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Right in the middle of 1975. Steve Harris (b. 12 March 1957, Leytonstone, London, England; bass) set up a band with Hard Rock influences. He called it Iron Maiden.

The heavy metal scene of the late 70s was widely regarded as stagnant, with only a handful of bands proving their ability to survive and produce music of quality. It was at this time that a new breed of young British bands began to emerge. This movement, which began to break cover in 1979 and 1980, was known as the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal, or N.W.O.B.*.M.. Iron Maiden were one of the foremost bands in the genre, and many would say its definitive example. Younger and meaner, the N.W.O.B.*.M. bands dealt in faster, more energetic heavy metal than any of their forefathers (punk being an obvious influence).

Steve Harris
There were several line-up changes in the Iron Maiden ranks in the very early days. They tried Dennis Wilcock (Steve's ex-band singer: Smiler)… it was Dennis who recommended Dave Murray (b. 23 December 1958, London, England; guitar) to join them but was fired soon after he had clash with Dennis. But was soon brought back (thank god!!!) which led to Dennis leaving the band. In the mean time Dave had joined a band called Urchin' which had another guitarist Adrain Smith. Dave and Adrian have been friends since they were born. (hang on guys … sounds something is cooking)
Back to 76, Steve still thought that Dave had to play in Iron Maiden. So he went to see the "Urchin" act. Harris convinced Dave to join Maiden again. It motivated the exit of Wilcock and Thunderstick (drummer). They were replaced by Doug Samson (drums) and Paul Di'Anno (vocals).
The first Iron Maiden concert was at the pub "The Cart & Horses", in Stratford, London. At the beginning of 1979, Dave gave a recording tape, which had songs like "Strange World", "Iron Maiden", "Invasion" and "Prowler", to Neil Kay, a known disk jockey specialist in hard rock. He was very surprised with the band's musical quality.
Doug Samson left the band, because he had health problems. Clive Burr replaced him. Clive was a young drummer with a great talent and he was very wished by the others bands to play with them.
Iron Maiden's first work was the Demo Tapes. The songs were edited at the independent "Rock Hard Records". These known tapes were called "The Soundhouse Tapes". EMI put Maiden on air on 21/02/80 playing "alive" at the the "Top Of The Pop's". They played the song "Running Free". The mini concert was transmitted by the BBC channel. Finally, the Iron Maiden released their first LP, "Iron Maiden", on 14/04/80. Will Malome were the producer. This album is considered a classic in the Heavy Metal genre.

Dave Murray
Dennis was fired by the band. The official reasons say that he wanted to change the Maiden's musical genre: Heavy Metal. Although he told in an interview that he had a fight with Rod about personals problems. Adrian Smith replaced him. He has a long career playing with Maiden.
The name Eddie The Head appeared from a joke which was very known in the London's East End at the time. It said: a woman gave birth to a boy very healthy, but he had a problem, he was only a head! The doctor said to the mother not to preocupate because in five years her son will have his whole body grown. Five years had passed by, so the Eddie's father entered his room and said: "Son, today is a very important day, it is your birthday and I brought you a present". Eddie's answer: "Oh no, another hat!" Riggs decided to create Eddie's full body. It appeared for the first time on the first Iron Maiden's single called "Running Free". I think that Eddie is the most legendary metallic monster of all times!
In 1981, the band released Killers with this line up. After that they went on a world tou, where they played around 125 concerts around Europe, Australia, USA & Japan. At the same year on May, Maiden edited their first official video, "Live At The Rainbow" which had 30 minutes total playing.
Paul Di'Anno was kicked out on autumn. The principal reason was the excessive consume of cigarette, drinks and he didn't take care of his voice. So concerts had been cancelled. The band fired Paul. That was a difficult decision because he was an important key for the Maiden's success.
So Bruce Dickinson (b. Paul Bruce Dickinson, 7 August 1958, Worksop, Nottinghamshire, England), joined Maiden on September. He has sung in a band called Samson before joining Iron Maiden. The band calls him Bruce "air ride siren" Dickinson. He had many auditions and one of them was his opening in Holland. Bruce's career as Maiden's singer was/is very long and too much productive.

