SCREAM FOR ME LONG BEACH!!!!!
What? Sorry Bruce, I didn’t quite get that…
SCREAM FOR ME LONG BEACH!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is Metal Year Zero for me. This is the record that shifted my listening from the pop / glam metal I thought was heavy to “real” metal. As hardcore as they seemed to me at the time, even Guns `n’ Roses sounded weedy next to this. I don’t remember what it was exactly that grabbed me at first listen, but whatever it was, it still has hold of me now.
I got a recording of this from one of my cousins. (I can’t remember which of the Glynns it was) I don’t know why they even had it, they weren’t metal fans, but I’m very glad they did. I have no idea what my musical life would look like now without it, but I remember I had a copy of it on a gold maxwell C90 and I played it till it broke. (I will not be translating that sentence for the younger members of the audience.)
Picking Life After Death almost feels like a cheat. This is effectively a live, best of album, covering one of the greatest album runs of all time, and it just doesn’t feel fair to other bands to compare them. But fuck each and every one of those bands. If they had written a string of albums as strong as the run from Iron Maiden to Powerslave, I’d be talking about them here and not Maiden. There’s a very strong argument to be made that this is the best live album of all time.
Just look at the track list on this record. There isn’t one duff song on here, and that opening one two of Aces High into Two Minutes to Midnight must have actually, literally, melted the faces of the front few rows of the audience that night. Even if that was the peak of this album, it would be impressive, but it’s just all time great song after all time great songs one after another.
The Rhyme of the Ancient Marriner is still my favourite Maiden song and this version is so much fun. Rhyme is probably the high point of adapting your source material and making it soar, because It can’t be easy to take on a poem like this and elevate it rather than just embarrass everyone involved. It’s the song all other long songs should be compared to. Do you do enough to earn your runtime as Mariner? If not, get stuffed.
And if singing songs about Samuel Taylor Coleridge poems sounds po faced, the stage banter never is, introducing The Rhyme of the Ancient Marriner by saying “This is what not to do if a bird shits on you” is still one of my favourite, and most ridiculous song intros of all time.
It was Hallowed be thy Name that was the song that really caught me first though. That slow building first section has so much dread, with the bell chimes tolling before that trademark Iron Maiden gallop kicks in. It’s a great showcase for Bruce and the speeded up pace really suits it live
On the older material you can see why some of the fans didn’t like the change from Di’anno. Bruce may be able to really hit those high notes, but he hasn’t got the grit in his voice and the older songs lose a little because of it. That’s the only criticism I have here though, and it’s not enough to stop this album from being one the high points of British heavy metal, showcasing what a beast Maiden were at the peak of their career.
https://lynkify.in/song/rime-of-the-ancient-mariner-live-at-long-beach-arena-2015-remaster/C78LFDPZ
The ways of exile 