft high zombie, one probably is expecting too much for them to be taken seriously by a generation brought up on Korn and Deftones.
Iron Maiden are a tight, well rehearsed band : You’d expect nothing less from a band that’s been touring the world for 20 years. They also put on an excellent show: but that’s what it is. Not a gig, a show. When Bruce Dickinson runs from side to side on the stage and gestures for the crowd to roar, like he has in every live video to date, its too predictable, safe, cabaret. When he screams out “scream for me (insert name of city here)”, like he does on 1985s’ seminal Live After Death album, its about as spontaneous as an autocue. There’s times when the choreography of the show seems too close to the likes of Boyzone, almost a parody of itself, only it takes itself seriously.
Realistically speaking, despite the strength of their back catalogue, this nostalgia is what keeps Iron Maiden as successful as they are. The past is a great place to visit sometimes, but you wouldn’t want to live there. Iron Maiden‘s stage show and material remains stuck there. The new material since 1992 has been a backward, regressive step ; they continue to ponder twin and weedy guitar harmonies when the nu-generation has been downtuning to get even HEAVIER, while Maiden have introduced quiet passages into their music like Jethro Tull or prog rock. Whilst “Fear of the Dark” showed a harder heavier more aggressive edge, there’s no hiding the fact that Iron Maiden sound like a band out of place, out of step and out of touch with todays metal scene. They’ve been overtaken, out paced, and where other bands have evolved, they’ve just reached a point where they’ve grown safe, formulaic, unchallenging. They’ve reached the end of their musical evolution, and they’ve been overtaken by the bands who used to listen to them in high school. Of course, they’re bloody good fun and Long may their metal cabaret continue. But if that’s the case then the score will have to be Nu-metal 1 , Tru-metal 0. On the basis of Tonight’s Show, Iron Maiden have a great future behind them. Of course, they rocked like muthas, but nowadays, that’s simply not enough…nowhere near enough.
