Iron Maiden News, Links, and Interviews

GhostofCain said:
blabbermouth.net

BRUCE DICKINSON Explains Why There Is A Lack Of New Rock And Metal Bands Who Are Able To Ascend To Arena-Level Status

In a new interview with Sweden's Bandit Rock radio station, IRON MAIDEN singer Bruce Dickinson spoke about the lack of rock and metal bands who are able to ascend to an arena-level status to take the place of METALLICA, IRON MAIDEN and JUDAS PRIEST upon their retirement. He said (as transcribed...
blabbermouth.net blabbermouth.net

Who will be the headliners of the future? Can you see any band reaching Maiden’s status at any point in the next few years?
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I don't see any band reaching Maiden or Metallica status. Promoters and many tickets companies are destroying the business.
 
Well just like with rock music, when Maiden, Rammstein and Metallica retires there will no be stadium metal bands. I dont think we can blame anybody for that.

I think that we can be happy with status of metal music today because just remember how it was in late 90's - early 00'. Metal was dead, only nu-metal was there.
My prediciton for future are:

Biggest arena shows (15-20k)
-Slipknot
-Tool
-Sabaton
-Nightwish
-Powerwolf
-Gojira
-Mastodon
-Lamb of God
-Epic
RATM, SOAD & Pantera (if they release new music)

Midsize venues (8-12k)
-Alestorm
-Gloryhammer
-Jinjer
-Babymetal
-BiB

Smaller venues (5k)
-Haken
-Windrose

Maybe I missed out some bands but this is only my prediction what I observe how those bands are growing and making they way up to top. Some of those predictions seems unrealistic but with heavy promotion and co-headling tour anything is possible.

Biggest problem is that most of those bands have agressive and growling vocals which is not very attractive to ordinary music fans. And some bands are more like a show event other than quality music experience.
 
There isn't enough infrastructure for bands to rise to the levels of artists like Metallica and Iron Maiden. Rock bands that do make a big impact often have a shelf life and no longevity (I'm thinking bands like Greta Van Fleet). Unless the music world has some big structural changes and a massive change in preferences, I don't think we're ever going to see a rock band reach those levels again.

With that being said there are some bands here in the states that have had real organic growth through word of mouth and relentless touring (I know some of these haven't translated to Europe in quite the same way):

Opeth
Ghost
Mastodon
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard
Gojira
Lorna Shore

These are artists who I have seen in small clubs/theaters or an opening slot and not long after they are headlining the biggest venues in the area. There are some caveats though. One is that a lot of them need to do coheadline shows to fill up venues. The other is that 80s bands like Maiden have had higher ceilings. The venues the bands I'm describing above play now are venues that Maiden played 20 years ago and have since grown out of. For Metal bands today, I think that is as good as it is going to get.

All things considered though, I think the Metal world is in a pretty good place. Nobody is going to be playing football stadiums anytime soon, but the internet has done a lot for fostering sustainable underground scenes bringing notoriety to bands who would never have gotten anywhere in the 80s. And since record labels are useless and there is no money in recording, bands have the resources to record on their own and fulfill whatever artistic vision they desire without having to answer to a corporation. As long as the band tours, they can put out any album they want.
 
The_7th_one said:
When Maiden and Metallica retires can be use avatars like Kiss :innocent: :lol:
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They just asked Bruce about that in the Bandit Rock interview and he said no way in hell, but then when they asked the hypothetical about what his avatar would look like, he opted for his earlier fake blond long hair look (presumably with an armadillo in his spandex trousers pointing to 2 minutes to midnight).
 
onurb said:
It was 100% on maiden channel earlier. So maybe it was a glitch on YT.
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This has come up before, it's not actually on Maiden's channel, YT has included it under the topic of Iron Maiden which makes it look like it's on Maiden's channel with the smiley avatar and all, but if you actually go to the Maiden channel it isn't there.
 
srfc said:
This has come up before, it's not actually on Maiden's channel, YT has included it under the topic of Iron Maiden which makes it look like it's on Maiden's channel with the smiley avatar and all, but if you actually go to the Maiden channel it isn't there.
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Thats why i deleted the previous post.
 
This is not a normal youtube video, it's Content ID. This is when you upload music on streaming services, YouTube also doubles as a music streaming service thanks to YouTube music. The Iron Maiden YouTube channel is also the profile of the band Iron Maiden (like on Spotify, Tidal, etc.) so if you upload music as a record company with the artist being Iron Maiden they will appear there.
 
Mosh said:
Opeth
Ghost
Mastodon
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard
Gojira
Lorna Shore
Click to expand...
All of these bands are bigger in Europe than in the states. But that's weird pick as they're all on different levels.

Ghost for example are arena rock and if they continue their career trajectory, will be playing stadiums in 10 years.

Gojira and Mastodon are mid level.

