As of 2025, Iron Maiden have officially been a band for half a century. And what a half-century it's been. From their early years helping to popularise the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal to becoming all-round breakout stars of metal in the 80s with a string of genre defining albums including Number Of The Beast, Powerslave and Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son, Maiden set the template for what it meant to be a truly massive metal band.
There have triumphs and trials aplenty, but with the band officially commemorating their 50th birthday in 2025 with the massive Run For Your Lives tour, we've assembled the 50 greatest moments that have defined Iron Maiden.
1. The birth of Iron Maiden
Steve Harris can’t recall when he had the idea for the band that would become Iron Maiden, but he remembers coming up with the moniker over Christmas 1975. “Even my mum thought it was a great name,” he told Hammer’s sister magazine, Classic Rock. They played their first gig on May 1, 1976 at St. Nicholas Church Hall in Poplar, East London. According to original guitarist Terry Rance: “Half the audience were nuns.”
2. Eddie makes his debut
Maiden’s earliest attempt at high-tech stage presentation, 1978-style, was a Kabuki-type mask suspended above the drums, with a fish tank water pump connected to its mouth. During the final song, this proto-Eddie ghoul discharged fake blood all over drummer Doug Sampson. He wasn’t happy. Everyone else was.
3. Di'Anno gets nicked before his first show
Ever had a bad first day on the job? Spare a thought for roguish singer Paul Di’Anno, who was arrested shortly before his very first Iron Maiden gig when police discovered a knife in his bag – a tool of his trade reconditioning oil drums.
“They did me for having an offensive weapon,” he told Metal Hammer in 2024. “Steve ended up singing most of the gig. I made it back in time for the last song.”
4. The gig that made Maiden
Maiden had worked up a buzz on the London pub circuit, but it was a show on May 8, 1979 at the Music Machine in Camden, sandwiched between Angel Witch and headliners Samson, that announced their impending greatness.
“I thought, ‘There’s something going on with this band, I think they’re going to be big,’” said Samson’s singer, one Bruce Dickinson. He wasn’t wrong.
5. Taking on Top Of The Pops... And winning
Iron Maiden were invited to perform their debut single, Running Free, on legendary TV show Top Of The Pops in 1980. There was just one condition: they had to mime. Naturally, Steve Harris was having none of it.
“I thought, ‘Bollocks to them, what have they ever done for me?” the bassist told Classic Rock. Maiden’s stubbornness won out. The BBC backed down and the band turned in a classic performance – live, of course
6. Exit Di'Anno, Enter Dickinson
Paul Di’Anno was a key part of Maiden’s success, but his card was marked by his penchant for partying. The band had already lined up Samson singer Bruce Dickinson as his replacement before they’d fired Paul, trying him out in secret. An audition tape, featuring Bruce singing Killers, Twilight Zone and Wrathchild, is on the internet. The words ‘no’ and ‘brainer’ spring to mind.
7. The curse of the beast
The recording of The Number Of The Beast album was reputedly cursed. Studio lights would randomly flicker on and off, and, when producer Martin Birch’s Range Rover allegedly collided with a minibus full of nuns as he was driving home on a dark and stormy Sunday evening, the mechanic’s bill came to £666.
“Martin was so freaked out that he insisted the garage charge him £667,” recalls Steve Harris.
8. Aces Pie
In 1982, anarchic Saturday morning kids’ TV show TISWAS interviewed “some heavy metallic persons” – namely Steve, Bruce and drummer Clive Burr, seated among an audience of fidgety children.
It was all very earnest, until a man dressed as then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (“another iron maiden”) whipped out some custard pies and began pelting the band with them. Because why not?
9. Mission From 'Arry
At a gig in Allentown, Pennsylvania in 1983, a heated onstage argument between Steve Harris and Nicko McBrain spilled backstage.
Luckily, Bruce sneakily recorded the expletive-laden ding-dong on his Walkman, prompting an irate Nicko to chase him down a corridor when he clocked it. Released as Mission From ’Arry, a B-side on 1984’s 2 Minutes To Midnight single, the squabble was pure comedy gold.
10. Maiden become a wedding band
Newlyweds Piotr Żmudziński and Dorota Nawrocka must have wondered what the hell was happening when Iron Maiden took to the stage at their wedding reception on August 11, 1984. The band had just played a show at Hala Arena in the Polish city of Poznań and, thirsty for a drink, had headed into town… accidentally rocking up at the club where the happy couple were celebrating their nuptials.
“We were asked if we would like to have a jam,” Nicko remembered. “We thought to ourselves, ‘Why not?’” The wedding band drummer was worried about his kit getting trashed, but Piotr and Dorota couldn’t have been happier about the situation.
“For many years, after we told someone that Iron Maiden played at our wedding, people were sarcastically answering that at their wedding there were The Beatles or Pink Floyd,” Piotr later recalled.
11. The cheese shop incident
The World Slavery tour was an epic, 11-month slog, but the band were starting to unravel just a handful of dates in. At a gig in Arma Di Taggia, Italy, on August 22, 1984, Bruce decided to change the lyrics to 22 Acacia Avenue.
Grubby lyrics about visiting a prostitute were transformed into a song about… a cheese shop?! “If you’re waiting for a long time / For the rest to buy their cheese,” sings Bruce, piling on the cheddar and Stilton-based puns. Terrible, but you gouda laugh.
12. Rock In Rio
On January 11, 1985, the World Slavery tour took a detour to Brazil, when Maiden appeared at the gigantic Rock In Rio festival, second on the bill to Queen.
