Original subtitles

Maiden! Maiden!

Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!

It doesn't matter

whether you're male, female,

Muslim, Christian, Catholic, Jewish. It doesn't matter.

If you're a Maiden fan, you're an Iron Maiden fan.

You're part of one fucking world

and one family, my friends.

♪ You'll take my life but I'll take yours too

♪ You'll fire your musket but I'll run you through

♪ So when you're waiting for the next attack

♪ You'd better stand there's no turning back

♪ The bugle sounds the charge begins

♪ But on this battlefield no one wins

♪ The smell of acrid smoke and horse's breath

♪ As I plunge on into certain death

♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh oh, oh, oh, oh

Hey, come on!

♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh oh, oh, oh, oh

Yeah!

It was always about the fans.

Always.

Thank you. Good night.

When you play in a country for the first time

or a city for the first time,

you're going in there not really knowing what to expect.

But the intensity of the reaction is amazing.

Thank you!

Er, thank you.

The whole thing was just like a dream.

It was like slow motion.

Surrounded by hundreds of fans...

twenty-four seven.

Any long careers,

you're gonna have ups and downs.

There's no two ways about that.

And you just kind of ride with it.

But the hardcore fans

were just with you through thick and thin.

You know, it's quite amazing to live and go through that.

At the end of the day,

I'd rather spend time with the fans than anything else.

Maiden! Maiden!

Maiden! Maiden!

It's about a sense of belonging,

belonging to the Iron Maiden family.

In that sort of community, that bond,

where we've connected on a shared love

of the same music, the same melodies,

they touch us in the same way with different backgrounds.

I do accounting work.

I'm a psychiatrist.

In the army. I work in the bomb squad.

I'm a musician.

A lecturer in war studies at King's College, London.

Play in a heavy metal band.

I'm a partner of the largest Latin-American investment bank.

I'm the CEO of Metal Blade Records.

I'm a retired New York City police sergeant.

And I'm a music journalist.

It feels like you're part of

a exclusive club,

but the only price of admission is loving the band.

Like, whenever I see a Maiden shirt out in the wild,

you can kind of give 'em like a bro nod

and go like, "Right on," like, throw you the horns.

Through all the years, I've been going

to hundreds and hundreds of concerts.

And I've been on the pit. I've been on the first line.

I've been there giving it all.

Now I'm older, I'm in the back.

But still, I jump and I scream.

You could feel this was legit.

Like, this was music being made by people that loved this music

and cared about this music just as much as we did,

even in those early days.

There's no way I'd go on stage

and play what I didn't wanna play. You know?

Even other... some... you know, some other forms of rock music.

I wouldn't... wouldn't do it.

You know... I would rather sweep the streets.

And I did in fact for a while.

I'm not interested in doing sessions just for money.

It's no secret that Steve Harris is the one sort of

steering the uncompromising nature of Iron Maiden.

When you say Steve Harris, we just say The Boss.

Because he is the mastermind.

He was an East Ender, just like us.

He was a road sweeper.

But he looked the coolest road sweeper in all the world.

He had the hair. He had the bags coming out of his belt.

I just knew that he was gonna make it

because he had that way about him, that determination.

The Iron Maiden

and the new wave of British heavy metal

really was an answer

to everything that was happening

at that time in England.

Are we going to have

another winter of discontent

as some politicians have claimed?

For many areas of Britain,

chronic inflation and unemployment

was taking its toll.

I mean, we didn't have a lot.

But then, no one did.

You know, we didn't think, "Oh, we ain't got anything."

It was just the same for everyone.

So it was just pretty normal.

At the time, all you've worried about

is getting a new amp that sounds all right

and some speakers that ain't blown

and you wanna just get out and do some gigs.

Steve said to me, "We've got some gigs.

"Would you like to do a bit of roadie-ing?"

And I said, "Yeah, of course."

I said, "Oh, I'll make you some lightboxes up."

Back then, we used to break into old warehouses

and we'd get a big pram and we'd load it all up,

anything I could get my hands on

and turn into lighting of some description.

And it just progressed from there.

Even like the first few gigs we did,

we were picking up fans straight away,

and the reason being was

'cause we were playing our own material.

I mean, we were already playing locally

around the East End of London.

But it started to really snowball for us.

Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!

Maiden! Maiden!

Friday night at The Marquee,

and East End rock band Iron Maiden

are playing the second of three nights at the club.

These gigs, at the end of a gruelling

concert hall tour covering forty venues,

are by way of a thank you to their delirious fans.

I mean, it's... So, like, what is it, ten to eight

and you can't get in The Marquee?

If I had a pound for every time I've seen Iron Maiden

I'd be a rich man by now.

If the heavy metal boom

is being taken seriously by the fans,

it's certainly causing a stir

in the offices of the record companies.

But when Iron Maiden formed, punk was what was selling.

And when the band were first offered a recording deal

they were told punk was what they had to play.

I didn't wanna play punk or new wave.

I... I didn't wanna have spiky hair

and dress in, you know, stupid clothes.

You know what I mean?

I wanted to play rock music.

Labels tried to make us more marketable, I suppose,

'cause punk was the thing that was happening,

so they wanted to take us down that road.

Next thing would obviously be for us to get our hair cut.

That would've been, "Fuck off."

Luckily enough, Rod come along

at a time when it was just badly needed.

And of course Andy come along a few years later

with all the business side of stuff.

They'd both go and bat away

a lot of the issues that we didn't wanna deal with.

But Rod's the bombastic Yorkshireman.

He'll just take no prisoners with the way he does things.

I put a barbed-wire fence around the band creatively.

No one gets within that fence.

They do exactly what they wanna do

with whoever they wanna do it with and that's it.

♪ Keep your distance, walk away

♪ Don't take his bait

♪ Don't you stray

♪ Don't fade away

Yeah, come on!

♪ Watch your step He's out to get you

♪ Come what may

♪ Don't you stray

♪ From the narrow way

We didn't get any radio play back in the day.

We didn't get any radio play for many, many years actually.

The industry didn't know what to make of us.

They didn't know what the appeal was.

But it's just made everybody,

the fans included, just more tight

and, you know, just more standing against it all.

So we were a bit of the underdog

in the music scene,

but we were the underdog

at just about everything really.

I've never really liked being in front of a camera,

especially these days.

So we thought this time round

it's much more interesting to be

looking at some other visuals than us while we're talking.

Because we're not as good looking as Eddie.

We weren't very familiar with who these band members were.

We didn't know any of their names

because you had the album cover

and there's Eddie.

He's face of the band.

He's on every album cover.

It's just one of those things that draws you in,

even without knowing the music.

I remember seeing Eddie when I was a kid

and just being like, "What is that?"

It kinda scared the shit out of you.

The origins of Eddie really came from the fact that

the guys in the band were actually quite shy.

And I just dug the idea of having a character

to put across the vibe of the band.

So I was with EMI having a meeting

and I noticed some artwork on the wall by Derek Riggs.

I had Derek come round with samples of his artwork.

In the middle of all that was the first album sleeve.

And we knew that we'd found our guy.

Well, Eddie can be whatever you want him to be,

that's the good thing about it and that's one of the reasons

why we've always had him on the covers.

It means we ain't gotta be on there for a start.

Eddie is so cute.

I love him.

You know, he's the mascot but he also is like the diva.

You know, Eddie's the star.

He's a creature that

has been disguised so many times

in so many forms and shapes through all the years

that you feel that he's immortal.

He's had so many experiences in so many civilisations

that you see him as a wise figure,

as a wise figure of metal.

He was a Mayan mummy

He was a monster coming out of a grave.

Eddie can be anything.

Eddie is like a really great example

that you can be ugly and angry and it doesn't really matter

and you can express yourself and be authentic.

♪ Oh, yeah! Yeah!

♪ Oh, yeah!

♪ Ooh, look out!