"666 The Number Of The Beast". Yes, we're in 1982. Iron Maiden recorded their third LP called "The Number Of The Beast". Maybe it is the best Maiden's album. Derek Riggs painted Eddie in a diabolic way, reflecting on songs like "Hallowed Be Thy Name" and "Children Of The Damned". This album won the first place on the
Bruce Dickinson
British band's albums chart and two singles were in TOP 20 in England. While releasing this album, the band introduced its self at the American market. The World Tour took them to play about 180 concerts in Europe, Japan and USA during ten months.
Clive Burr left the band. There were many reasons. He was saturated by the hard living on the road and his relations with Steve Harris weren't very good. "All that I can say is that the time which I played in the Iron Maiden were very amusing. I don't have any complaint about it. The band was the right thing at the right moment" Affirmed Clive Burr. He was substituted by Nicko McBrain in 1983.
On May in the same year, Iron Maiden released one of their master-pieces "Piece Of Mind". This album received bad and good criticisms. It won the third place in albums chart, It was produced by Martin Birch. Again a world tour of about 180 concerts was under way. In this tour, Eddie appeared as a giant monster that walked through the stage. In this album Nicko made his mark through the drum solo intro on the opening song of the album 'Where Eagles dare'.
After a shortly rest, the band released their fifth LP, "Powerslave". This album contains classics songs like "Aces High" and "2 Minutes To Midnight". The "World Slavery Tour" was the biggest Iron Maiden's digression. It was about 300 concerts during 13 months in 8 countries. "It was an interesting experience, but we will never repeat it.", said Steve Harris. They played at a Brazilian's rock festival called "Rock In Rio", Hammersmith Odeon in London and Long Beach Arena in Los Angeles
where were recorded their first live album "Live After Death".

After some rest the band was back in action with next LP, "Somewhere In Time" in 1986. On the album's cover, Eddie appears as a forthcoming warrior. On the cover's back, inside the CD case, there's a very curious place. Derek Riggs painted the "Rusking Arms", a Bar called "Long Beach Arena", the "Rainbow", the "Ancient Mariner seafood restaurant", the "Phantom Opera House", the "Marquee Club", a movie called "Live After Death", and the clock shows "23:58". Guitars' synth were used in this album. Between this and the next album, the band realized their fourth official video called "12 Wasted Years". This video shows a band's historical material. It shows images from concerts in Rusking Arms, Marquee, a short interview with Neil Kay (the person who "discovered" the band) and other people. After the "Somewhere On Tour", the band took six months to rest. When they got back, realized their seventh album, "Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son" which were produced by Martin Birch. "The album is about
a complete history from the beginning to the end, that relates the visions from a kind of clairvoyant, Doris Stones, who announced his own death and at the end he gets insane." said Bruce. This is the principal idea that the song "The Clairvoyant" was written about.
In this album was used keyboards rather than guitars' synth that were used in "Somewhere In Time". "We didn't need a keyboard player. Adrian, Steve, an engineer or anyone that was able to play it", said Bruce. While playing alive, the band could count on Michael Kenney playing the keyboards. The concerts all over the world had the stage very decorated according to the album's cover. Derek Riggs painted seven Eddies.
In this year (1988), the Iron Maiden has reached their highest mark, they were the top band playing in Donington Castle. The band played for over 1,07,000 fans. "I was wondered while we were testing the equipment and I realized: S**t, this is serious!", said Dave Murray. Donington was the last outing with Adrian.

The band decided to take a year to rest. Each one dedicated for differents projects. Bruce Dickinson set up a band and release an album called "Tattooed Millionaire" and started to sing in a digression. He and his band played in England and USA. Adrian set up a band too, called A.S.A.P. The Iron Maiden's end was approaching.

