Studio Album #16 - Rumours and Speculation (New Info 27.02.15)

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Mosh said:
That's the thing though. New artists can use the internet as a platform for promoting their music. They don't need record labels anymore really.
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A studio cost £1000 a day, easily. To have that kind of capital going in for a few weeks of recording is no small thing for a band. Then you will have to hire a producer, and pay for mixing and mastering on top of that. Back in the day, you got signed and made the album on an advance from the label. Today? Good luck having a label finance your recording if you're not Iron Maiden.

How are you going to earn money from promoting on the internet? New bands have no advertising-funds, will not be able to sell albums if they stream the music or if it is pirated so they're going to take a big loss if they want to record a good album and finally booking a tour without help from a management and booking agent isn't done easily.

Another area were margins has been cut is merchandise. No venue longer permits sale of merchandise without getting a share of the profit. Iron Maiden can sell t-shirt here at 10x the price of a plain H&M one, but a new band?

What they record labels did back in the day was no small thing. And access to the internet doesn't replace them in the slightest.
 
SixesAlltheway said:
Hopefully something is brewing....
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It is!
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Maturin said:
A studio cost £1000 a day, easily. To have that kind of capital going in for a few weeks of recording is no small thing for a band. Then you will have to hire a producer, and pay for mixing and mastering on top of that. Back in the day, you got signed and made the album on an advance from the label. Today? Good luck having a label finance your recording if you're not Iron Maiden.
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You don't need to do any of that anymore. Iron Maiden could record everything in Steve Harris' house for free. It could be self produced and mixed/mastered in professional programs such as Logic. There are plenty of artists doing this and making great sounding albums while bands like Iron Maiden, Rush, and Judas Priest make piss poor sounding with professional studios and producers. How does that work?

How are you going to earn money from promoting on the internet? New bands have no advertising-funds, will not be able to sell albums if they stream the music or if it is pirated so they're going to take a big loss if they want to record a good album and finally booking a tour without help from a management and booking agent isn't done easily.
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How do you make money with a poster or radio play? Neither of those things makes money for the band. You don't need advertising funds because, for the most part, internet promotion is free. Upload your song to youtube, share your music on facebook, reddit, etc. There are plenty of platforms for this and I'd argue that it's more effective than the old way of doing it. Sure it makes it harder for bands to get discovered with all the music out there, but it's easier for a band to make an album (that they want to make) and get it to their fans. There are plenty of groups who have gotten popular because of the internet too. There have been a ton of "youtube sensation" bands popping up, it's like a modern MTV. You even see this in the rock/metal community. There's a band called Periphery who are making a huge splash in the progressive metal community and they got popular through internet exposure. Sure none of these bands get as big as Iron Maiden, but you also have to remember that Iron Maiden came out when Metal was on top. It's not like that anymore, so you're probably not going to see another Iron Maiden.

The other problem is that Iron Maiden should approach the internet and such differently than a new band. Iron Maiden is already established so they can make a media buzz without even trying. Other groups have to do more special things and go the extra distance in promoting. Also performances and merchandise. Nobody buys albums anymore so bands have to rely more heavily on those things. But there's also youtube monotization, which apparently pays a lot if you get enough views. And isn't that how it kinda worked in the first place?
 
YouTube has, in two or three years, singlehandedly replaced tv and radio. That's why the big record companies are trying to cut a deal with YouTube and push the independent guys out of the medium.
 
Mosh said:
You don't need to do any of that anymore. Iron Maiden could record everything in Steve Harris' house for free. It could be self produced and mixed/mastered in professional programs such as Logic. There are plenty of artists doing this and making great sounding albums while bands like Iron Maiden, Rush, and Judas Priest make piss poor sounding with professional studios and producers. How does that work?
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They are two very different things, and it is a sad thing that the large productions are getting fewer each year in favour of self-produced albums. Iron Maiden has recorded live without a click track for the last 4 albums at least, and that you can not do with a laptop, Logic and a soundcard. It does sound different, but a lot of people prefer music that is played in an organic and natural human way as opposed to one that is almost machine-made to a click track in a computer. If you want an example of record someone and their cousin couldn't do in their basement, listen to One Way Ticket to Hell... And Back by The Darkness.

Mosh said:
How do you make money with a poster or radio play? Neither of those things makes money for the band.
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You're kidding right? Radiostations pay a large sum of licensing money to be able to play music, as does every venue and even the local bar. They are required to keep record of what songs they have played, and that money is then distributed as royalties to the artists by the organisation that takes care of this business in the particular country. In Sweden, it's called STIM. I think I read that one minute of airplay is worth around £40 for the artist on the larger stations. Swedish singer-songwriter Tomas Ledin created a discussion a while back when he got an hour of his concert broadcasted on public service TV. That made him more than the average month's pay in Sweden. Or around £2800, just in royalty fee, for performing his music on TV.
 
