“steve’s got a ruthless streak”
THE PAIR CLASHED WITH EACH OTHER IN MAIDEN’S EARLY DAYS
musical triumphs aside, the one thing that everyone knows about Bruce is that he is a fully qualified airline pilot. at this point, his flying career is merely an accepted part of what he does, but back in the 90s the notion that the singer in a successful band could also forge a career in aviation was preposterous. But with Uncle John’s raF tales still echoing faintly in the back of his mind, Bruce began to edge towards earning a pilot’s licence, albeit not before another member of Iron maiden did it first.
“First of all, Nicko became a pilot and [in the book] there’s a very terrifying story involving fencing and sleeping on floors in ferry terminals, and the chapter is called, ‘You’ll believe a drummer can fly’, ha ha!” Bruce chuckles. “But that was the moment where I thought, ‘You know what? I’m kind of interested in all this flying business…’ I didn’t think I’d ever be a pilot, but at least I could play around with an early portable computer and put Microsoft Flight Sim on it, so I did but I got bored of it very quickly.”
With his enthusiasm mounting by the hour, Bruce arrived at what he describes as his “road to Damascus moment” while on holiday in Florida in July 1992.
“I took a trial flying lesson and it really was an ‘oh my god!’ moment, you know? that was another slippery slope that eventually led to actually getting a job flying airliners, which also involved being in New York on 9/11, so there’s a chapter about that, too. there are some pretty hairy stories in there. If you’re afraid of flying, it might not be the book to read before bedtime, ha ha ha!”
even the biggest and best-informed Bruce Dickinson fans on the planet may find themselves startled after reading one particular chapter entitled ‘Into the Fire. It’s an account of the singer’s frankly deranged decision to play a solo gig in the middle of war-torn Sarajevo at the height of the Bosnian conflict in 1994. Next time you hear a band moaning because they have to put up with a few days in smelly van, refer them to the fact that after the gig, Bruce took a selfie in the middle of no man’s land and was told by his army driver that the “last bloke who did that got shot”.
“We drove into the middle of a warzone and did a gig. We did it because we could, really, and we didn’t want to give up! It was bonkers, but it’s a brilliant story!”
This is not the first time Bruce has written a book. Fans will recall the laudably smutty but somewhat amateurish novels – The Adventures Of Lord Iffy Boatrace and The Missionary Position – that he penned and published in the 90s. Nearly 30 years on, his skills as an author have improved immeasurably, and What Does This Button Do? skitters along with wonderful fluency and verve, from humble start to epic finish. anyone hoping for the dishing of music biz dirt will be disappointed, however, as Bruce insists that he avoided including anything that might detract from the book’s overall narrative flow. that’s not to say that the book is toothless: all the fallings out and splits within and without Iron maiden are explored with disarming honesty and pragmatism. Bruce is plainly conscious of people’s prurient interest in life’s salacious and painful moments, but in keeping with his (and maiden’s) reputation for being down-to-earth and comparatively non-cynical, he has no desire to puncture or polish any egos.
“I’ve already had people emailing me, saying, ‘I hope you’re not going to say anything horrible about me, because my lawyers will be on it like a shot!’ and I haven’t got the heart to call them and say, ‘I’m really sorry, but you’re not important enough to be in it!’ So that’s amusing. When it comes to maiden,
I talk about those things but don’t dwell on them for ages. I deal with them sensitively, I think. It’s just stuff that happens and maybe it shouldn’t happen sometimes, but it does, and so I’ve written how it feels when it does happen. Shit happens because we’re human beings.”
there is no shortage of great books about rock’n’roll and heavy metal, but precious few of them will leave you feeling like you’ve been plugged into the mains for several days. What Does This Button Do? is essentially the Bruce Dickinson experience – effervescent, passionate, remorselessly energetic and ever so slightly mad – transferred to the printed page. It ends, as you might expect, with a mischievous flourish and a palpable sense that whatever he does next, it will almost certainly be worth reading about in the future.
“the book stops at the beginning of the Book of Souls tour, which is when I’d just set foot in the 747 simulator, about to learn how to fly it, before going off on tour,” Bruce concludes. “the last line is, ‘What does this button do then?’ and, strangely enough, that’s disturbed the German publishers! they found the title very unsettling. maybe it gets lost in translation, but their feeling was, ‘Why would you push a button if you don’t know what it does?’ But then that’s kind of the whole point. Why wouldn’t you?”
What Does this Button Do? IS OUT ON OCT 19 VIA HARPER COLLINS. AN EXCLUSIVE EXTRACT IS OVERLEAF