♪ Scream for mercy

♪ He laughs as he's watching you bleed

♪ Killer behind you

♪ My blood lust defies all my needs

♪ Ooh, look out I'm coming for you

♪ Aha, ha, ha, ha!

♪ Oh! Oh!

But Eddie to me is

the greatest marketing tool in heavy metal history.

This group created its own universe.

You didn't necessarily have to hear the record.

Their artwork captured me before I even heard a sound.

'Cause it's not just a sonic thing.

It's sight, sound, story and style.

I was 16 at the time.

I saw the album cover.

I saw Eddie staring at me.

I bought the record. We went back to my house,

literally putting the needle on the record

and the intro, the first guitar chords of Prowler...

I was like,

"This is the greatest heavy metal record ever made."

♪ Walking through the city

♪ Looking oh so pretty

♪ I've just got to find my way

♪ See the ladies flashing

♪ All their legs and lashes

♪ I've just got to find my way

♪ Well, you see me crawling through the bushes

♪ With it open wide

♪ What you seeing, girl?

Paul Di'Anno was the first singer of the band.

And Paul was a singer who could wail.

♪ Can't you believe your eyes?

♪ It's the real thing, girl

♪ Got me feeling myself And reelin' around

He really brought, you know,

the passion and the energy,

this sort of slight air of menace,

you know, all of these things that came across.

You know, he was a badass.

I really felt we'd achieved something

because, you know, we'd paid our dues and that,

going around all the clubs and sweaty places.

And when that first album came out,

I was really proud of it, you know?

Yeah, with the first album, it really went well for us.

You know, it went straight into the charts at number four

and done really well

and we haven't really looked back since then.

We literally made history, 'cause no one sounded like us.

The fans and that every night, it was completely packed out,

it was absolutely fantastic

'cause it was going absolutely berserk.

It seems that they'll do anything, you know?

And because they do that,

then we'll go and do anything for them.

I'm a bit taken aback. You know, I'm still sort of

trying to take it all in at the moment.

♪ ...round, yeah!

But Paul was having, you know,

a little bit too much fun on the road.

It's well documented that he used to piss it up

quite a lot and was a bit of a naughty boy.

He was not somebody who was known

for leading a choirboy's lifestyle.

Getting off his head most nights,

coming on stage hungover.

And I guess that they had

had to cancel a few shows

and that was definitely not

something that any band wants to do,

let alone a band like Iron Maiden,

who was starting to really make an impact.

Steve had this vision

of what they were

and you didn't interfere with that vision.

If you interfered with that vision

you were not gonna stay with this band.

I've been called Sergeant Major,

Ayatollah, Headmaster.

I've been called most things.

But the problem with Paul was that

he wasn't really looking after himself health-wise.

It was real tough work with him.

So we sort of thought, "Well, we can't let him pull us down."

The voice is such a, you know, massive part of the sound,

and I was very worried

that it might be the end of our career.

He liked his drink.

He liked his substances.

And then we toured basically four, five shows a week,

and I don't think that helped his voice at all either.

I think it was the pressure that was getting to me.

You find other distractions

like cocaine and shit like that,

and, yeah, I had a problem.

I... I must admit, I did have a problem.

We missed gigs.

And then we had to cancel the whole German tour.

I mean, he just had to go.

It was a no-brainer in the end.

We thought, "We... We're just gonna have to change."

And as sad as it was, that's Paul, you know?

He's a lovable rogue.

I wouldn't have been able to give 100%

or 1,000% to Iron Maiden. And that's not fair.

You let the band down, you let yourself down,

you let the fans down.

And so I thought, "Best to go."

I was very depressed about it.

It was a bummer. You know, the singer's leaving.

When I heard that Paul was out of the band

I thought, "Oh, no, my band is dead."

I was in a band called Samson

and we were on the bill at Reading Festival.

Steve and Rod were in the audience, checking me out.

Now, Rod was absolutely dead against having me in the band.

Steve was like,

"Just go and have a look at him as a singer."

So they did, obviously, saw my performance,

and then Rod decided that he would have a chat with me.

Hello there. That's right, it's Bruce.

He said, Are you interested in the job?

I went, "Of course I'm interested in the job.

"Don't be daft!"

So he, er, chopped out a big line of coke

and said, "Do you want some?"

I went, "No, I don't do that stuff."

He went, "Oh. You don't mind if I do then?"

So, erm, I'm sitting there and he said, er, right,

he goes, "I'm offering you the chance

"to audition for Iron Maiden."

And I said, "Look, Rod,

"let's just put cards on the table here.

"You know I'll get the job.

"But the question is not

"whether or not I'll get the job.

"The question for me is,

"Do you want the pain in the arse

"that's going to appear in your life?

"'Cause I'm not gonna be like your existing singer."

Steve totally found somebody

who was as ambitious as him in Bruce.

Bruce is totally professional, totally, er, into fitness,

looks after his voice, looks after himself,

wants to go out there and be the best and, erm,

that's all you can ask from any frontman really.

When it happened, it was about 50-50

between people like, "Oh, no, I liked Paul way better.

"I don't like... I don't like Iron Maiden with Bruce."

50-50.

Bruce had it tough enough as it was

because Paul Di'Anno was beloved.

Paul Di'Anno is still beloved by guys like me.

It was a little bit strange,

but this is me,

this is what I do

and you're either gonna get used to it or not.

And some people absolutely hated it.

Somebody said, "This is horrible.

"It was like listening to my favourite songs

"being sung in a cement mixer by an air-raid siren."

To which Rod immediately went,

"Bloody great. A human air-raid siren. I love it!"

They wanted somebody who was gonna be

capable of leading from the front

as they took over the world,

and obviously they found that guy.

Never has anybody been better equipped

for, er, world domination

than Bruce Dickinson in his mid-twenties.

You know, like, it's just absurd.

♪ I remember it as plain as day

♪ Although it happened in the dark of night

♪ I was strolling through the streets of Paris

♪ It was cold It was starting to rain

♪ And then I heard an ear-piercing scream

♪ And I rushed to the scene of the crime

♪ But all I found was the butchered remains

♪ Of two girls who lay side by side

♪ Yeah, murders in the Rue Morgue

♪ Never gonna find me

♪ Murders in the Rue Morgue

♪ Running from the arms of the law

Bruce took them to a new level with his range,

with his presentation on stage.

It's not just his vocal prowess,

it's like you're watching Broadway.

He has this intense stamina

and it's infectious, and when he, you know,

gets the crowd going.

Bruce, you only joined a few months ago, didn't you?

Yeah, just after, er... after August last year.

no, September last year.

I know Iron Maiden have had a few line-up changes

but there had been sort of fairly settled with the line-up.

Was it quite difficult for you, er,

going in and joining an established band line-up?

Not... Not really 'cause we've sort of known each other

for quite a long while

through my sort of... from my last band I was in.

So, I mean, it, er...

it all fitted in really well, really.

I mean, we like the same sort of music

- so it's no real problem. - Yeah, yeah.

♪ Murders in the Rue Morgue

♪ Never gonna find me

♪ Murders in the Rue Morgue

When we first started touring together,

when I'm singing the lead vocals

I stand in the middle of the stage.

And suddenly I've got, like, you know,

Steve's bass in my ear.

You know, grrr, and he's like...

and he's like shoving me.

There he was in my face and was cursing and swearing

and you know, stuff like that,

and this got quite heated after a while.

And it came to a head, Newcastle City Hall.

Steve was hopping mad. He was saying that

I was getting in the way and everything.

I was like, "Well, when I'm singing, mate,

"I stand in the f... in the middle of the stage.

"Not you, me."

I said, "Then when I'm done singing,

"you can stand in the middle of the stage whenever you want."

And we... we were... we were gonna go outside and...

and, you know, have a... have a fistfight.

And Rod came in. He was like,

"Break it up! Break it up, you two! Stop it!"

And, er, Steve... Steve was like,

"He's gotta go! He's gotta go! He's gotta go!"

And Rod's said, "He's not going!"