Maturin said:
They are two very different things, and it is a sad thing that the large productions are getting fewer each year in favour of self-produced albums. Iron Maiden has recorded live without a click track for the last 4 albums at least, and that you can not do with a laptop, Logic and a soundcard. It does sound different, but a lot of people prefer music that is played in an organic and natural human way as opposed to one that is almost machine-made to a click track in a computer. If you want an example of record someone and their cousin couldn't do in their basement, listen to One Way Ticket to Hell... And Back by The Darkness.
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I don't think it's sad at all. Thank god I don't have to pay thousands of dollars to go all the way to a studio and record in a set amount of time if I want to record my own music. I'd hate having to do that. You can easily record live without a click with Logic. It would require a more expensive setup (extra microphones and such) but it's possible. And Maiden aren't exactly strapped for cash so I don't think that would be an issue. I'm not sure what's inhuman about using a computer to record. It has all the things you'd get in a real mixing desk, you just have easier access to it now. You still get humans performing and often in a more relaxed environment.

Either way, sonically I'd take almost any album recorded on logic over the shit sounding albums Maiden have been making since Fear of the Dark. I don't care how "real" it is, they sound awful.


You're kidding right? Radiostations pay a large sum of licensing money to be able to play music, as does every venue and even the local bar. They are required to keep record of what songs they have played, and that money is then distributed as royalties to the artists by the organisation that takes care of this business in the particular country. In Sweden, it's called STIM. I think I read that one minute of airplay is worth around £40 for the artist on the larger stations. Swedish singer-songwriter Tomas Ledin created a discussion a while back when he got an hour of his concert broadcasted on public service TV. That made him more than the average month's pay in Sweden. Or around £2800, just in royalty fee, for performing his music on TV.
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But who does that money go to? You see stories all the time about musicians getting seriously fucked over with royalties. The record label is going to get a cut, as well as the producers and others involved with making the song. The only musicians who get any substantial pay are the songwriters. And as far as Maiden goes, they hardly got radio play anyway. Still don't. I'd be very surprised if they were ever bringing in a significant amount of royalties.

That's where youtube comes in. If an independent artist is getting paid on youtube, they can take the money and distribute it however they want. A single guy in his basement making all the music himself can take that youtube check and keep everything for himself. How possible was that in the 80s?
 
For me, will be one of these:

40th Anniversary with Rock In Rio 30th anniversary gig;
New tour (as Nicko said the band will play more gigs next year);
New album (pehaps with new album format or release schedule);
Or (no one of us wants this, but...) last album and last tour.
 
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Mosh said:
Either way, sonically I'd take almost any album recorded on logic over the shit sounding albums Maiden have been making since Fear of the Dark. I don't care how "real" it is, they sound awful.
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Well, the most striking thing about Maiden's sound live and on record these last years is how they speed up every time they get going. Listen to how The Wicker Man speeds up when Steve enter the song, or how they speed up when the whole band joins the gallop-riff in Lord of Light. That's what happens when Iron Maiden play live, and the only way to capture that on recording is to play live. Of course it is an example of poor musicianship, but that's how they sound and want to sound.

Brave New World is a world-class lesson in producing. Good luck making that at home. Of the others, only A Matter of Life and Death is really good.

Dance of Death sounds the way it does because it was a rough master made on an old mastering desk and burnt on CD for Steve to listen to in his car, but it backfired on Shirley when Steve got back the next day and loved how it sounded and demanded it be made the final master. So the album has the exact same story as the unfinished cover. It's unfinished by anyone's standard. Of course it doesn't sound well produced.

I'd agree The Final Frontier is an awfully produced album but that is how it works out when you're lazy and record it in two-three weeks and then have your producer sit for months trying to make it into an acceptable product. Shirley even commented on how "some bands" tell you how quickly their albums are recorded, but how much more work there is to be done in post-production in those cases. There's even autotune on Bruce in Coming Home, because he wasn't bothered to do enough vocal takes.

Brave New World is the only album since Fear of the Dark with a good production, because it is the only album which had both a good producer, and a band that decided to work it through (or rather, was pressured by a returning singer who is said to have insisted together with a record company who made it a priority, which the A&R credits on the album surely shows. I'm sure EMI gave them a lot of opinions on the ongoing work through them. It wasn't like they had a lot of confidence in the bands decision-making capabilities by 1999.)

No Prayer for the Dying was recorded in Steve's barn with a "fuck it" attitude, which Bruce has called a mistake many times over the years. Fear of the Dark and The X Factor was made in the same place when Steve had made into a real studio, but of course it wasn't a top notch studio. Same with Virtual XI, which is awful. These albums are Maiden's home produced ones, and I hope you're not saying that they are better than Brave New World to The Final Frontier?
 
I think at this point you'd be hard pressed to find a singer who doesn't use autotune sometime or another.


