Following 2006’s epic A Matter Of Life And Death and a tour which found them playing that album in full, Iron Maiden turned their eyes to the past with the Somewhere Back In Time Tour. In 2008, Metal Hammer climbed aboard Ed Force One to get to the heart of Maiden’s enduring success.
We’re 35,000 feet in the air over Central America and Captain Bruce Dickinson is on the intercom screaming the words to Aces High as the plane he’s piloting banks into a sickening 360˚ tailspin and downwards towards certain doom…
Well, that’s been the recurring nightmare of Hammer since agreeing to climb aboard this latest Iron Maiden touring extravaganza. Why did they need a plane? Why did they have to load it with 12 tons of heavy metal stage gear and pyro and let the singer fly the fucker? And why the fuck did we agree to be in it?
That’s easy to answer. Maiden are the biggest metal band on the planet. Fact. And in order to fulfill the demand for shows the band require their own transport plane to move the stage so that they can play what is effectively a stadium gig every 48 hours – a feat never even attempted by the likes of the Rolling Stones or U2, which are now the bands Maiden rank alongside in terms of worldwide ticket sales. Metallica, GN’R and AC/DC may all be giants of rock, but next to Maiden they don’t even come close. And why is Hammer here? Because, despite the flying nerves, you’d have to grind our bones into bread before we missed out on the chance to herald their homecoming at Twickenham Stadium on July 5, 2008.
The previous 48 hours have been a bit of a blur as we’ve caught flights half way round the world and met up with Maiden at the infamous Aztec temples of Mexico City, where the band were blessed in a purification ritual inside the Temple Of The Feathered Serpent before they went on to surprise even themselves and sell out a 54,000-capacity baseball stadium. Now, Hammer is currently sat in a front- row passenger seat of a very special and hugely converted Airbus 727.
This particular plane is totally unique; it has the call sign AEU666, and has a decorated fuselage livery proudly bearing the insignia of heavy metal’s first royal family, not to mention one snarling cyber-looking sonofabitch called Eddie. Welcome to the inner sanctum world of ‘Ed Force One’…
“Eeeee-op! How do you like my big shiny plane thing then, Mr ’Ammer?!” gurns Maiden drummer and all-round lovable nutbag, Nicko McBrain. “Great, innit? Beats the fuckin’ bus any day of the week!” He sounds like a cross between Blackadder’s General Melchitt and one of Sesame Street’s bin-dwelling puppets.
As Nicko says, a plane is, after all, a very nice way to travel between gigs. Something that even Steve Harris has surely come round to seeing?
“I was a fan of the idea from the start,” corrects Steve as we turn to fly down the Mexican coast towards Costa Rica, the site of tomorrow night’s gig. Without question, being aboard Ed Force One is a unique rock’n’roll ego experience, but it’s also a practical working environment where a band get to recharge with minimum hassles from officious local airport types and the crew get to work like dogs every 48 hours building and stripping stadium-sized stage rigging.
“We can now go to places we’ve never been to before,” says the bassist. “Take Costa Rica, for example. We’ve never played there before and we’ve sold 25,000 tickets. Columbia, we’ve sold 44,000 tickets there. Next time we come back we’ll be able to look at playing Honduras, Equador, Peru and other countries we’ve never played before.”
Like anyone who has achieved their life’s ambitions and maintained a clarity of purpose and singularity of vision, Steve feels suitably proud of his band’s achievements and his life’s work.
“I think people understand that we’re not big flash rock stars who will rub success in the fans’ faces. We give a lot back, and I hope that the fans feel a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment in seeing where Maiden is now because they’ve all been part of that journey. Having the plane and paying to tour this way enables us to fulfill our end of the bargain and get a show this size out to people who have wanted to see the band for years.”
He isn’t kidding. Last night Hammer witnessed Iron Maiden lay waste to Mexico City as 54,000 rabid fans lost the plot in the baseball stadium. That’s approximately 40,000 more than the last time Maiden played there, the vast majority of whom weren’t even born when Powerslave was last toured, which is a point not lost on the boys.
“We didn’t want to just tour for the sake of making money,” considers Steve, sipping on a cup of PG Tips courtesy of our in-flight service. “We wanted to bring these songs to the young fans that haven’t heard them.”
And it’s not this big because you are in fact making this the last hurrah, as some wilder internet rumours would have us all believe?
“No, this is definitely not our last shout at all. The last studio album we did [2006’s A Matter Of Life And Death] we all enjoyed so much that there will definitely be at least one more.”
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What’s so odd about having conversations about the end of Iron Maiden with its founding member is that despite the years of road weariness they’ve each piled up, there’s such a real sense of hunger in the Maiden camp it seems inconceivable to consider a finish line.