And I think that was the beginning of us

starting to understand each other...

...a bit better in a weird way.

♪ It took so long and...

They were a better band when Bruce joined.

They were more powerful.

They had more charisma.

They had more visible sort of intensity.

But Bruce was just a piece of the puzzle.

♪ I'm never going home!

The most fundamental thing really

was the strength of the material they made,

were badass musicians.

Undeniably, the sound of Maiden for us

was always about the guitars.

That's the first thing that comes to your mind,

those twin harmonic guitars going on,

and the push, the power behind it.

No guitar partnership has ever had

quite the same chemistry as Adrian and Dave.

Two lead guitarists which make men of a certain age

and... and ladies too I'm sure,

erm, go a bit weak at the knees.

Dave and I have always gotten on.

We've been mates since we were kids, you know?

So on a personal level, there was no problem.

And that translated into work.

We grew up in East London

and we lived a couple of streets away from each other.

I think 'cause we're good friends and we have a laugh,

we can play the subtle harmonies,

subtle nuances, things that have to be correct.

Yeah!

Every element of it was perfect.

Playing with this astonishing bass player,

the things Steve can do on a bass still blows my mind.

The galloping bass was front and centre

and his particular style of playing the bass

differentiated Maiden from all other metal.

Steve uses a lot of chords.

You know, he'd be doing the galloping thing

and then he'll suddenly put in a chord.

And you think, that sonically adds so much to it.

Clive Burr, the drummer with Maiden

for the first three records...

He was a fabulous drummer. I really admired his drumming.

♪ Sanctuary from the law

Clive was great and, erm, we got on really well.

♪ Sanctuary from the law

♪ You love me tonight Tonight!

You had an astonishing drummer in Clive Burr,

God rest his soul.

But when he left, they got Nicko.

And just everyone's like, "What the fuck is this bloke?

"Where the fuck did he come from?"

- Nicko? - Matthew?

How would you like us lot to be your backing group?

I thought you'd never ask.

He's a funny bloke and he's a big ray of sunshine, Nicko.

I just spat on your lens.

Every...

The way he plays drums,

you can tell, it's something that is beyond his control.

It's a gift from the Gods of metal,

that was given to him and he's just the tool.

The entity of Maiden was strong with Clive and Paul Di'Anno.

There was a magic that was set there

way back in the early days.

But when I came in, it seemed to be natural.

Although I did, like, four or five songs rattled off,

that was my audition.

But, you know, we bonded.

There was an unwritten bond, if you like.

Yeah, it was pretty instant.

The '80s were incredible.

Every album kept getting bigger and bigger.

And we knew we were on the verge

of something really special.

Woe to you, O earth and sea,

For the Devil...

...sends the beast with wrath,

because he knows that time is short

Let him who hath understanding reckon the number of the beast

for it is a human number.

Its number is six hundred and sixty-six.

CHEERING

♪ I left alone

♪ My mind was blank

♪ I needed time to think

♪ To get the memories from my mind

♪ What did I see?

♪ Can I believe?

♪ That what I saw that night was real and not just fantasy?

♪ 'Cause in my dreams

♪ It's always there

♪ The evil face that twists my mind

♪ Brings me to despair

♪ Night was black was no use holding back

♪ 'Cause I just had to see was someone watching me?

Sing it!

- ♪ Six... - ♪ six, six

♪ The number of the beast

♪ Sacrifice is going on tonight

You could tell this band are gonna be massive.

Zero to heroes, you know, like, in no time.

I'd never left the UK before. It was just exciting, you know?

There was all these, er, new experience

that just kept evolving.

And you didn't really have time to think about much of it,

you just... you just rolled with it.

♪ ...towards the chanting hordes

Iron Maiden are one of the leading exponents

of the UK heavy metal scene.

Fans here for their concert at the music hall,

their debut concert here in Canada,

have been lined up for a couple of hours.

And fans is part of what makes Iron Maiden work.

Getting to where they were without major radio play

was a big deal back then.

The band had so much respect among heavy metal fans.

What is it, do you think makes them

more special than anybody else?

They're different, you know?

They come out of England so they're different. They love it.

Well, I think that it's the best music that I can hear.

- Yeah? - Yeah,

'cause I love heavy metal and I love

your kind of music very much.

It was the beginning of what I described as

a non-stop roller coaster

that never ever got to the bottom.

It just carried on accelerating.

We just achieved terminal velocity

and stayed there for five fucking years.

In that period, the Iron Maiden logo,

Eddie stood out way beyond

any other band that was out there.

I mean, it was r... this really dynamic logo.

It's hard for me

to think of a more recognisable mascot

or imagery associated with a hard rock band

than Eddie and Iron Maiden.

You know, it was just such an incredible creation.

Eddie had a huge thing to do

with the success of Iron Maiden.

because here is an image of this character or creature,

whatever it is, that people could somehow kinda relate to.

The thing about Eddie is he transcends generations.

'Cause you always can lure a young head in with a character.

Eddie is a monument.

I give credit to Maiden.

They understood the flag-bearing thing.

It connects with the fans, the nationhood of it.

Eddie just progressed every year.

Came up with the ground-support system,

the moving rig that no one else had.

So every year I...

I actually bettered what I'd done the year before.

We created a monster, basically.

A Scarborough family court heard today

that a young offender who gunned down

a wealthy East End gambler,

his wife and young daughter last April,

was heavily influenced

by the skeletal mascot of a heavy metal rock group

and by literature on Satan.

There are numerous reports of Satanic activities

throughout central Texas.

This music is nothing more than songs of Satan.

- Satanism. - Satan.

That is what ten thousand dollars' worth

of burning records looks like.

Well, we feel that many of the songs are, er,

of the occult nature.

They sing about witchy women,

the daughter of the devil, sleeping in her bed.

We think it's definitely having an influence on young people

to go the opposite direction of what the Bible would teach.

New York's John Cardinal O'Connor

claimed this type of music

was guilty of leading listeners to Satan's camp.

Groups like Iron Maiden

feature death's-heads,

monsters and Satanic pentagrams.

The PMRC wants ratings

on all records with explicit lyrics.

It strikes me as being a little bit of religious mania.

You know, there's all kinds of ways

that people can use their... Their talents and energies

to better people's lot in the world

besides spending their time having law suits.

It seems a waste of time and money.

The word had gotten out

so the Jesus freaks were scared.

It was great.

You're a kid. It's like the coolest thing to be part of.

Like, you love this band

and there's people protesting about this band.

Like, you're only making us love 'em more, dummies.

Can anybody take seriously a man in a red suit

with a long, red, floppy tail and two plastic horns

with a little light bulb that light up

on the end of his trident?

I mean, if that's devil worship, I'm sorry,

I must be in the wrong century.

I was born in a very strong Catholic country,

and if you don't follow the rules

you're gonna be burned in Hell.

And then all of a sudden here's Eddie

and here is "The Number of the Beast"

with the evil in it and Hell is fun.

Hell is not that dangerous. Hell is some place where, fuck,

these musicians come back and forth.

And I go, "Maybe there's not such a thing as Hell and Heaven.

"Maybe it's more about us as people

"rather than who's up there telling who's bad and good."

♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah

♪ Hallowed be thy name

The panic of Satanism and Iron Maiden proves

that these people don't actually read

what these songs are about.

And what they all don't understand

is these are stories.

What do you think about

the importance of the text of the songs, the beginning?

Oh, the lyrics.

In the text of the...

- Yeah, in the lyrics. - Yeah.

I think, erm, because a lot of the earlier rock bands

sort of were, well, coming from the blues and stuff,

blues used to sing about being on the road

and, you know, being in love with their woman,

and, er, I think there's a lot more things

you can write about these days.

You don't have to write about my baby doesn't love me any more

and all this sort of rubbish, you know?

It seems crazy to write songs about...

about drinking and... and screwing women

and, erm, smoking, erm, strange substances

and going out and partying and all the rest of it,

when these are all things that are much more fun...

