Review by Shawn Perry
Live Photos by John McMurtrie
Look in the sky…it’s a bird…it’s a plane…it’s Iron Maiden. Indeed, the British metal band’s arrival aboard their own ‘Ed Force One’ 747 tour jet was reminiscent of the Beatles when they touched down at JFK airport in 1964. Granted, there wasn’t a press conference or thousands of anxious, prepubescent fans waiting on the tarmac to greet the band when the jet, commandeered by lead singer Bruce Dickinson, landed. But its presence at LAX elicited a surge of excitement for fans around the Southland. It meant that Iron Maiden was in town and, in their own take-no-prisoners fashion, ready to set up shop for two days of heavy metal madness.
The two-day stand at the Forum closed out the U.S. wing of The Book Of Souls world tour, before the band jetted off to Tokyo. Somehow LA is either at the beginning or tail end of a tour, but the gigs at the Forum carried a special buzz. There were the legions of fans, more than most wearing black Iron Maiden T-shirts, arriving early, tail-gating, perhaps enjoying a pint or three of Trooper beer, maybe gabbing with Stew from KLOS, and, in general, getting psyched for one of the top three most important heavy metal bands out of the UK — the other two being Black Sabbath and Judas Priest.
As far as I’m concerned, all the other so-called “metal” bands pretty much emulate those three in one way or another. I like Black Sabbath because they started it and I grew up with them; Judas Priest because they refined it; and Iron Maiden because they layer it up with a progressive attack too hard and heavy to outgrow. Hard to believe, all three are currently active in some form or another as we speak. What’s even harder to believe, especially if you were brought up on the heavy metal of the 70s (even though it was rarely and mistakenly identified as such), is that Iron Maiden, really part of the fabled late 70s New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM) movement, may well be the mightiest of all.
Maiden has passed through Southern California innumerable times, but this was only my third time seeing them (for shame). The other two were on August 10, 2012 at Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre (in the pit, no less), and then my first time during their infamous four-night run (I don’t remember which night) at the Long Beach Arena in 1985.
Over the course of so many years in the 20th century, Maiden went through many highs and lows. Then Bruce Dickinson and Adrian Smith returned to the fold in 1999, and their popularity soared, with legions of new and old fans basking in their signature three-ax attack from Smith, Dave Murray and Janick Gers. When you throw in Nicko McBrain’s pile-driving drum assault, Steve Harris’ relentless bass work, and Dickinson’s boundless energy and stage presence, the ingredients mesh, coalesce and blend together to create a chugging, metal machine ready to take down anything in its path. An assortment of visual aides, pyrotechnics and various incarnations of Eddie the Head give the whole thing a bigger-than-big effect.
The diehards who filled the open floor of the Forum added to the spectacle. They slowly filled in as the opening band, The Raven Age, featuring Steve Harris’ son George on guitar, warmed up the masses. Between sets, the floor started to rumble. UFO’s “Doctor Doctor” came up over the PA, and you’d have thought UFO was on stage playing as multiple fists pumped through the air. The lights came down afterwards, and the stage with its fortress-like arrangement became the focal point, with Dickinson wearing a hoodie and shrouded in a spotlight before a cauldron of dry ice, reciting the lyrics to “If Eternity Should Fail,” the first song from The Book Of Souls.
The word on the street was that the band was playing a lot of the material from The Book Of Souls, and that certainly was the case for the first few tracks until they got to “The Trooper.” Dickinson came out in a red coat, pacing the walls of the fortress, waving a British flag and bellowing the lyrics, “You’ll take my life but I’ll take yours too…” before the guitars solos came tumbling forth, precisely executed as the room, like a battlefield under siege, erupted into a spitfire of synergy.
The band and their audience melded into a cold-fusion centrifuge ready to explode on impact. All you could do is stand back and watch the fireworks. In the world of Iron Maiden, visions of war, death, destruction and even history pop up from time to time — at the Forum, even Winston Churchill made his presence known.
Before “The Book of Souls,” Dickinson pontificated on the Maya civilization, mentioning how empires like it never survive (wink, wink). “A life that’s full of all the wealth and riches,” he sang, “can never last for an eternity…” Harris, Smith and Murray held steady, Gers playfully hoisted his guitar up high, fire spit out from their pillars, a high-power jam ensued, and Eddie, dressed as an Apocalyptic Mayan warrior, engaged with Dickinson. The singer pulled Eddie’s heart out and held it before the Forum crowd. Somehow, without his heart, Eddie exited the stage and the band brought it home.
The bells guided “Hallowed Be Thy Name” until the song opened up as Harris, Smith, Murray and Gers each took turns fueling the fire before McBrain delivered the crushing blow. The audience was locked and loaded, mutterings of “Maiden” and “Up The Irons” kept the action on pace. They chanted the chorus on “Fear Of The Dark” and then surged forward and the number let loose. A three-song encore of “The Number Of The Beast,” “Blood Brothers” and “Wasted Years” brought the night to a rousing conclusion. Monty Python’s “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life” faded in as the house lights came up aqnd the faithful filed out of the building and spilled into the parking lot.
If you came to the Forum tonight expecting to hear “2 Minutes To Midnight” or “Run To The Hills,” you would have been sorely disappointed. Other bands stick strictly to the hits and staples — even when they have new music to shill — but Iron Maiden sticks with the business of making new records and touring behind them, even playing a fair portion of new material live — a risky move, almost a big no-no, for any other band with a vintage legacy. Defying convention at every turn, doing it their own way, totally self-sufficient and self-contained enough to own their own plane that carries the band, the crew and all their gear — this is how a rock and roll band survives in the trenches of today’s merry-go-round of musical hopscotch.