“There’s certainly a strong sense of purpose about us at the moment,” agrees Steve. “If I’m honest I think it’s because we really don’t know how long we’re going to carry this on. People have to remember that we don’t just stand there and play,” he sighs, momentarily sounding every one of his 52 years. “An Iron Maiden show is a physically demanding gig for each of us and although we’re all in pretty good nick right now I can’t honestly say that I’ll be able or comfortable attempting to do this in a few years’ time.”
Attempting to navigate away from such horrors as a Maiden-less world, Hammer suggests that there’s a real sense of celebration about this tour too.
“This being a celebration is Bruce’s take on it. For me it’s a little different,” counters Steve. “Our decision to play the entire new album back to back on the last tour justifies us being able to do this greatest hits idea this time around… and we did say a few years back that we were going to flip-flop between new album tours and greatest hits tours from different periods, so it shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone,” adds the bassist testily.
Conversation with ‘Bomber’ Harris is always a little on the guarded side. Even with a beer in his hand at the hotel bar later, his chat is always measured. Steve also never forgets what you’ve said. That’s not to say he’s a killjoy – far from it – but he has found himself in innumerable situations the world over where he’s been surrounded by drunken fools at all hours, so these days you can’t blame him for seeking conversation in more cerebral realms. Escaping a particularly boisterous and amusingly pished Bruce later that evening, Hammer stumbles into Steve having a conversation about predestination, reincarnation and the inevitability (as he sees it) of life after death.
“I used to have very firm views on what I believed in, but once you have kids, it’s amazing how much you start seeing yourself through their eyes. Things I believed I knew to be truths as a young man I’m now not so rash about any more.” And with ‘bar recall’ like that, it’s no wonder Steve has a natural suspicion of journalists. It’s far more upmarket than Bruce’s (albeit entertaining) war stories from when he toured Serbia during the conflicts and was nearly snipered.
Ah yes, it’s about time Bruce Dickinson, singer, pilot, author, movie playwright and producer and all-round architect of all this plane madness made his presence felt…
“When I came up with this crazy idea of the Maiden plane I just thought it’d make a great gimmick that’d grab people by the throat, but it’s succeeded beyond all my wildest dreams – it’s caught on like a wildfire,” laughs the ebullient vocalist.
Catch on? Jesus, that is the understatement of the tour. Channel 9 national news filmed the plane coming into land for their first Australian shows in 15 years, while the Fox Network are booked to come on board and fly with the band for a nationwide special across the USA in a week or so. Fantastico Brazil are on board in two days’ time and that will screen live to six million people, not to mention the live coverage that Sky News India broadcast to some half a billion people across India two weeks prior to this South American jaunt we’re on now. Yeah, you could say that this plane thing has kinda caught the attention of the world’s media. It’s probably the biggest thing in the skies since Concorde.
“The media attention it generates is only part of its worth,” reasons Bruce, who shares his flying duties with two other Aestrus Air pilots. “The plane is incredibly functional and it enables us to get to countries in times we could never have done before. We get to do a huge show every 48 hours and play to everyone who wants to see us. That’s a great feeling.”
And it also makes you look like the kings of the castle somewhat, doesn’t it? Metallica might have a Lear jet but you’ve got a fucking great plane with 12 tons of mayhem locked in the hold.
“I’m not denying there’s a vibe that says this is a band with no fucking limits. If there’s a metal fan on the moon we’ll be going there! It’s fucking marvellous being in Iron Maiden right now. It’s something that we’re all feeling. You can’t beat Iron Maiden right now!”
Is Maiden now at the point where you always wanted it to be?
“I now have a realisation of how big this whole thing can get for sure. But during the planning stages of this tour it never occurred to any of us that it could ever get this big. I used to wonder what we’d do when we hit that plateau that every big band hits where you’re just plugging away doing a couple of nights at Wembley for the new record and another couple of nights there a year later for a greatest hits set and all that bollocks. But luckily we’ve avoided that completely and we’ve tripled the size of our audience in the last five years.”
So why has that happened now?
“We’ve captured people’s imaginations. We’re playing in Costa Rica tomorrow night to a football stadium full of people when we’ve never released a record or done one interview there before. That tells me that Maiden is something that people worldwide just love to be part of.”
At a press conference the day before, Bruce had reacted forcefully against a term used to describe the current tour as a revival in Maiden’s fortunes. Bruce had been adamant that the tour should be seen as a celebration of Maiden’s history and nothing more.