It's much more fun doing it

than it is listening to a song about it.

So, I mean, anybody can go and do it

at the end of the day anyway.

You know? I mean, we prefer to write songs about

things that people don't do very often, like death.

As you might know, we've got a new album

wandering around at the moment.

The album is called Powerslave, all right?

We did a song on this album

that's about 13 minutes long, all right?

This little track that we'll do for you.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner!

If you compose

very intricate 11, 12 minute songs,

you probably want a powerful, weighty theme

to go with that music.

Why would you compose 12 minutes

and have a song about something very trivial?

♪ Hear the rime of the Ancient Mariner

♪ See his eye as he stops one of three

♪ Mesmerises one of the wedding guests

♪ Stay here and listen to the nightmares of the sea

♪ And the music plays on back to the North

♪ Through the fog and ice and the albatross follows on

♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, yeah

Thing about Maiden is they have

a quite narrative way of storytelling in their music.

So you've got these epically long songs,

like "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" for example,

where they're telling you a story.

There's all this like literary inspiration, poetic inspiration,

a lot of songs about the historical battles

and Alexander the Great

and people being trapped in ice.

♪ Stranger in a strange land

♪ Land of ice and snow

♪ Trapped here in this prison Yeah

♪ Lost and far from home ♪

I grew up thinking that I was sort of out of place,

a stranger in a strange land.

And I think the exploration of different worlds,

you get to be a stranger in a strange land,

but with everybody else in the same way.

You... You get to access that same world

with each other when you're listening to that song.

Part of the fun of being an Iron Maiden fan

is everyone else writes it off

as this kind of comic-book, childhood, sort of nonsense,

but you know actually the themes are quite serious.

They're quite weighty. They're quite intellectual.

Even the take on them is not a superficial one.

It's not a whimsical one.

It actually tries to depict through the music

what Coleridge was thinking

when he wrote Rime of the Ancient Mariner,

what the experience

of the Battle of Passchendaele was like.

What do people say when they come along

the video of Run to the Hills and they're suddenly seeing you

being like, civil war, er, mercenaries, er,

killing all the Indians?

Oh, no, well, that's an... I mean, that's an anti...

that's an anti-Indian-killing song.

I mean, the whole thing about it is it's saying,

"Well, look, this is what happened

"and it's not like the cowboy movies."

♪ White man came across the sea

♪ He brought us pain and misery

♪ He killed our tribes He killed our creed

♪ Took our game for his own need

Even though Maiden lyrics can...

tells very, like sad stories about war, death, suffering,

in the end there is like this message of hope.

I think that's important and you can relate to this,

that even if you go through some difficult times,

Maiden music can help you out and guide you.

By the time they'd hit '84

they'd already toured the world.

They even went behind the Iron Curtain,

a place that not many bands ever go.

In those times in Poland

there were no record stores.

If someone was lucky enough to have, er,

family in Germany or in, er, England

he could like record a few copies for...

for his friends on the cassette tapes.

So when someone told us

that Iron Maiden decided to come here and to perform,

it put some fresh air into our country.

Iron Maiden! Iron Maiden!

Iron Maiden! Iron Maiden!

We stepped off the plane

and the scene was very, very much

like the images you see of The Beatles

when they first came to New York City.

When we first turned up on the bus

and they were just all outside jumping up and down,

chanting, "Maiden" and all that,

it was just unbelievable.

I mean, this was a different type of emotion.

It was just pure joy

for the fact that we were just even there.

Basically, groups don't come to Poland much

because there's not

a tremendous amount of money here

and they don't sell any records here.

But that doesn't really matter.

There either comes a point when money,

you know, doesn't...

doesn't have any real importance.

I mean, what's it worth to make 35,000 people... happy?

It was a very strange, surreal experience

because you knew these people were under this suppression.

We were told, "You mustn't get involved with it

"'cause you're being watched."

This was still, like, this KGB vibe

and there was always a military and police presence at shows

and they would line up in front of the stage,

looking at the audience.

There was this underlying fear

that it could just explode.

Iron! Iron! Iron!

The Maiden was the first band that brought,

like, the full stage production into Poland.

So they didn't just play, you know,

with a plain black backdrop.

They put in the whole show with Eddie, with pyro.

And people understood how spectacular rock shows can be.

♪ There goes the siren that warns of the air raid

♪ Then comes the sound of the guns sending flak

♪ Out for the scramble we've got to get airborne

♪ Got to get up for the coming attack

♪ Jump in the cockpit start up the engine

♪ Move all the wheel blocks there's no time to wait

♪ Gathering speed head down the runway

♪ Got to get airborne before it's too late

♪ Running, scrambling, flying ♪

I think one of the things that

was very impressive to me

was the reaction of the Polish kids.

It was very visceral.

♪ Scrambling, flying, Rolling...

It's like somebody opened up a magic box

and there was light came in

and they had been in the darkness all this time.

They just really had been waiting, like,

with a thirst and a hunger

to let out their emotions

and let out their feelings and scream,

you know, and bang their heads.

♪ Live to fly

♪ Fly to live

♪ Aces high

Yeah!

Them Polish people were amazing.

And there was a line of military police

along the front of the stage.

Initially they had their backs to the band.

But, you know, after a few songs,

they were turning round, getting more into it.

And then by the end they were taking their hats off

and chucking their hats on stage.

You know, it was amazing.

- Na zdrowie! - Na zdrowie!

Now, we're gonna smash the glasses together.

Well, last night had to be absolutely furious.

We played at a Polish wedding.

How did it come about?

We went to a bar in the hotel

and it was really naff, right?

So we ended up going down this...

It was supposed to have been a disco, weren't it?

And it ended up being a sort of a... a converted ballroom.

So there was this wedding going on at the time,

about 300 people dancing the waltz as we walked in.

So we got severely...

Sort of, into the bottle of booze, see, didn't we?

Then these people in the club said,

"Would you like to have a jam?"

"Yes," we said, didn't we?

- Yeah. We did. - And we did.

♪ We all came out to Montreux

♪ On the Lake Geneva shoreline

I think we all got a bit inebriated that night,

and so we just got up and did a Deep Purple song.

I don't think most of them

probably didn't know who we were.

I remember looking at a couple of older people

and they were like, "Who are these guys?"

You know, "What are they doing at our mate's wedding?"

But they went nuts.

♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah All right!

Yeah...

Ah, you can't play heavy metal with synthesisers.

Yeah.

No, it doesn't sound right.

They knew they were doing something good.

It was not only the rock concert.

It was like something more. Something more, more important.

♪ I'm running free, yeah

♪ I'm running free, yeah

♪ I'm running free, yeah

♪ I'm running free

Everybody!

Thank you all!

Beyond that wall

were guys that were just like us.

And I thought it was so great that Iron Maiden

was able to pull down that curtain

and go beyond that wall.

Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!

You know, this country wants to tell you

that country and we're gonna fight against each other?

Hell no. Let's all rock 'n' roll.

♪ Tell me why I had to be a Powerslave

♪ I don't wanna die I'm a god, why can't I live on?

♪ When the life giver dies all around is laid waste

♪ And in my last hour

♪ I'm a slave to the power of death

I think for many Polish people,

especially in, you know, 1980s,

when they hear songs like "Powerslave"

they could really refer this

to their own situation and the country's situation.

In Gdansk, some muted shouts of Solidarity,

but enough police to ensure there was no trouble.

I think anybody who's in a situation

where they're oppressed,

music is an outlet for people to get them through hard times.

It's fantastic if you feel that

you've helped people in that way.

We're not political.

We do it through the lyrics of the music.

And that breaks down

the totalitarian barriers around the world.

♪ Tell me why I had to be a Powerslave

♪ I don't wanna die I'm a god, why can't I live on?

I first encountered Iron Maiden

when I was a teenager in Lebanon.

In the early '90s, Lebanon had just come out of civil war

and I had just discovered heavy metal.

