EDDIE’S RETURN
IRON MAIDEN’S BACK FOR FIRST TIME SINCE 2010
Loudwire and Metalsucks both rank them No. 2, and Rolling Stone and MTV put them at No. 4.
On Ranker, they’re No. 1.
No matter how you split the hairs, Iron Maiden is right there alongside Black Sabbath, Judas Priest and Metallica near the top on any list of the all- time greatest heavy metal bands. What sets Maiden apart is that it managed to get there, in the pre- internet age, without the benefit of radio play and chart hits. They did have a mascot, the rotting corpse Eddie.
Named for a very unpleasant- looking medieval torture device, the band was formed in England by bassist- songwriter Steve Harris and played its maiden gig in 1976. What followed was several bumpy years of personnel changes before an acclaimed self- titled 1980 debut that featured the signature dual guitars and Paul Di’Anno on vocals. ( Their Pittsburgh debut was supporting Judas Priest and Whitesnake at the Stanley Theater in 1981 on their first North American tour.)
The band became the Iron Maiden that would top metal polls with the addition of operatic singer Bruce Dickinson for 1982’ s “The Number of the Beast,” an album that found them rising to No. 33 on the U. S. album charts while being declared satanists by paranoid conservatives — pre- Tipper Gore’s Parents Music Resource Center — despite the dream- like lyrics of a satanist gathering and the narrator warning, “This can’t go on. I must inform the law.”
Iron Maiden returned that year to open for Priest again in the half- house Civic Arena. The PG wrote that Iron Maiden was “indistinguishable from any number of heavy metal bands still squeezing some bucks from this bankrupt genre” — a genre that we can agree is doing pretty well 37 years hence. In ’ 83, Iron Maiden returned to headline before 6,000 at the arena, Dickinson donning a devil’s mask to sing “The Number of the Beast.”
Through subsequent ’ 80s albums “Powerslave,” “Somewhere in Time” and “Seventh Son of a Seventh Son,” the band continued its rise as so- called “pioneers of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal.” Writing for the PG, Mark Madden said of the ’ 87 show: “If there was any doubt that Iron Maiden is the current king of heavy rock, those doubts were erased last night as the British quintet combined power with melody to produce the best metal concert here in years.” Priest was there the year prior.
“I saw them back in the late ’ 80s and was blown away,” says Pittsburgh guitarist Mike Moscato, who plays in Sahara as well as the Maximum Voltage AC/ DC tribute.
“I saw Iron Maiden in Pittsburgh on the Piece of Mind tour [ 1983],” says Dofka guitarist Jim Dofka, noting that “their dual guitar harmonies, soaring vocals, galloping rhythms and sing- along choruses became a staple in all that is heavy metal as we know it.”
The good times lasted until ’ 93, when Dickinson bailed after a farewell tour supporting “Fear of the Dark,” leading to a less exciting Blaze Bayley era through ’ 99. Then Dickinson was invited back for “Brave New World,” billed as a more “progressive” album inspired by the Aldous Huxley novel.
“I don’t know why he left in the first place,” guitarist Janick Gers told the PG prior to playing the pavilion in Burgettstown in 2000. “I think he didn’t want to play our kind of music anymore. He was out about seven years doing different kinds of stuff and then he started playing music that was very similar to what Maiden’s about anyhow, and it kind of crossed where we were.”
Maiden’s last trip here was almost a decade ago, at the pavilion in 2010, with 15th album “The Final Frontier,” which won the band its first Grammy for the song “El Dorado.”
The Legacy of the Beast World Tour, which stops at PPG Paints Arena, Uptown, on Saturday, is a rare Maiden run without a new album. Rather, it’s “history/ hits tour” with a production inspired by Maiden’s mobile game that takes Eddie and the band through different worlds.
“We’ve got all kinds of crazy things going on, including a replica Spitfire plane dominating the stage during ‘ Aces High,’ tons of pyro, a giant Icarus, muskets, claymores and some truly marvelous flamethrowers, which I have a hell of a lot of fun with, as you will see!” the 61- year- old Dickinson said in announcing it.
This time, the arena will be packed for a legacy band boasting five members — Dickinson, Harris, drummer Nicko McBrain and guitarists Dave Murray and Adrian Smith ( plus Gers) — who date back to the early days of the group.
“Iron Maiden was the bridge between the London punk scene and the galloping twin guitar attacks of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal,” says Edward Banchs, a Pittsburgher who authored the book “Heavy Metal Africa. “I love them because they are the complete package — the sound, the live show, the albums, Eddie, and of course, their energy. Easy to see why they remain relevant four decades into their career and show no signs of wear.”