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Iron Maiden: The final frontier

24/09/10 || Butt-Beard

Butt-Beard: “OH SHIT! Is that a new fucken Maiden record! Motherfucker! Here’s fucken 20 euro, give me that shit.” That’s what I said to the fucken guy at the store today. That and “Fuck yeah I want the t-shirt with that.”

Now everyone knows that Maiden’s been around the block, much like your mother. So me and Rev will go through the tracks one by one and comment/splurge on them. I will say this…“FUCKEN MAIDEN!”

Revenant: Fucken Maiden indeed. We don’t need to intro them, but if you haven’t heard of them before and came here by accident, I think this is the site you want. Right, let’s kick this shit off already.

1. Satellite 15… The Final Frontier
Butt-Beard: The opening to Iron Maiden’s new album is a long experimental wankage with drums and guitars. After a short silence, a few subtle arpeggios and Dickinson’s voice come into play, while Nicko McBrain starts a robotic rhythm section with the bass drum and well… I don’t really know what to think of the result. And then… like the shining light at the end of the long tunnel… it all becomes clear… the heavens part… IRON MAIDEN CAN’T BE FAR!

Revenant: Fuck this intro. One minute would have been fine, two minutes bearable, three minutes pushing it, but for fuck’s sake, 4 minutes of this shit? Note to other bands: an option to skip lengthly intros is a must. The song, when we finally get there, isn’t half bad.

2. El Dorado
Butt-Beard: This first single, which was available to download for free already on the band official website, is neither the big hit of the album nor the most representative. It begins the same way “Satellite” ended, a punchy guitar along with Nicko McBrain bashing on his cymbals. This kind of firework effect is usually used to conclude a song or a show, and sounds kind of like the opening to “Hit The Lights” if you ask me. Then comes Iron Maiden’s traditional gallop with a riff peering on Megadeth’s heavy/thrash style. Actually this shit sound a fucken lot like Megadeth.

Revenant: A decent track, but nothing I’d write home about (not that my mum would care anyway). I’m not digging the chorus, but I like it a little more with each listen. A grower, for sure, but I’m still waiting for something to wow me here.

3. Mother Of Mercy
Butt-Beard: A slightly medieval atmosphere, like a warrior’s hymn, or the stink of the village, is what I get out of this track. Like many more to come on this new album, the guitars start off clean. After some guitar riff explosions, here comes the same verse again, played in a louder guitar version, and once more, the inevitable gallop riff. The chorus is another easy one to remember, because it’s the name of the song.

Revenant: This one suffers from “A Matter of Life and Death” syndrome. Lifeless track filled with Bruce over compensating. It can only get better from here.

4. Coming Home
Butt-Beard: The power ballad of the album, fuck. However, this song is catchy as fuck. Note also that there is a really nice bromance solo.

Revenant: Get out your cigarette lighters, light them up and raise them high. Oh yeah. This is the best track so far for the album, even if it is a little slow. Did somebody mention bromance? Bring it over here big fella, I think I need a hug.

5. The Alchemist
Butt-Beard: We get quickly into the thick of things with this plain track. No intro, no bridge. Only verse, chorus, verse, chorus, solo, verse, chorus. End of fucken story. It is a traditional track with Maiden’s rhythmic riffs and Nicko McBrain’s signature cymbal punching.

Revenant: At last this album has a pulse and we have something a little quicker. Nicko and Steve do a nice job here, but I don’t really dig the guitar riffing too much. Like most of what has passed to date, decent without being too impressive.

Butt-Beard: We are half way through and all Maiden’s gimmicks have been distinguished already. If this was NCIS (fuck how awesome would that be?) this would be the part where Gibbs storm in on the killer’s house, just as the criminal escapes. Things however are a little bit different. These tracks were meant to be catchy but they eventually turn out to be average…

Revenant: I hate NCIS. Ziva’s pretty hot though. I wouldn’t kick her out of bed for farting, if you kno what I mean. Anyway, let’s push on…

Butt-Beard: Dude, how can you hate fucken NCIS? I’d rather go for that lab chick. The one that listens to KMFDM…yeah that one’s pretty hot.

6. Isle Of Avalon
Butt-Beard: Iron Maiden demonstrate their talent for the crescendo intro with “Isle Of Avalon”. The guitars start with an Arabic tinged motif, the drums come in with some hi-hat. The bass drum then comes in discreetly. Following the example of “The Longest Day” on the former album, the drums really show up like powerful explosions and a couple of rounds on the toms producing a “thunder drum” effect, maybe McBrain has been listen to “De Mysteriis”. Overall, it is a good track that follows in the tradition of the epic songs on “A Matter Of Life And Death”.