So I went to my local bootleg record store

'cause that's all you had in Lebanon at the time.

And I said, "I want the most metal thing you have."

And he gave me... It was 1992, he gave me Fear of the Dark.

And it was as if the album was talking to me.

I mean, I was a teenager,

I'd just lived through war

in a country that was still very turbulent,

and of course, like all art,

the interpretation is very subjective

to the person encountering that art.

And so for me listening to that album,

I just cast all kinds of interpretations that had to do

with my own life in war-time Lebanon.

And I felt this album

is basically commenting on my life.

And that for me was very special and it remains still today a...

a chilling experience whenever I listen to it.

This is Mijalic and these are the men

who come to burn it.

The Serbs call it ethnic cleansing

and Mijalic's Muslims have fled.

In the '90s, the situation in Kosovo,

it was really bad. You know, former Yugoslavia

and the ethno-nationalist wars that... that ended it

was exactly the context of me getting into Iron Maiden.

During the war there was this community exchanging tapes.

These exchanges built a community.

You know, you would just stay friends with these people.

Through Iron Maiden I found a community that is like-minded

and that bonded us further together and kind of helped us

throughout the times of hardship.

On September 11th, we ended up responding

down to the site at ground zero.

Saw the second one come down. And that...

You know, again, seeing that come down,

and even prior to that, people jumping,

I needed an escape. So, you can drink,

you could do things that aren't good for you,

or you could find something that you enjoy

that takes you to a different place, to a better place.

For me, that was music.

For me, that was Iron Maiden's music.

People want to feel that they belong somewhere

and so metal becomes this feeling of belonging

to something where everyone is equal,

where you are free to express yourself, and crucially,

where you are defying the system.

♪ Tell me why I had to be a Powerslave

♪ I don't wanna die I'm a god, why can't I live on?

♪ When the life giver dies all around is laid waste

♪ And in my last hour

♪ I'm a slave to the power of death

♪ Slave to the power of death

♪ Slave to the power of death

Still ahead in the new music,

more from Rio de Janeiro, including Iron Maiden,

Al Jarreau, Rod Stewart and more.

♪ Rock in Rio ♪

Maiden! Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!

Rock in Rio was the biggest show

Maiden had ever played.

Everything was a bit chaotic.

But now we were a platinum-selling band.

So then the pressure is on.

Can you, while the pressure is on you,

continue to be the best band in the world for the fans?

At the time, we were just in it.

So we had no time to step back.

We were just on the roller coaster.

Amigos! Rock in Rio!

Scream for me, Brazil!

Scream for me, Brazil!

Brazil, come on!

♪ Yeah, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah oh, yeah

♪ Oh, God of earth and altar

It was just incredible, incredible to play

to, like, three hundred thousand.

There was people as far as the eye could see.

Absolutely amazing.

And it was broadcast all over South America.

We were, of course, excited about the show.

It's exciting.

But when I'm on stage,

I find it exhausting.

Yeah!

Yeah! Yeah!

I then go off to the back

and I'm trying to mop up the blood

'cause it's a head wound. It bleeds like crazy.

And a roadie comes up and goes, "No, no, no, no, no!

"Message from Rod. He says,

'Can you squeeze it a little bit more

"and make it bleed.

'It looks amazing on the monitors!'"

And I pointed to a camera with a red light on and said,

"Just go over there and stick your face into it."

♪ Just a babe in a black abyss

♪ No reason for a place like this

♪ Walls are cold Souls cry out in pain

♪ An easy way for the blind to go

♪ A clever path for the fools who know

♪ The secret of the Hanged Man The smile on his lips

Yeah! Yeah!

Yeah! Yeah!

You have so much emotional energy to expend...

it will eat you alive in the end. It will eat you up.

Yeah! Yeah!

Maiden! Maiden!

We wrote, recorded, released,

and toured five albums in six years.

It just kept getting bigger and bigger.

It was the world's biggest roller coaster.

It just took us to new heights round the world.

But we were working ourselves to the bone.

You get on the treadmill of tour,

album, tour, more touring.

I took one look at the band

and my first thought was,

"They look tired. They look stressed."

The concerts were great, you know? People were great,

but everything else was horrible.

It wasn't just a 13-month tour.

It was the ten-month tour before that

and it was the eight-month tour before that.

So cumulatively, it was five years.

Five years of the golden cage.

You can tell they had the mileage,

that they'd put in the hours.

And Iron Maiden at the beginning were just brutal tours.

Everyone was fried.

Bruce more than anyone else.

And I think we didn't realise just what a toll it would take.

Good night! Thank you! Good night!

You know, Maiden's rise was so quick

and so meteoric, and I think that

when you're in your twenties and into your early thirties,

you're so hungry

and you're so wanting-it-all

that you don't even realise that

you actually have a say

and, "Wait a minute. Like, we should take a break."

I... I looked at the tour schedule

and there was one point

where we were doing seven shows in a row,

then there was one day,

then there was six shows in a row...

...and there was one day,

and there was five shows in a row.

Bruce, before you catch a cold, just what's the...

I caught one already.

It's too bloody late now.

- Er, what's... - My manager.

Look, look, he's doing his job.

- I pay him 20% for this. - Yes. I'm pretty sure...

I said to Rod,

"Erm, you realise that you're dealing with human beings here?

"And that I'm the singer,

"and you can't re-string a voice.

"So, if you want me to last longer than five minutes,

"maybe we should consider building in, like,

"a period of rest."

We were doing so many shows

that Nicko got blisters all over his hands

and then they broke

and then he got blisters under the blisters

and they broke and then he got an infection.

There were plenty of casualties from the '80s...

I want to see the back of your robe.

...you know, littering the sidewalks of Los Angeles

and various other cities, and I thought,

"I just do not want to be one of those casualties."

No more!

We just did the previous two albums

which was, er, "Somewhere in Time" and "Seventh Son,"

which I was really proud of production-wise, song-wise.

I thought they were really... really a step on, you know?

And it seemed to me like

we were going backwards doing it,

just going in and bashing it out

in Steve's barn, you know?

We were getting ready to work on "No Prayer for the Dying."

I desperately wanted it to be a great album.

I had what they call writer's block.

I desperately wanted to write,

I just didn't have anything.

And I think they sensed that I... I wasn't happy with it.

It was time for a change. For me and for them, really.

And so I left the band.

Adrian leaving was... was a big thing for me.

And I didn't know what to do. It's difficult to take it in.

I just felt that with Adrian, he wasn't happy

and the morale of the band wasn't good.

You know, people have paid their money

to come and see you,

you gotta give them a good performance, the best you can.

I got a phone call from, er, the boys

after Adrian Smith had left.

Erm, I think Adrian felt that he wanted to continue

in a different direction.

They asked me to go down there and play these songs.

I wasn't quite aware what was going on with Adrian.

Nobody told me.

I wasn't happy, 'cause his gear was there

and they wanted me to play through his gear.

It felt wrong to me that he wasn't there.

And in the end they just said, "Listen, he's gone."

In the dark, Mr Janick Gers.

We've... We've locked him into a very tight space,

so there'll be no swinging around.

No swinging, no movement, no dancing.

So we did a couple of songs

and then we did "Trooper."

And it just... I mean, I looked over at Dave

when we started playing. It was just so powerful.

And when it finished you were tingling.

The energy levels were just beyond.

Oh, you are naughty, but I love you.

And then they asked me to join.

You've introduced a new member to the band,

erm, Janick there.

Erm, how did he come into the picture?

Well, basically, we just, erm...

We just fucked him up. We just...

After Adrian left the band we just phoned him up and said,

"Look, can you learn four songs by tomorrow?"

That phone box out there.

And, er...

"Come down tomorrow and try 'em out, you know?"

How do you think the new material's

gonna come across live?

It's gonna come across amazingly, hopefully.

What do you think, Bruce?

You, calm down! You, calm down!