The band returned to the studios to start the rehearsals to record their next album. But Adrian wasn't liking the new album's direction. He preferred to play in A.S.A.P. So he left the band, but he had already recorded the song "The Assassin"'s base rhythm.

Adrian was substituted by Janick Gers. He had been known by Maiden for a time. The band knew that he was a Maiden songs' fan. So he had a very short a audition. Steve Harris told Janick to learn how to play the songs "The Trooper", "Iron Maiden", "The Prisoner" and "Children Of The Damned" for the audition, but while Janick was playing the first chords from "The Trooper", Steve realized that he could be the new band's member. He and Dave soon became good fellows. Interesting scene had took place while approaching Janick, when Janick was approached to replace Adrain, he in turn went to Adrain & tried to convince him to return to the band….. That takes some spirit to do that … who's gonna look at an offer to play with one of the best rock acts ever to play with them???? … not me definitely … anyways I'm not that great as Janick to even think of that.
The band started to record the new album at Steve's "House". The new album was called "No Prayer For The Dying". It was a great album which had two great singles "Holy Smoke" and "Tailgunner". The songs in this album became more aggressive than the others Maiden's albums. Another great single was "Bring Your Daughter... To The Slaughter" that was composed by Bruce based on a movie called "Nightmare on Elm Street V". It was also Janick's maiden composition with Maiden.
The band started their new digression. They played in shorter stages. The Maiden's World Tour's support band was "Wolfsbane" that the singer was Blaze Bayley. The new digression's stages were very short, the only things that could be seen on it were the "Marshalls" and the Nicko's drums.
Janick Gers

After the "No Prayer On Tour", they took a relative rest. In 1992 the band released their new album called "Fear Of The Dark". At the same year, they were the TOP BAND to play in Donington Castle again. It was released an album and a video called "Live At Donington" which shows the full Maiden's concert. The album "Fear Of The Dark" was recorded at Steve's "garret". It was produced by Martin Birch and co-produced by Steve Harris. When the band played the song "Running Free" in Donington Castle, Adrian Smith joined the band and played it alive. Everyone was surprised. But it was just a small collaboration by Adrian.

In the beginning of 1993, Bruce left the band. All the fans as well the band became surprised. "I want to concentrate on my solo career as a singer, as a writer and dedicate more time to my family", said Bruce.

A Staggering amount of Demo tapes …..4959 tapes (!), which contained songs sang by Paul Di'Anno, Michael Kiske, Joey Belladona (Anthrax), a guy called Blaze Bayley and others, had been sent to Maiden's office. The band tried to choose the best one. At last it was confirmed the Bruce's successor, "Blaze Bayley" which has sung in the band called "Wolfsbane".

In 1995, the band released their next album "The X Factor" that was a polemical album for some people. In 1998, they released their next album called "Virtual XI". In the same year it was released a PC Game called "Ed Hunter" which the principal objective was to KILL all the enemies. (I do like the albums "The X Factor" and "Virtual XI")

The two Maiden's album sang by Blaze were very rejected by the fans. A lot of fans didn't buy them. So Blaze was kicked out. Steve Harris called Bruce and Adrian back to Iron Maiden. "Iron Maiden is my home" said Bruce.

In the year (2000) Maiden released their new album called "Brave New World" which was produced by Kevin Shirley and co-produced by Steve Harris. This is a very good album of the pure Iron Maiden's Heavy Metal. They started the new World Tour. They had played in many countries and finished the tour playing in Brazil. It was the "Rock In Rio 3". A big Rock festival. Iron Maiden played in the first festival (1985), and it was the biggest crowd that Maiden have ever played to (more than 200.000 metal fans).
Last year the Band released Dance of Death with three guitarists in action. It's like having best of both worlds!!!! Hope we have some more from the band …. We humans can never stop getting greedy … can we … we always want more!!!!
Anyways
Up the Irons !!!!
Chinmaya Chirputkar
(chinferno24@hotmail.com)

www.drummingworld.com