News 18th Studio Album discussion

It’s not just Steve. Metallica have suffered from even worse lack of studio perspective for decades now. I’d suggest Metallica are so leaden with awful production decisions like Death Magnetic and St Anger; over long songs; b-side material making albums like on ReLoad and Hardwired disc 2; and by LuLu and St Anger in general - that we have it really good by comparison!

Some loss of perspective is probably inevitable over the decades of being told you are brilliant and being adulated by fans.

I also don’t begrudge Steve for Barnyard studios in the 90s. Do us fans ever think that Steve literally just needed to stay home to stay sane and have some family life, after the onslaught of the 80s?

That said, no excuse for not hiring a producer for TXF of course.
 
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Helmuth Von Moltke said:
It’s not just Steve. Metallica have suffered from even worse lack of studio perspective for decades now. I’d suggest Metallica are so leaden with awful production decisions like Death Magnetic and St Anger; over long songs; b-side material making albums like on ReLoad and Hardwired disc 2; and by LuLu and St Anger in general - that we have it really good by comparison!

Some loss of perspective is probably inevitable over the decades of being told you are brilliant and being adulated by fans.

I also don’t begrudge Steve for Barnyard studios in the 90s. Do us fans ever think that Steve literally just needed to stay home to stay sane and have some family life, after the onslaught of the 90s?

That said, no excuse for not hiring a producer for TXF of course.
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This may come across as controversial, but Metallica have never populated many of their albums with songs that have little to no redeeming qualities. I love Load and ReLoad but some of the songs are so generic. I would argue that Maiden have not done this.
 
Helmuth Von Moltke said:
It’s not just Steve. Metallica have suffered from even worse lack of studio perspective for decades now. I’d suggest Metallica are so leaden with awful production decisions like Death Magnetic and St Anger; over long songs; b-side material making albums like on ReLoad and Hardwired disc 2; and by LuLu and St Anger in general - that we have it really good by comparison!

Some loss of perspective is probably inevitable over the decades of being told you are brilliant and being adulated by fans.

I also don’t begrudge Steve for Barnyard studios in the 90s. Do us fans ever think that Steve literally just needed to stay home to stay sane and have some family life, after the onslaught of the 90s?

That said, no excuse for not hiring a producer for TXF of course.
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Load and reload are very soft, death magnetic its like they tried to sound classic metallica again some good songs there. St anger imposible to listen weird riffs rithm changes weird and anoying sound. They tried to write songs in a different way but its a really bad album. And hardwired its not even close to death magnetic. Yes,if we try to find the last great metallica album. Its the black album in 1992?
 
I agree about Metallica, and this part is especially spot on:

"Some loss of perspective is probably inevitable over the decades of being told you are brilliant and being dilated by fans."
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At the beginning of their careers, they were all ambitious young musicians—apprentices, eager to learn. Once they achieved enormous success, it's only natural to want to become your own boss and say, "From now on, we'll do things our own way." There's nothing inherently wrong with that, but I think you also need a few people around you who aren't afraid to say "no" and tell you things you may not want to hear.

I also think the other band members should be much more willing to question the band leader's decisions when they believe the band is heading in the wrong direction. My guess is that Bruce nowadays simply wants to enjoy what is arguably the greatest job in the world and isn't particularly interested in arguing with Steve over production choices or the band's sonic direction.

He could have sided with Adrian over the sound of The Final Frontier, but why create unnecessary conflict when the overall Maiden machine is still running smoothly? Better to relax and enjoy the ride. At least that's how I imagine it.
 
Helmuth Von Moltke said:
Some loss of perspective is probably inevitable over the decades of being told you are brilliant and being adulated by fans.
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And that's why I think we've entered the "double-album" phase of Maiden's career. No song isn't up to snuff anymore and they all belong on the album, when most outside the Maiden bubble tend to agree that the last two albums might be stronger minus a song or two.
 
CA Bryers said:
And that's why I think we've entered the "double-album" phase of Maiden's career. No song isn't up to snuff anymore and they all belong on the album, when most outside the Maiden bubble tend to agree that the last two albums might be stronger minus a song or two.
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Songs that are b-side material are one thing (The Man of Sorrows sounds like a demo they slapped on the album) but what's even worse for me is when we get an album like Senjutsu where I'd argue nearly every song needed to be edited, in some cases heavily. Too much repetition and sections that go nowhere which end up driving song lengths up thus leading to the album needing two CDs.

Senjutsu particularly feels almost cynical with how it's only four-ish minutes over 78:59 which is standard CD max length. If you wanna be safe, 77 minutes is well within the margins and what they'd go for. There's no way there wasn't five minutes that could've easily been cut from Senjutsu.
 