No, it's gonna be amazing, you know?

It's so... It's full of energy.

- Pass the buck, hey? - Yeah, look here!

No, it's full of energy. It's...

We've just been rehearsing. It's gonna be great.

No, it's gonna be mega.

♪ The killer's breed or the demon's seed

♪ The glamour, the fortune the pain

Halfway through the next tour

Bruce told me, "I'm leaving the band, all right?"

And we still had, like, two months of touring to do.

So I'm sitting on stage behind him every fucking night

looking at his sorry arse,

knowing he don't wanna be in Iron Maiden.

I took it as an affront to the fans that he was up there

knowing full well he didn't wanna be there.

No, I was really, really fucking angry at him.

They were playing Wembley Arena

and Bruce was singing like...

...and nothing was coming out.

And I remember Harris

looking at the monitor guy and the sound guy, going...

You know? And there's nothing coming out.

And then it slowly dawned on Steve

that Bruce wasn't singing.

And that's when I realised things were not good.

Thank you! Good night from Iron Maiden!

It has been a very good ten years.

We will all see you soon...

I hope.

Good night.

When you're in that, kind of,

chosen family of a band,

it's often brutal.

Sometimes it's difficult and the pieces don't fit.

And for your own sanity you need to be away from it.

I thought of packing it in... completely.

I thought, "Is all this worth it, this madness?"

I was ready for the funny farm... genuinely.

♪ Die!

Iron Maiden couldn't be

at Donington this year.

Their current world tour finishes in two weeks' time

and then the search is on for a new lead singer.

Bruce Dickinson is leaving the group

to pursue his solo career.

So, Bruce, why are you leaving Iron Maiden?

Erm, in a short...

A short answer, to do something different.

And what would that be?

Erm... a different kind of music.

♪ I've been down at the crazy house

♪ I've been playing with the cat and the mouse

The bombshell hit

when Bruce decided to fuck off from Maiden.

If he doesn't wanna be here then, "See you later."

When I heard Bruce was leaving I was like,

"No, he cannot leave."

It was definitely, for me, shocking.

It's not something you wanna hear

about your... your favourite band.

He'd already left when I found out.

And I was kinda like, "Oh my God,

"what the fuck just happened?"

We sort of hold our heroes to this standard

that they just have to continue to be what we want them to be

and what we expect them to be,

but that doesn't really allow for an artist to grow,

and he is, you know, a consummate artist

and I'm sure he needed it.

So, Steve, what are you gonna do for a singer?

You know, we've been listening to tapes.

We've got, like, about... I don't know.

about five suitcases, er, full of tapes to listen to.

And, er, you know,

hopefully we'll find somebody who's, er, reasonably unknown,

but maybe played on a club circuit somewhere,

had a bit of experience with audiences.

Erm, but I think it will be exciting to find somebody

who hasn't really, you know, made it or whatever, you know?

Now this lot haven't been on since the year '81.

They're good heavy rockers, just here to have fun.

They're called Iron Maiden, with new man Blaze Bayley.

♪ The freeway is jammed and it's backed up for miles

♪ The car is an oven and baking us wild

♪ Nothing is ever the way it should be

♪ What we deserve we just don't get, you see

Blaze coming in,

he brought a different sound to Maiden.

And I love his voice.

And, like, Blaze is a very accomplished metal singer.

I'm almost shocked that he took the job.

I'm sure it was amazing to hear,

"Yeah, we want you for the band."

I'm sure he was partying that night.

But I'm sure when he woke up the next day he was thinking,

"Oh shit."

Steve Harris said to me,

"What we do, we do together.

"And I don't care who writes the music,

"who writes the songs,

"as long as it's great."

But still, it's a massive job.

I was very surprised that they selected me.

I've met a lot of fans

and, er, generally the... the reaction has been,

to their credit, they've just said, "Well, good luck."

You know? And I think they just wanna see the band do well.

And, erm, I'm looking forward to going on tour.

But the... the main thing is, I can't replace Bruce Dickinson.

Blaze Bayley,

he was an up-and-coming British vocalist,

but he didn't have the range that Bruce has.

It was such a hard spot,

I think, for that guy.

And he sounded so different too.

It wasn't like they got a guy who could at least sing what...

the way Bruce sang on those songs.

♪ Roll of the dice Take a spin of the wheel

Many of us sort of wonder why

they didn't do more to work with his natural ability.

But, you know, he brought his own spin

to the Iron Maiden sound.

I thought Blaze did an absolutely brilliant job,

particularly live.

You know, I think he was...

You know, I don't think you could fault him

for his contribution to Iron Maiden.

Some fans were screaming, "Fuck Blaze,"

during the shows and I think that's quite unfair.

I fucking told you!

I fucking told ya! Right, I fucking told ya!

Can you see? Can you see who it fucking is?

Get it! Fucking get it!

There was a time in the early days of punk

in the late '70s when, er, spitting was something

that fans did to show their appreciation.

That never sort of transferred to the metal scene at all.

You know, spitting at a metal show is insane.

Any human being would object thoroughly to being spat on.

Fucking had it!

The Blaze era of Maiden,

- there was great moments. - I'll fucking kill you!

But there were many that weren't.

I don't think any of the commercial decline

was Blaze's fault.

That was just circumstance.

- Anyone else? - The mainstream

heavy metal rock press were saying,

- "Maiden are dead." - Fuckin' had it!

"Maiden are over.

"We have Nirvana.

"We have grunge.

"That is the future.

"That is what's coming."

Everyone that wasn't grunge, more or less,

were considered like...

like a old reptile or whatever, you know?

They... They just looked at you

like you were an idiot or something.

Heavy metal wasn't cool any more.

The '90s was crap.

Everything was just like...

too big clothes and ugly shit. You know?

The grungy scene was happening.

I think the Seattle bands were coming in.

I think, actually, we asked Nirvana

if they want to support us

and they said, "No, we're too old for them."

During the Blaze years,

I saw them go towards small clubs,

probably 2,000-seat venues,

and it was just...

It was intimate, is how I would describe it.

I saw them on The X Factor tour, erm, in Philadelphia

at this small place called the Electric Factory.

I think it fits a thousand, 1,500 people.

There weren't even 500 in the arena.

Now, instead of playing

in, you know, arenas and big venues,

we were back doing clubs again.

That kind of really put a few chinks in the armour

of the band as a whole.

Yeah, we had... we had a bit of a rough time in America.

The fans seemed to desert us there.

Er, but the rest of the world, we... we still did fine.

Not the same, admittedly, but we did okay.

I think Steve had been beaten up

mentally, emotionally,

by a bruising few years

when it hadn't quite worked out

the way he thought it was gonna work out.

It was a challenging time 'cause Bruce left

and then I went through a divorce as well,

so there was all that going on as well.

But I'm really proud of that period, really,

because we were just up against it.

We were fighting, you know, and I like that.

That's a challenge.

And all the hardcore fans were still there.

It's important to really understand the Blaze era

and respect the Blaze era and him

and what he brought to the band.

And I think the two albums are fantastic.

They're so dark. They're so different.

But they're great albums.

We all have, er, er, a lot of respect for Blaze.

But I guess I'm not gonna surprise anybody if I say that,

you know, Bruce is the voice of Iron Maiden.

And, you know, that's what we grew up with.

That's what we want.

I remember saying to Steve, you know,

I heard Bruce would like to come back into the band again,

and he was, like, a little bit shocked, I think, you know?

And, and I was trying to convince him that it might...

this is a good thing to do.

I think we accept we weren't a world-class band any more.

Like Maiden, Bruce is struggling a bit.

His solo project didn't go quite the way he expected

and I think he... he... he really missed it.

You know, Maiden's just got a special vibe.

They belong together.

When I got the news, it was horrible, it was awful.

I absolutely loved being in Iron Maiden.

But it doesn't matter if I'm there or not.

Planet Earth is a better place for having Iron Maiden in it.

That was when I wanted to get Adrian back in.