“I hate this ‘revival’ concept. You revive something that’s dead. I just think that celebration is a better description of a Maiden gig. There are so many kids now enjoying what we do that weren’t even born when we did this last time. Iron Maiden is a cross-generational band now and… fuck me, is that Popocatépetl?” exclaims the singer, breaking off mid-sentence to point at a dramatic-looking and very much fume-belching volcano on the plane’s port side. “That still looks like one angry mountain to me… er, what was I saying?”
This tour being a line in the sand, you being bigger than Metallica, U2, the Stones and Jesus all combined etc…
“Ha ha. Technically that’s true, we are bigger than all of them – except Jesus. In some countries I could definitely live with this being the final thing in terms of what we’ve achieved with Iron Maiden but I don’t want to leave it as it is because there is a lot more life left in us yet. But it is important that we stop for a little while after this and really work out how we come back from a tour this significant in order to be able to challenge people’s imaginations again. I think people’s expectations of us are going to be so high it’ll need thinking about properly.”
Now that is telling – a band understanding that something major is happening right now and already making plans to deal with the consequences down the line. It also leads into the question that most bands hate to have asked: knowing what you know now, if you had your chance to do anything differently from your past career, would you?
“No, not a single thing,” comes Bruce’s stock-standard response. “Well, actually… I wouldn’t have recorded an album in a barn for one thing. And I should’ve made one of my solo albums a bit heavier too. And maybe we should have dealt with Clive [Burr, Maiden’s first drummer, sacked due to ‘musical differences’ and a fondness for the odd shandy] a bit differently. But essentially everything we’ve done individually or collectively has shaped us to get to this point now so how can anyone complain?”
“When they first came up with the idea of the plane I thought they were all mad,” smirksAdrian Smith, one third of Iron Maiden’s sizzling ‘triple axe attack’, as one cornball Mexican journo described them at a press conference the previous day. “If the truth be told, I was a bit concerned about the plane because this idea of having all the crew and the band on the same schedule was something I thought impossible to do. Like, how could I stay in bed all day if I had to be on the same plane that got that smelly lot into each city to build my stage on time?” cracks the ever-dry-humoured guitarist.
And then the small matter of your singer flying the plane everywhere…
“Ah, but thankfully he isn’t attempting to fly everywhere, is he? Bruce couldn’t play a gig, have a drink afterwards ’til God-knows-what-time and then check flight charts the next morning – that’d knacker anyone. Bruce picks his moments to let his hair down…” says Adrian, as Bruce amuses himself in a frankly worrying way with a rubber airplane he’s picked up from a fan. The glee with which Bruce is launching said toy to test its aerodynamics would be understandable if it wasn’t for the gonzo way he cackles every time it crashes down onto the gangway of our real plane. Still, it’s a good way to see different places though, isn’t it, Adrian? We’re desperate to take our minds off Bruce’s unsettling antics.
“It would be if we had half-reasonable schedules,” he quips back nonchalantly, by now immune to Bruce’s wind-ups. “There just isn’t enough time to see anywhere, which is a shame and the crew are fucking knackered, if I’m honest.
“The shows have been wonderful, though. It’s been really excellent playing some of that old stuff again.”
Does it seem weird thinking about the years between now and the last time you played Moonchild back in 1989? After all, you left the band following that tour…
“There isn’t much I regret in terms of the decision I made,” answers a deeply thoughtful Adrian. “Maybe if it were possible for me to have had a conversation with my younger self at a few crucial times then maybe I wouldn’t have done certain things in terms of leaving the band. That said, I knew I needed to leave because I was burned out and I needed a break. It was seven years non-stop and I’d lost my identity for too long. I was enduring one hangover after another and surviving a gig is something you can do as a young man but you just can’t as you get older. Now I’m enjoying every moment that comes my way.”
Someone else enjoying every moment is Nicko and, even though he’s the most senior in years of all the Maidenites, his infectious energy radiates warmth and speaks volumes of his passion for the Maiden cause.
“Sometimes I do feel that we have become living legends… that we do carry a weight of expectation from crowds worldwide. But that’s OK – we love it! I’d like us to be remembered for our truth and the integrity of our music.”
A handy round of Jack’n’Cokes are laid on from the Aestrus staff, the female contingent of whom are clearly being baited (make that ‘stalked’ in some cases) by the, er, boisterous male attentions of the tour crew. But mid-way down the plane, sat next to his old mucker Dave Murray, you will find the sandy-haired barnet of Janick Gers with his head buried firmly in a book and probably contemplating running another of his much-loved half-marathons. It seems appropriate to ask the one Maidenite who joined the band post-80s (just!) what he thinks about the songs that defined the band and his role in now bringing them all to life in this set.