Revenant: Well fucken said. I like this track. Things are on the up (and that has nothing to do with Ziva either).

7. Starblind
Butt-Beard: After another clean guitar/keyboards part followed by silence, the Troopers move on to a heavy and lively part with a subtle, soulful melody. Yeah, I’m really running out of ideas. Rev! Any words on this shit?

Revenant: Hey, you’re doing a good job man! I don’t like the drum beat during the verse on this one but fuck, the chorus is epic and I love it. The middle section is also quite good. It doesn’t quite bend me over and slap my arse with it’s brilliance, but another good tune nonetheless.

8. The Talisman
Butt-Beard: With an acoustic guitar in the background, Bruce Dickinson tells us a story with an old man’s voice, creating a mixed feeling of comfort and disturbance, I’d actually like him to do some bookreadings of Paradise Lost, or Dante’s Inferno. Then the prelude comes to an end, slowing down to announce a dimming silence and crashing into a new heavy start. It’s an age old trick, but fuck does it work. The Talisman is a great track. These 9 minutes are a succession of intense moments, with the song’s catchy guitar riffs, and we are favorable to the “woooooohoooohooo”.

Revenant: I’m starting to get epic track overload here. This song reminds me a lot of “The Legacy” from the previous album, but I’d say this is slightly better.

9. The Man Who Would Be King
Butt-Beard: For this track, of which the title reminds me of Blaze Bayley’s album names (ouch!), Iron Maiden mix things up with… a clean guitar intro. Again. This prelude ends again in a short break before switching to a livelier song. Half-way through, there’s a tempo change, much like the unconvincing twist of a Hollywood movie. Note the pleasant guitar solo. The song comes to an end in an interesting way with a slow and progressive fade out, a true epilogue for this heavy metal moment of bravery.

Revenant: Didn’t I just say I was getting epic track overload? Yeah, it’s another pretty fine track but when you place them all back to back to back it starts to get a little tiresome. I always enjoyed having the epics at the end of the Maiden album, not every track needs to be an epic.

10. When The Wild Wind Blows
Butt-Beard: The fact is that the end of “The Man Who Would Be King” would have been a great conclusion, having put up with these 4 mini-epic tales to move on to another never-ending track, the longest of the album, well it doesn’t make you feel like listening to it. The whole track is a repeat of what had come before it. However “When The Wild Wind Blows” is the merriest song on the album. It seems impossible not to jump up and down when you hear it. After 11 minutes of semi-forgivable auto-plagiarism, this title ends in perfect symmetry, with a couple of arpeggios leaving the way to a windy sound.

Revenant: For me, this is the best track on the album. More than any song that passed before it, this track makes better use of three guitars than any other. Yes, for once the third guitarist isn’t redundant, fancy that eh? Very much a multi-layered song, best enjoyed listened to closely.

So that’s it, ten tracks and 76 fucking minutes worth. I could have listened to the first three Municipal Waste albums in the same amount of time. Closing thoughts, beard-growing-butt?

Butt-Beard: A new era has come; Maiden don’t know how to write hits anymore. Maiden are no longer comfortable or sharp. After the fifth clean intro, you cannot help but smile. You just have to deal with it; today Maiden is a progressive metal band – albeit a good one.

Revenant: I had hoped, with the band spending the last year and a half touring and playing only their old shit, that it would have rubbed off. Sadly not. This album is very much a progression from the last one. It suffers heavily from epic overload. Couldn’t they have thrown in a quicker track at some point for variety? Shit, I would have taken “Futureal” just to break things up.

So Butt, got a score in mind? I’m thinking a 7 is in order: some good material, but too many songs stretched into epics.

Butt-Beard: Well, despite my original excitement to the point of retardation, Maiden have dissapointed me. I’m feeling a 6. So 6.5 total.

6,5

Information
Released: 2010
Label: EMI
Website: www.ironmaiden.com
Band
Bruce Dickinson: vocals
Adrian Smith: guitars
Dave Murray: guitars
Janick Gers: guitars
Steve Harris: bass
Nicko McBrain: drums

Tracklist
01. Satellite 15…The Final Frontier
02. El Dorado
03. Mother Of Mercy
04. Coming Home
05. The Alchemist
06. Isle Of Avalon
07. Starblind
08. The Talisman
09. The Man Who Would Be King
10. When The Wild Wind Blows

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