Interesting mention of Lorna Shore. I saw them last weekend (brilliant) and the story of their recent headline tour is that of constant venue upgrades. They sold out the Glasgow Barrowlands (capacity 2000) which is the same venue I saw Maiden on the VXI tour. That gig wasn't a sell out.

Make of that what you will.
 
GhostofCain said:
blabbermouth.net

BRUCE DICKINSON Explains Why There Is A Lack Of New Rock And Metal Bands Who Are Able To Ascend To Arena-Level Status

In a new interview with Sweden's Bandit Rock radio station, IRON MAIDEN singer Bruce Dickinson spoke about the lack of rock and metal bands who are able to ascend to an arena-level status to take the place of METALLICA, IRON MAIDEN and JUDAS PRIEST upon their retirement. He said (as transcribed...
blabbermouth.net blabbermouth.net

Who will be the headliners of the future? Can you see any band reaching Maiden’s status at any point in the next few years?
Click to expand...
I think he's full of crap.

There are plenty of younger bands out there at arena and approaching stadium level. The problem is that the live music industry, particularly for rock and metal, is stuffed with much older bands, most of whom should have retired long ago.

I mean, even fucking KISS, who just played their "final" show refuse to just fuck off properly.

And the festival organisers are afraid to put younger bands on as headliners for fear of scaring off the oldies who's disposable retirement income they rely on. Because they've created that expectation that there's going to be a Maiden or Metallica playing every year.
 
Spaldy said:
All of these bands are bigger in Europe than in the states. But that's weird pick as they're all on different levels.

Ghost for example are arena rock and if they continue their career trajectory, will be playing stadiums in 10 years.

Gojira and Mastodon are mid level.

Interesting mention of Lorna Shore. I saw them last weekend (brilliant) and the story of their recent headline tour is that of constant venue upgrades. They sold out the Glasgow Barrowlands (capacity 2000) which is the same venue I saw Maiden on the VXI tour. That gig wasn't a sell out.

Make of that what you will.
Click to expand...
They’re all about the same in the states, Lorna Shore a bit less so but only because they’re newer. They are the next big thing in metal here in the states and are probably going to be huge soon. I picked those artists largely because other than King Gizzard, they have all played at the same venues in the last two years. Several of them have coheadlined with each other.

I cannot see Ghost playing stadiums in the USA.
 
Mosh said:
I cannot see Ghost playing stadiums in the USA.
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Their last tour of the USA was arenas and amphitheaters and that's about as big as they'll get here due to the subject matter. Regardless: that's huge. Up until this last album cycle, these were the places that Metallica played. These are still the places Maiden plays.

Ghost getting to that stage in like 10 years is pretty impressive.
 
Spaldy said:
I think he's full of crap.
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Is he though? Festivals struggle to get strong headliners when bands like Maiden, Metallica etc arena available.

Spaldy said:
I mean, even fucking KISS, who just played their "final" show refuse to just fuck off properly.
Click to expand...
I am no fan, but are we really blaming bands that promoters want them to perform, I probably would have a hard time retiring if I still could headline festivals and sell out arenas/stadiums.
 
Spaldy said:
I think he's full of crap.

There are plenty of younger bands out there at arena and approaching stadium level. The problem is that the live music industry, particularly for rock and metal, is stuffed with much older bands, most of whom should have retired long ago.

I mean, even fucking KISS, who just played their "final" show refuse to just fuck off properly.

And the festival organisers are afraid to put younger bands on as headliners for fear of scaring off the oldies who's disposable retirement income they rely on. Because they've created that expectation that there's going to be a Maiden or Metallica playing every year.
Click to expand...
He's very clear-sighted actually...all you have to do is to check what bands have been headliners for dozens of years now...it has nothing to do with "scaring off the oldies..." it's just a fact that young bands (and I'm talking here about bands with a 15-20 years of career already), have never reached the level of Maiden, Metallica, AC/DC or a few others, in terms of popularity. Rammstein might be the exception but still it's a band that has been around for almost 30 years, can't say they're that young either. Ghost might in the near future attract a lot more people and may be a strong candidate to be headliners (at least here in Europe, can't say about the US and I'm not gonna even talk about other markets) but that's it.
So as hard as it might be to accept it, once Maiden, Metallica, AC/DC and some others retire, I'm afraid a lot of these big festivals (Wacken, Hellfest, Download) will have a lot of trouble to attract tens of thousands of fans. Maybe from time to time there will be a band that is hip for a few years but that lasts a long time? Hmmmh, I hope but as for now, I'm not sure at all..
 
My tuppence:

There isn't the zeitgeist of old, as @Mosh mentioned earlier it's good for all the cliguey genre's, but that's a double edged sword in that it means you can have people not being exposed to anything from outside their bubble. How do you even have a mainstream hit anymore? Something is released, it's on the platforms for a couple of days and then by the end of the week it's forgotten about.

Also, old fart bands headline things because old farts go to things. And they also have the mainstream hits that everyone knows, which is what you need at festivals.
 
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