“I’ve actually played most of them before, as part of the Ed Hunter tour, which we did when Bruce came back in the band [1999]” says the earnest guitarist. “We’re not parodying ourselves with this setlist; we’re not pretending that we’re back in the 80s or anything. But it’s great to be able to play some of these songs that haven’t been heard in 20 years, songs that still feel as powerful and as exciting as they did 20 years ago because that shows the vitality that this band has.”
Do you feel that you’ve really achieved a personal moment of real satisfaction seeing the band reclaim that aura of invulnerability from that 80s’ period, especially after the low points of the mid-90s with the Blaze era?
“You know what? If you’re the type of people like we are then you move your goalposts. You refer to the Blaze era like it’s a down period, but I can tell you, as musicians at that time we were really cooking.”
Dave Murray has been quiet up until now. In fact, Dave Murray has been quiet for much of his 30-year tenure in Iron Maiden. But as the one bandmember to have been stood alongside Steve in the pubs and featured on every recording the band have ever made, Dave does have some unique perspective on the journey from pub to stadium.
“When we first started playing Costa Rica, Columbia and Puerto Rico were specks on a map to me,” chuckles the soft-spoken guitarist, his trademark grin seemingly etched into his features. “We had a moment the other day looking at the plane on the tarmac at LAX Airport with a sold-out LA Forum behind us, when I think I said to him, ‘It sure beats the crappy Fiat 500 we used to use to take the gear down to the Cart ’n’ Horses in, doesn’t it?!’”
Descending at an almighty rate, Costa Rica emerges from the primordial clouds: all rocky outcrops, misty mountains and hidden jungle-covered valleys topped off with another sodding great volcano spewing out acrid fumes. Ed Force One makes a sharp bank to the left and drops the remaining 10,000 feet in a matter of minutes. As the plane touches down there is a cheer from the road crew and our escape from Mexico is complete. Ivan the Terrible pops his head out from the cockpit to inform us that the VIPs need to be ready to move as soon as the side doors are open as there are “several hundred nutters” on the runway surrounding the plane. He ain’t kidding! Either fluoro jackets and ear defenders are the in-thing for the Costa Rica fashionistas this season or every man, woman, child, dog and parrot of Costa Rica is already on the tarmac waving wildly at Ed Force One. Two mini-vans pull up and there’s a knock on the cabin door. “Welcome to Costa Rica, Aye-ron May-don,” says a beaming young official. “Please be signing this?” he enquires hopefully, waving a copy of Number Of The Beast. “First, we get off the plane then we be signing things!” barks Rod Smallwood, Maiden’s manager.
Outside, the terminal is mental: crew kit bags and mountains of filming equipment are everywhere piled 10 high as 40 roadies are herded through customs and into a glass tunnel-come-waiting area surrounded by wide-eyed fans. Ever wondered what a goldfish feels like? Try standing in an airport terminal surrounded on three sides by a quarter-inch of glass separating you from 400 Maiden-crazy fans watching every breath, scratch and nervous bead of sweat.
Like any country starved of decent-quality rock’n’roll, Costa Rica has seized the opportunity to party and has embraced the band like national heroes. Kids have been camping outside the venue for four days.
When the band and Hammer arrive under police escort, having navigated a mixture of barely lit barrio back streets and super-modern state-of-the-art highways, the national stadium is reaching fever-pitch.
The show is like Mexico’s – breathtaking in its delivery of the classics as each number propels the feeling of the last and takes you higher into heavy metal nirvana. Clearly the Costa Ricans feel the same way, for as Bruce remarks from the stage, “25,000 Costa Ricans make twice as much noise as 50,000 Mexicans!”.
The next day, Hammer is setting off back to Blighty while Ed Force One marches onto the more intimidating climes of Columbia. Yet even in the soulless confines of the airport terminal, a little Iron Maiden goes a long way. Hammer notices a buzz building as a constant flow of people gather at one of the main windows, all pointing and making frantic grabs for cameras. Peeking over the top of the melee we can see Ed Force One lining up on the runway, engines revving and the unmistakable visage of a mummified Eddie leering back. As the plane accelerates down the tarmac, a spontaneous applause starts to echo around the terminal followed by a huge roar of approval. In a rare moment of splendid celestial co-incidence, every TV monitor in the entire airport, which is currently showing last night’s news, has cut to live footage of Maiden onstage playing Number Of The Beast and Ed Force One’s nose lifts up and into the South American skies.
‘Iron Maiden’s gonna get ya, no matter how far’? You can bet your arse they will come
Originally published in Metal Hammer issue 180, Jun 2008