Getting the band back together.

Everybody was a little bit more grown up

and everyone was a little bit more open.

And it was... it was great.

I sort of enjoyed the second time round a bit more.

You know, I was much more confident.

To me it was like a, you know,

second bite at the cherry, you know?

All the things that I maybe regretted

or thought I could've done better

or thought could've been better

back in the '80s.

So I said, "Look, let's get Adrian back in.

"We can go with the three guitar players."

I mean, that's in... in my thinking as well.

But can we have three guitarists?

Jan kept saying, "Don't worry, Nick, I'll step down

"and you can go back to the original line-up."

And I went, "You ain't going anywhere, mate."

And I said to Rod,

"Are you gonna take less of a commission then?"

"Ooh, what do you mean?"

"If we're gonna have six people

"in the band, we're gonna have to split the gig pot six ways,

"instead of five."

"Don't be so fucking stupid. He's gone."

I said, "No, but I've got a point,

"haven't I?"

And I remember going up to Steve's room

and I said to him,

"Well, he's talking about bringing Adrian back."

Steve's deadpan face looks at me, and he says,

"Just think about it. It's dangerous.

Think of what we can do going with three guitar players."

Bruce in his box. Hello.

I was aware that things were not great with

the Maiden situation.

And I got the call.

You know, "How do you feel about rejoining the band?"

I'll be honest, I wasn't sure

about him coming back at the time

because I didn't know what his reasons were.

I suppose all of us were probably brought up

in the way that men didn't discuss those things.

You know, we didn't discuss our feelings.

We just got on and... got on with it.

I remember saying to Steve,

I said, "Look, my old man had this philosophy

"about if someone shits on the McBrain name,

"they don't get a second chance.

"He's bound to do it again. Do we take the chance?"

And he said, "Let's just have a meet and see how it goes."

So I arranged a meeting for all the band.

Bruce comes in and Steve... ...says to him,

"Why do you wanna come back?"

And he said, "Because I wanna play big gigs again

"and I think we can do great."

Er, Steve said, "All right then,"

and we went to the pub.

That was it. That was the fucking meeting.

We got a beer each and I put my arm round Bruce

and I said, "Mate, you know, I'm really happy

"that you're back in the band."

Singing eyebrows.

What's he up to?

I said, "But I can't retract what I said

"and what I felt about when you left.

"I'm still pissed off at the way that happened

"and the way you did it."

And he looked at me and he said,

"I wouldn't have it any other way, Nick. I love ya."

Well, when Bruce came back, it was like...

...a sigh of relief for all the Maiden fans.

It was like, "Yes, he's back! Oh, he's cut his hair.

"But still, he's back."

These things happen for a reason,

and when Bruce came back, he was stronger and more focused

on what was the... the goal to do as a team.

Title song from the new album...

...Brave New World.

♪ Dying swans

♪ Twisted wings

♪ Beauty not needed here

♪ Mother love

♪ Is no more

♪ Bring this savage back home

♪ Wilderness

♪ House of pain

♪ Makes no sense of it all

♪ All is lost

♪ Sold your souls

♪ To this brave new world

All right!

♪ A brave new world

♪ In a brave new world

♪ A brave new world

- ♪ In a brave new world - ♪ In a brave new world

They had these three guitar players,

and while it could have been an absolute mess because egos,

they are the example of teamwork.

I mean, if this was certain other guitar players

it couldn't happen.

Because there'd be too many egos involved.

But it's not about that.

It's... It's about making the band sound better.

Iron Maiden had the second golden age.

And it's not even that they'd been trying

to recapture it from the '80s.

They'd been forging ahead with brand new material

that is unlike that stuff,

but just as good in a totally different way.

It's the ebb and the flow.

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

Proof positive.

Go anywhere around the world where Maiden is playing,

stadiums full of people.

What happened to grunge?

♪ A brave new world

Come on!

♪ A brave new world

♪ A brave new world

♪ A brave new world

Iron Maiden absolutely had to hit rock bottom

in order to claw their way back to the top.

Oh!

♪ A brave new world

They had to go through the trenches

to become the greatest band in the world a second time.

♪ Dying swans

♪ Twisted wings

♪ Bring this savage back home

When Bruce came back with Adrian,

no management in the world could foresee

that that would be the plan.

That's fucking divine intervention

because I think

if we hadn't have had Bruce come back with Adrian,

I don't know if this band would have still existed.

But with Maiden, there were good times and bad times.

Bruce called me on, erm,

I think it was the day before Christmas Day in 2014

to tell me very abruptly, "Hey, I've got throat cancer."

Obviously was... was a hell of a shock.

We had a whole world tour planned.

I look at my diary and, for this year,

and the whole thing is all just crossed out.

Cancel, cancel, cancel, cancel.

Er, so... everybody was pretty freaked out.

He called me and he told me, said, "Nick."

He said, "I've just... just seen

this oncologist in London.

"And he said that I've got throat cancer."

So I'm fucking, like, this with the phone going,

"No! This is my brother! He could die!"

You know, like anything else, Bruce went to it as a project.

He studied it. He knew exactly what was going on.

Erm, he committed to every detail,

every treatment.

Like Bruce, the fucking arsehole that he is,

goes into it, "Oh, there's this drug and there's this"...

Bless his heart. I mean, he researches stuff.

That's what Bruce is like.

The thing about the recovery from cancer,

is it's, erm, very personal. No other way to describe it.

It's your cancer. You own it.

You've got to destroy a bit of yourself to get rid of it.

And so he had the treatment.

And I figure, "How are you doing?

"Has your hair fallen out yet?"

He said, "I went to the pub the other"...

I was like, "You went to the pub?"

He said, "Yeah, got a beer in front of me."

He said, "Me beard fell out."

I said, "Not your hair?"

He said, "No, me hair's okay...

..."but me beard fell out onto the bar!"

Oh, God.

And in a couple of weeks' time he phoned me up and he said,

"I'm in remission."

And I went, "Fucking brilliant!"

♪ Sacrifices buried with kings

♪ Accompany them on a journey with no end

♪ To an afterlife that's rich with fruit of all the gods

♪ And to face the demons of their underworld haunts

He went out on The Book of Souls tour.

I was there that first night,

and everybody was, like, palpably nervous

about whether or not he would sound like he used to,

and incredibly enough, he did.

♪ The sentient is sent to seek out all the truth

♪ A flight to earth that is a given from his birth

I remember seeing him at the barrier

in February, 2016,

and he was just so powerful live.

It was a really amazing experience.

♪ Falling of ages

♪ Forest of kings

His vocals actually, it sounds to me,

even stronger than it was before.

It was almost a miracle really.

♪ The book of souls

To see Bruce perform again

after all that rigmarole he went through

was absolutely amazing.

The good Lord worked a miracle for us, really did.

He worked a miracle when he left,

worked a miracle when he came back 'cause he brought Adrian,

he worked another miracle when he had his cancer,

and another miracle was he was our captain.

Oh, Captain, oh, Captain.

You go from, you know, Bruce Dickinson,

rock 'n' roll star

to "Hello, good afternoon,

"this is your captain, Bruce Dickinson.

"Our flight today will be two and a half hours."

Five Star Triple six, tower.

Sierra One cleared for take-off.

Wind 292 at 10 knots.

My great uncle was in the Royal Air Force,

my uncle was in the Royal Air Force.

My dad was an engineer.

So my heroes when I was a kid growing up

were not rock stars. They were test pilots and astronauts.

Years ago, I was on holiday

and I saw, "Trial lesson, 35 dollars."

I thought, "You know what, I'll have a go."

And I got in this little Cessna and took off,

and it was a... just this revelatory moment.

It's like wiring up the inside of your head... with these.

During that period,

I flew myself around Europe a little bit.

So I started acquiring more and more things,

and to cut a long story short, I did a full set of licences,

it's like a year and a half of exams, academic exams.

Finally got qualified, got my little two stripes,

off I can go.

