Maiden England 2013...

Last night, my wife surprised me w/ an offer to go see Iron Maiden in September. For once, a show we want to see falls on one of her nights off. Still not 100% sure, but it looks like we'll be able to make it work.
 
I remember how I dug Seventh Son when it came out, and I remember watching that tour show, Maiden England, on VHS back then. Funnily enough, I was watching it again just a few days ago. Seventh Son was the last album I really liked that much. After that, my interest in metal sort of waned, and Adrian Smith left, anyway.
 
Having never seen them live, it's great to get a chance to see them recreate that particular show.
 
I'm not all that excited w/ the opening act, Megadeth. I do think they have incredible material, and songs I dig, but I'm allergic to Dave Mustaine. I just can't stand the guy. At worst, maybe we'll just walk in later. Or then try to forget about it and just enjoy the moment.
 
The other thing I'm not all that excited about is Janick Gers. I didn't like his playing on the studio albums. I hadn't heard him live - until last night when we were talking about that stuff and someone put on a recent live album. Now I'm starting to think that it's even worst than I thought.
 
I'm not a big fan of Dave Murray, but he can play consistently and adequately. I always felt Smith was the guy w/ the touch, the one who could really communicate the emotion. A bit like Gilmour, w/ just a few notes. That's how I was able to tell their solos at first - when I could feel it, it was Smith. Worked 90% of the time.
 
But Janick Gers is to Iron Maiden and their music what Yoko Ono is to John Lennon's music.
 
So I guess it'll be like seeing the Beatles w/ Yoko.

And since I was in the mood, I decided to do some catch up and listen to what they'd done more recently. No Prayer for the Dying had pretty much marked the end of my interest, though I did dig a few things on Fear of the Dark. 
 
I still haven't listened to the Dickinson-less albums. I remember hearing a couple of songs on both and not being impressed, so I went directly to Brave New World and the following ones up to the most recent one. I'm not sure how much I like them - not all that much so far - but there's one that really seems to stand out - A Matter of Life and Death.
 
Though I feel that they stretched things a bit too much in some cases and that the songs could have been a bit shorter, it's the first time in a long long time that they successfully experimented w/ things while remaining true to themselves. IOW, it sounds like good old Iron Maiden, but not because they're galloping E-C-D ad nauseam. It was the first time in years that they managed to surprise me a bit - and, even more importantly, to communicate w/ me as a listener on an emotional level.
 
I was also quite amused to find out that 3 of the best songs contain ideas and sections very similar to things I had written in the early 2000s (before that album came out). :P
 
Anyway, that's one (relatively) recent album that'll stay on my gym playlist.

I'd seriously have a tough time picking a favorite Maiden album - both the first albums w/ Di Anno and The Number of the Beast are all-time favorites of mine. Whichever I've listened to the most recently is likely to be my favorite at that time.
 
But the Di Anno stuff is all good as far as I'm concerned -  EPs and things like Live +1 or Maiden Japan, they're all on my classics list. If only Adrian Smith and Martin Birch had been there for the first album... The songs were there.
 
I loved the way Dickinson sounded on Number of the Beast - but as early as Piece of Mind, it starts drying out and the excessive touring just burned it out I guess. From Live After Death on, it became a bit painful to listen to, as if his voice was constantly pushed to the point where it's about to break. I remember listening to Live After Death and feeling as if someone had just yelled the same note at me for 2 hours.
 
Retrospectively, even Powerslave was a bit like that. It's odd cause the only image that comes is that his voice had dried up and lost its elasticity. It still went up and up but it sounded rigid. When he took a break from Maiden, I though he'd managed to recuperate a bit, but, still...
 
So I realized last night while working out that his voice was actually the main reason why I discarded many of those recent albums so quickly. I grow tired of hearing him yelling at the top of his voice and constantly sounding like he's running out of air. I've previewed a few cuts from those 2 albums w/ Blaze and, lo and behold, his voice seems to work much better for me. It's still what I call a dry voice, but it's not as annoying as Bruce's can be. I'd love to hear him on those songs on A Matter of Life and Death.
 
Man, you did get to see some cool opening acts, indeed.  
Speaking of opening, one of the other options we considered was seeing Maiden in San Bernardino instead of Vegas. Quite a line up.
 

 
 
But that's on a Friday, and Friday is a no go for us. :/

TBH, I haven't listened to Testament since The New Order - I think that's what it was called. 88 ish. 
Megadeth - Last I owned was So Far, though I know a few songs from what I think is supposed to be their masterpiece, Rust in Peace.
Anthrax - They're the ones I listened to more than the other. I think the last one I heard from them was Sound of White Noise, so early 90s.
Overkill, I didn't know all that much. I remember a video where one of the guitarist looked a bit too much like James Hetfield.
The other band, Sabaton, I never heard.