Maturin said:
Well, the most striking thing about Maiden's sound live and on record these last years is how they speed up every time they get going. Listen to how The Wicker Man speeds up when Steve enter the song, or how they speed up when the whole band joins the gallop-riff in Lord of Light. That's what happens when Iron Maiden play live, and the only way to capture that on recording is to play live. Of course it is an example of poor musicianship, but that's how they sound and want to sound.

Brave New World is a world-class lesson in producing. Good luck making that at home. Of the others, only A Matter of Life and Death is really good.

Dance of Death sounds the way it does because it was a rough master made on an old mastering desk and burnt on CD for Steve to listen to in his car, but it backfired on Shirley when Steve got back the next day and loved how it sounded and demanded it be made the final master. So the album has the exact same story as the unfinished cover. It's unfinished by anyone's standard. Of course it doesn't sound well produced.

I'd agree The Final Frontier is an awfully produced album but that is how it works out when you're lazy and record it in two-three weeks and then have your producer sit for months trying to make it into an acceptable product. Shirley even commented on how "some bands" tell you how quickly their albums are recorded, but how much more work there is to be done in post-production in those cases. There's even autotune on Bruce in Coming Home, because he wasn't bothered to do enough vocal takes.

Brave New World is the only album since Fear of the Dark with a good production, because it is the only album which had both a good producer, and a band that decided to work it through (or rather, was pressured by a returning singer who is said to have insisted together with a record company who made it a priority, which the A&R credits on the album surely shows. I'm sure EMI gave them a lot of opinions on the ongoing work through them. It wasn't like they had a lot of confidence in the bands decision-making capabilities by 1999.)

No Prayer for the Dying was recorded in Steve's barn with a "fuck it" attitude, which Bruce has called a mistake many times over the years. Fear of the Dark and The X Factor was made in the same place when Steve had made into a real studio, but of course it wasn't a top notch studio. Same with Virtual XI, which is awful. These albums are Maiden's home produced ones, and I hope you're not saying that they are better than Brave New World to The Final Frontier?
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Brave New World isn't anything special production wise.

The problem with Iron Maiden's production is that Steve Harris has too much of a hand in the process. His hearing is clearly damaged and it affects the way the music comes out. Iron Maiden's tendency to speed up could be captured on any recording softeware. Just don't record to a click. I'm not sure why clicks are being associated with Logic anyhow, those have always been a thing. Nirvana's Nevermind was recorded to a click, for example.

Iron Maiden's home recorded albums are bad but you have to remember two things:
1: Home recording technology is nowhere near where it is now. It's not even worth comparing.
2: Steve Harris is an awful producer.

My point was more that the recording method really doesn't matter very much at the end of the day. When you have artists making better sounding albums in their rooms on a laptop while Maiden blows a ton of money on a studio, it makes you wonder what the point of spending so much money on studio time is anyway.
 
Mosh said:
Iron Maiden's tendency to speed up could be captured on any recording softeware. Just don't record to a click. I'm not sure why clicks are being associated with Logic anyhow, those have always been a thing. Nirvana's Nevermind was recorded to a click, for example.
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I'm not saying click tracks is a new thing or associated with any DAW.

But they wouldn't play like they play together if they recorded their parts with like Nicko playing drums first, then adding bass etc. It's what they're saying over and over again. Playing together everyone at the same time makes it sound in a particular way. And as a musician who has done that kind of recording, I'm totally with them.

Mosh said:
Brave New World isn't anything special production wise.
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What do you have as a reference point then?

They've managed to make what is basically a live recording at the base have all instruments sit perfectly in the mix. It sounds like the world's biggest band, where every part is audible, yet it sounds complete. And the many double tracking-parts on the vocals is spectacularly well carried out. Bruce voice is dealt with in a way that makes it sound full at all times, with just the right amount of ambient effects on it. The keyboard-parts are always adding to the mix, rather than distracting and being quite many they are still almost unnoticable to casual listening. They're just there to make it sound well produced. And it succeeds in doing just that.

The guitars works so well, with the many parts forming a complete sound but every part is still perfectly clear in the mix. The solos are a bit more effect-heavy than they usually do, but in that they gain that the usual imprecision isn't that obvious. Another point is the drums, which sits so well with the rest that it is unbelievable. The kick is clear without being a trebly "click" sound - and that is without making it sound like a triggered "metal" drum sound. Doing that takes skill - usually it's either "click" or a muddy "thump" that only adds bass to the mix without cutting through. The snare is also super-cool. Can't really think of another record that his kind of drum sound.

There isn't a slight bit of muddy "loudness" feel to the mix, and yet it sounds huge.
 
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Sorry for the nudge, but has anyone got anything to report? Any more Paris sightings since the French Open? No-one has sat next to Nicko for two hours on the Eurostar? Any hope of an album by Christmas?

(Actually, I know the answer to that last one...).
 
Just a very little clue. A guy on the french Maiden fans forum told us that he is working in a truck company, and that he was recently ordered to deliver some packs to Iron Maiden. He obviously had no right to tell us the exact place or the axact nature of the goods, but it was in France and near Paris.
 
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