And then the phone rang.

There was an airline called Astraeus

with a couple of old 737s,

and they've said, "We're looking for pilots.

"Do you want the job?"

I went, "Yeah."

And that's how I ended up a 737 pilot.

And I thought, "Wow, wouldn't it be great

"if I could just fly the band to gigs?"

Rod, to my surprise, said, "Wow, what an amazing idea."

And so we rented the aeroplane off the airline.

It made money, it worked,

and it was an incredible experience for us.

We could just get to the places in the world

which are much harder to get to,

like Quito or Manaus

in the middle of the Amazon rain jungle,

Lima, Jakarta.

And it was well worth it to see all those fans.

What other band has done that, you know?

Just name a band who's had, like, their own print on plane,

their singer has piloted it,

and they've gone to all these crazy locations.

If we go to play in Puerto Rico...

Now customs and immigration in Puerto Rico

is normally really, really tough.

So when we come in on Flight 666

I said, "Oh, shit, they're gonna pull us over,

"have everybody pull down their pants. We're fucked."

As we're walking out the door, I see the guys

from customs and immigration lined up.

I go, "Oh, fuck, they're waiting for us."

As we start walking out, they go,

"Hey, can I get a picture?

"Can I get an autograph? Can I do"...

They were fans!

The fans that they have cross everything.

It's doctors, lawyers, police.

I think music for me

is the most valuable art form ever.

It's the one that really unites all people.

Music is instant and it's eternal.

Ah!

What an amazing thing this is

that you and us have created in Maiden all round the world.

The message from that that goes out is that

it doesn't matter whether you're male, female, Muslim, Christian,

Catholic, Jewish. It doesn't matter.

If you're a Maiden fan, you're an Iron Maiden fan.

You're part of one fucking world and one family, my friends.

So this goes out to all of you for being amazing tonight...

because we are all blood brothers!

♪ And if you're taking a walk through the garden of life

♪ What do you think you'd expect you would see?

♪ Just like a mirror reflecting the moves of your life

♪ In the river reflections of me

♪ Just for a second a glimpse of my father I see

♪ And in a movement he beckons to me

♪ And in a moment the memories are all that remain

♪ And all the wounds are reopen again

- ♪ We're blood brothers - ♪ We're blood brothers

- ♪ We're blood brothers - ♪ We're blood brothers

- ♪ We're blood brothers - ♪ We're blood brothers

- ♪ We're blood brothers - ♪ We're blood brothers

It's a bit like a sort of heavy metal waltz, this one.

- Hey, hey! - Hey, hey!

There's nothing more exciting

than being part of an Iron Maiden crowd.

Great fucking crowd of great fucking people,

and express yourself freely knowing that you are protected.

Because you are part of the people

and that people is part of you

and you have that power also to give back to the band.

Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!

My favourite moment at a Maiden gig would be

when I saw them at Earl's Court

and they played "Blood Brothers".

and I looked around, and there was lots of men about my age.

We were all crying.

♪ We're blood brothers

What are we?

- ♪ We're blood brothers - ♪ We're blood brothers

♪ We're blood brothers

♪ We're blood brothers

♪ And if you're taking a walk through the garden of...

♪ Life

But of course, er, there will be an end at some point.

A major development in the world of heavy metal

as one of the genre's most beloved drummers

has announced they're retiring from touring

after a 42-year career.

It was an easy decision,

but I wish I could still play with the guys, you know?

I... I... I wish I had my full fitness.

Lovely, yeah. Just do that.

Something like that. There it is.

I had a stroke in January last year

so I had to really work hard for three months

to try and get my hand working.

Nine weeks into rehab,

I knew that we were opening with "Somewhere in Time",

the opening track on The Future Past tour,

and there's a middle section I can't play.

I phoned Harry up and said, "Look, mate,

"I'm really struggling.

"I can't play the intro to "Trooper". I can't"...

He said, "Look, play it straight, straight fill."

"You're a fucking genius."

I'm the drummer and I didn't think to play it straight.

- Come on, mate. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's the character of Steve Harris.

After 42 years playing with him,

this is what he's like.

He's about Iron Maiden, he's about the band.

You couldn't wish for anybody else to be your friend.

Thanks, Drew.

But I still was struggling,

trying to push myself

and I know I'm not being able to do this.

My body was fatigued and I thought, you know,

"This isn't fair on the rest of the guys."

I admire him for trying and for working his arse off,

but his body was just failing.

And we were worried that something else

would happen as well.

It was horrible.

We can't just say, "Off you go, now!"

Nobody would understand.

And it's a shit thing to do

because Maiden has been his life.

So, I made an announcement

at the end of the tour.

And I thought, you know,

it's time to pass drumsticks to a younger fella.

This morning Nicko announced

that he was stepping back

from playing live drums with Iron Maiden.

So let him know how much he's loved, everybody!

Nicko! Nicko! Nicko! Nicko! Nicko!

What I'm really gonna miss is being on tour

and playing with my brothers.

They are just all exquisite people.

A lot of people see it as,

when there's no band any more, it's all over.

But I don't see that.

Iron Maiden will be part of this

a long time after they're gone.

It's, er... Yeah. I don't see an end to it.

From day one,

they were gonna conquer the world.

And that's what Iron Maiden did.

And they're still doing it today.

They are one of the biggest bands,

I believe, in the world.

And in a very real way,

Maiden and the great bands,

you know, that have come a little before and after,

the great ones, connect with that feeling

and make life a little bit more bearable.

Iron Maiden are about

this quest for kinship and connection

and you can feel that emotion in the music.

It's about being part of the same group.

It's being part of something

that is not about individualism.

It's about being part of the world

and trying to make it better.

We all love playing, that's the thing.

I think when you're really enjoying what you're doing

then you don't really wanna stop, do you?

People ask questions,

"What you do in the future?"

Well, we're gonna tour.

And then we're gonna tour again

and we're gonna tour again and again,

till we can't any more.

The Iron-Fucking-Maiden!

Oh, yeah!

Everybody everywhere, put your hands in the air!

♪ Won't you come into my room?

♪ Wanna show you all my wares

♪ Wanna see your blood

♪ I want you to stand and stare

♪ See the blood begin to flow

♪ As it pours upon the floor

♪ Iron Maiden can't be fought

♪ Iron Maiden can't be sought

Oh, yeah!

Everyone, let me fucking hear you!

♪ Oh, well, wherever Wherever...

Who are we?

♪ Iron Maiden's gonna get you no matter how far

♪ See the blood flow watching it shed

♪ Up above my head

♪ Iron Maiden wants you for dead

♪ Won't you come into my room?

♪ I wanna show you all my wares

♪ I just want to see your blood

♪ I just want to stand and stare

♪ See the blood begin to flow as it falls upon the floor

♪ Iron Maiden can't be fought Iron Maiden can't be sought

♪ Oh, well, wherever wherever you are

♪ Iron Maiden's gonna get you no matter how far

♪ See the blood flow

♪ Watching it shed up above my head

♪ Iron Maiden wants you for dead

♪ Won't you come into my room? I wanna show you all my wares

♪ just want to see your blood I just want to stand and stare

♪ See the blood begin to flow as it falls upon the floor

♪ Iron Maiden can't be fought Iron Maiden can't be sought

♪ Oh, well, wherever wherever you are

♪ Iron Maiden's gonna get you no matter how far

♪ See the blood flow watching it shed

♪ Up above my head

♪ Iron Maiden wants you for dead

♪ Won't you come into my room? I wanna show you all my wares

♪ I just want to see your blood I just want to stand and stare

♪ See the blood begin to flow as it falls upon the floor

♪ Iron Maiden can't be fought Iron Maiden can't be sought

♪ Oh, well, wherever wherever you are

♪ Iron Maiden's gonna get you no matter how far

♪ See the blood flow watching it shed

♪ Up above my head

♪ Iron Maiden wants you for dead

♪ Ow! Ow!