An eventful set saw a furious Bruce accidentally splitting his head open on a guitar in front of 350,000 people (and a TV audience in the millions). Blood poured down his face. Metal had landed in South America, and Maiden’s hero status on the continent was sealed.
13. The Lucozade Advert
It’s 1985. Mum’s watching Coronation Street. Yawn. Suddenly, during the ad break, Phantom Of The Opera comes blaring out the telly as 80s Olympic hero Daley Thompson glugs a bottle of syrupy glucose drink Lucozade and legs it in slo-mo around a running track to the sound of the 1980 Maiden classic.
Several million viewers are unexpectedly electrified, and a new audience cops an earful of those irresistible triplets.
14. "Scream for me, Long Beach!"
1985’s monumental Live After Death album is home to one of the most iconic stage cries in history. “Scream for me, Long Beach!” yells Bruce at several points, a reference to Long Beach Arena, where the album was partly recorded.
This clarion call instantly went down in Maiden history – today, no Iron Maiden show is complete without the singer exhorting: “Scream for me, [insert place name here].”
15. Trolling German TV viewers
Maiden’s ‘no miming!’ edict (see entry No.5) had clearly fallen by the wayside when they appeared on German TV show P.I.T. in 1986 to perform their new single, Wasted Years.
As the music played, the (possibly ‘refreshed’) bandmembers started swapping instruments, with Steve Harris and Nicko McBrain deciding they both wanted a go at ‘singing’. Chaos? Ja!
16. Somewhere In Time's artwork
Choosing the best Maiden cover is like a parent trying to pick their favourite child. But when it comes to pure nerd-bait, the winner has to be Derek Riggs’s phenomenal Eddie-as-futuristic-bounty-hunter artwork for 1986’s Somewhere In Time. It’s packed with Easter Eggs and in-jokes. We’ve counted 32. Any advance on that?
17. Nicko on the Sooty Show
It was the ultimate drum battle: the mighty Nicko McBrain versus an orange glove puppet. In 1988, the Maiden man appeared on kids’ TV staple The Sooty Show, where he went stick-to-stick with the titular bear.
“I lost - he’s pretty sharp,” said Nicko, who subsequently paid tribute to his nemesis by featuring Sooty on his drum kit at shows.
18. Something completely different
“Monty Python is in your childhood DNA,” Bruce once declared. Indeed, we all know how much the band love Python (Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life, anyone?) and they were delighted when Python movie editor Julian Doyle recruited Python’s Graham Chapman for 1988’s Can I Play With Madness video. Suitably surreal, it saw Graham fall into a cave and meet Eddie in a freezer.
19. Monsters Of Rock '88
Headlining a bill that included Kiss, David Lee Roth, Megadeth and Guns N’ Roses, Maiden drew around 107,000 people to the 1988 edition of the Monsters Of Rock festival. The record still stands, but the day will forever be remembered for the tragic deaths of two fans who were killed in the crush during GN’R’s set.
20. Bruce goes to paradise
Short-lived BBC drama The Paradise Club is largely forgotten… by everyone except Maiden fanatics. Bruce dominated one 1990 episode as a hot-headed rock singer embroiled in shady showbiz shenanigans (alongside a pouting, pre-Maiden Janick Gers), delivering such hilariously clunky gems of sanitised street philosophy as “Life’s crap then you die.”
21. Hitting No. 1
No Prayer For The Dying is no one’s favourite Maiden album, but it did contain Bring Your Daughter… To The Slaughter.
Originally a brilliantly schlocky Bruce Dickinson solo song, it was released as a single at the end of 1990 and promptly knocked poor old Cliff Richard’s Saviour’s Day off No.1. It’s still the only Maiden single to reach the top spot.
22. The Metallica 'tribute'
Metallica paid homage to Maiden with a cheeky, out-of-tune snippet of Run To The Hills on 1987’s $5.98 EP. Maiden returned the favour on their 1992 cover of Montrose’s 70s rock staple Space Station No.5.
As the song speeds up at the end, you can just about hear Bruce say, “It’s getting faster, lads! Hurry up! Here comes Metallica in the rear-view mirror!” For some reason, he then pretends he’s a horse racing announcer: “At the finish it’s Prick, followed by The Wanker…”
23. An early taste of the six-man line-up
Maiden’s six-man, triple-axe line-up got its first rehearsal seven years early, storming Donington ’92 in front of almost 80,000 fans. Two years after leaving the band, guitarist Adrian Smith rejoined his bandmates to give set closer Running Free a euphoric but poignant extra emotional punch.
24. Bruce's 'final' show
When Bruce left Iron Maiden in August 1993, he went out in the most OTT way possible – with a live show filmed at Pinewood Studios, featuring magician Simon Drake. It culminated in the latter impaling Bruce inside an actual Iron Maiden, before Eddie mounted the singer’s decapitated head on a spike. Of course, there was absolutely no way Bruce could come back after that. Cough.
25. The Blaze years
Let’s show a little love for Maiden’s most-underappreciated era. When diehard Maiden fan Blaze Bayley replaced Bruce Dickinson, he said joining the band was like being Dorothy in The Wizard Of Oz, prompting Bruce to sweetly send him a couple of yellow bricks (as in the Follow The Yellow Brick Road song from the movie).
Let’s not forget that Blaze helped keep the band going during the toughest time in their history – the fact he had some enormous shoes to fill was hardly his fault.
