Martin Popoff - Iron Maiden: Album by Album

ALBUM BY ALBUM

MARTIN POPOFF

with

Blaze Bayley Rich Davenport Bobby Blitz Ellsworth
Marty Friedman Matt Heafy Tim Henderson Chris Jericho Jimmy Kay
Sean Kelly Mike Portnoy Franc Potvin Kirsten Rosenberg
Brian Slagel Nita Strauss Ahmet Zappa

C ant say I was Eddie-on-the-spot with The Soundhouse Tapes, and for that I blame the fact I was from a small town in British Columbia, one ocean and one very large continent away from Iron Maidens hunting groundsthe prey being any other New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM) band that would dare stumble into their path on their way to renaissance rock dominance.

But there I was at Quintessence Records in Vancouver, paying $14.99 for my import copy of Iron Maiden on May 28, 1980, snatching up on that same trip (what I was doing on an eight-hour car drive away from home during the grade-eleven school year is beyond me) a copy of Saxons Wheels of Steel for $16.

Getting home to Trail, Im sure I was struck by how Saxon still had at least one leg warmerclad toe in the 70s, while this other band that I knew was already soaking up all the oxygen in the scene was all about the new decade, Steves long struggle through the second half of the 70s notwithstanding (how were we even to know such things back then?).

Thus began a dizzying bout of Iron Maiden mania. Killers was purchased through my work at the local record store, Kellys (no price recorded for posterity), on May 30, 1981, followed by the Maiden Japan EP, $3.99 on December 12, 1981. The Number of the Beast was snagged at A&A Records in Vancouver on a trip my dad made to visit me during first-year university, where I had been lonely and stressed, having (long story) put three-fifths of my eggs in one basket for an experimental arts program called Arts One, wherein the prof decided to give almost everybody some variation of C minuses. In any event, me an Pops went to, I believe it was, three Vancouver Canucks playoff games.

Back to Maiden, The Number of the Beast was purchased brand new for $4.97 on April 7, 1982. Flash forward to May 26, 1983; Piece of Mind ran me $7.99 at Sam the Record Man in Victoria. Powerslave? $6.99, September 20, 1984, at A+B Sound in Victoria. Then Live After Death for $9.99 on November 27, 1985, at Cheapies Records in Hamilton, Ontario, now that I found myself submerged in the MBA program at McMaster. Thanks for indulging me the use of my green Duo-Tang record purchase record that Id lost for fifteen years and only recently found.

Ill hit you with one other date. The first time I ever saw Iron Maiden live was with Saxon and Fastway supporting in Spokane, Washington, July 24, 1983. Again Ill blame the lapse on coming from the boonies, nowhere near the rock n roll tour circuit. But what a show; to this day I rank Piece of Mind, Power & the Glory, and Fastway as titanic equals and, strangely enough, in my opinion the best records of the three bands respective catalogs.

Grind forward a few weeks and then some and here we are, in a position to celebrate together this legendary band that is still vital, making the same kind of music they brought us in the heady days of the NWOBHM, from which they quickly leapt ahead, thanks to determination, talent, personality, a pile of creativity, Rod Smallwood, and Derek Riggs and Eddie.

For those unfamiliar with the structure of the Album by Album series, this book is a follow-up to similar tomes Ive written on Rush, AC/DC, and Pink Floydthe concept being the assembly of a panel of deep fans and experts from all walks of life, and a subsequent jaw session over each of the bands studio albums. What resulted for these folks, in many cases (because they told me so), for myself for sure, and hopefully for you the reader, is a rekindling of the love affair you might have had for this band at one point, since dimmed in the sensory overload that is modern digital life.

Like I say, thats certainly been the case for your intrepid moderator, because, I gotta tell ya, during the long journey through the Maiden catalog with these folks, many of them friends and all at least acquaintances through the years (save for the two women I had not known before, Nita Strauss and Kirsten Rosenberg, as well as Ahmet Zappaall delightful), Ive come out the other end affirming something Id suspected for many years: even though for an old man like me theres no way that anything else the band makes will ever usurp the deep sentimental love I have for the first five Iron Maiden records, absolutely nipping at their heels and hugely enjoyable near start to finish are the last four albums.

Alas, Brave New World I like about as much as I did during the excitement we all had as we interviewed the guys and wrote about the reunion in our mag Brave Words & Bloody Knuckles eighteen years ago. But land sakes, Dance of Death and A Matter of Life and Death I used to sneer at the similarities in those titles, but now the word death in an Iron Maiden record title is synonymous with top-shelf qualitywith these two albums, its almost code for the elixir of youth.

And dammit, I love it when that happens. I love it when a heritage act I grew up with can keep me engaged with their new music. In this light, I put Maiden in the same camp as Motrhead, Deep Purple, Cheap Trick, Kiss, and, as the next generation goes, Metallica, Megadeth, and Overkill. (Saxon and Accept aint doing too bloody badly, either.)

Anyway, thanks for allowing me these introductory musings. I hope you enjoy reading the thoughts of my esteemed and knowledgeable panel as much as I did gathering them. It was an absolute joy getting told and resold seemingly one minute to the next on the many deep virtues found all over the vast Maiden catalog, especially, as I say, across the astonishing run of superlong and involved records since Bruce bounced back. With that happy thought lingering, I now ease myself into the comparatively passive moderators seat and present to you Iron Maiden: Album by Album.

Discographic Notes

A few notes on the presentation of the album credits:

Credits and citations of all types, where available, are reproduced to be in the spirit of the earliest UK issue of the album.

Albums up to and including No Prayer for the Dying get the vinyl-related Side 1/Side 2 designation. After that, to reflect full immersion into the CD age, that designation is dropped.

Song timings are cited as per the earliest issue of the album from any territory. If not available on UK issue as was the standard, I went next to the US or Canadian issue from the same year.

Where there are discrepancies on writing credits or song spellings and punctuations, back sleeve took precedent over record label.