Ruflux said:
Songs that are b-side material are one thing (The Man of Sorrows sounds like a demo they slapped on the album) but what's even worse for me is when we get an album like Senjutsu where I'd argue nearly every song needed to be edited, in some cases heavily. Too much repetition and sections that go nowhere which end up driving song lengths up thus leading to the album needing two CDs.

Senjutsu particularly feels almost cynical with how it's only four-ish minutes over 78:59 which is standard CD max length. If you wanna be safe, 77 minutes is well within the margins and what they'd go for. There's no way there wasn't five minutes that could've easily been cut from Senjutsu.
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I agree. Senjutsu is bad arrangement-wise. The only 2 songs that are OK and don't need to be edited are Stratego ad The Writing On The Wall IMO.

Also, stop with Janick doubling every melody that Bruce sings. It's been done to death. And it sounds bad when Janick misbends or Bruce is in bad daily form.
 
Ruflux said:
Songs that are b-side material are one thing (The Man of Sorrows sounds like a demo they slapped on the album) but what's even worse for me is when we get an album like Senjutsu where I'd argue nearly every song needed to be edited, in some cases heavily. Too much repetition and sections that go nowhere which end up driving song lengths up thus leading to the album needing two CDs.

Senjutsu particularly feels almost cynical with how it's only four-ish minutes over 78:59 which is standard CD max length. If you wanna be safe, 77 minutes is well within the margins and what they'd go for. There's no way there wasn't five minutes that could've easily been cut from Senjutsu.
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I've though it could be cynical too. Since TBOS Maiden have been releasing the slip case book version of their albums. Maybe there's much more profit in these formats and it doesn't make sense to do a book for a single cd. Maybe. Just a thought. Because I agree, Senjutsu is bloated. There's a 9min song in there that could easily be 5.

But do I really think that Steve would be aware and intentionally lengthen a song just to make a double album because it's more cost effective/profitable? I really don't think I believe that about him. Do I? Dunno. Either way, every album from AMOLAD is a tad too long for me. Give me the 80s when an album was 40mins and a film was 90, none of this 3hr action movie nonsense you get nowadays, like fuck me, if you can't get Van Damme from A to B in 90mins then your plot is too convoluted, your message too diffuse.
 
matic22 said:
I agree. Senjutsu is bad arrangement-wise. The only 2 songs that are OK and don't need to be edited are Stratego ad The Writing On The Wall IMO.

Also, stop with Janick doubling every melody that Bruce sings. It's been done to death. And it sounds bad when Janick misbends or Bruce is in bad daily form.
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Agreed on all counts. I saw a Gillen video the other day and Janick is doing the vocal doubling the whole way through the song. He's been at it a loooong time.

It must be a group choice. Like if it's Janick preferred style fair enough but surely someone could/would veto it if it annoyed them as much as it annoys us. Maybe they love it. Weirdos.

This is also why I'm more fond of Wasting Love in the studio than live, they just don't have the control or accuracy for the swells and bends and it sounds out of tune in any live version I've heard, even though the rest of the performance is great, the guitar ruins it for me.
 
I would personally love it if they finally tuned down. I know Bruce hates that, and that Steve is against change, but if they`re gonna give us one last album, I would love it if they went out heavy.
 
Azas said:
My guess is that Bruce nowadays simply wants to enjoy what is arguably the greatest job in the world and isn't particularly interested in arguing with Steve over production choices or the band's sonic direction.

He could have sided with Adrian over the sound of The Final Frontier, but why create unnecessary conflict when the overall Maiden machine is still running smoothly? Better to relax and enjoy the ride. At least that's how I imagine it.
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yes this is almost certainly true, the other part of it is keeping them all motivated to carry on aged 67/68/69… enjoy your life and do the fun parts of the job.

After returning, Bruce seems to have first bitten his tongue back in 2003 over the DoD artwork, which he hated, but he didn’t veto Steve over it. At least he didn’t succeed.

Around 2010, yes, it seems Steve starts getting more of his way in the studio - pure speculation, but the Satellite 15 intro he repurposed from Adrian is for me the first catastrophic studio album decision of the reunion era (meaning you may like / dislike certain songs, but to me, using it as a studio intro was the first genuinely controversial and poor quality idea that made the cut on a studio album after 1999).

The moral of the story - never show Steve something that’s unfinished!!!
 
UpTheIrons said:
You could probably cut 5 minutes from the song 'Senjutsu' alone!
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This one actually grew on me. I listened to it a few months ago and it just clicked, it hooked me, I was invested, it took me on a journey, for the first time.

I know I've complained about length but really, if they are being creatively true to themselves then I'm all for it, even if I don't always dig it.
 
As much as I love Hell On Earth, I can't lie: I was super disappointed on my first listen once I realized that despite there being over a minute of music left, there were no new riffs or sections left. It was the same riff repeated for the entire minute, while slooooooowly fading out. I hate fade-outs with a passion, and one that is literally a minute long? Inexcusable. No one can convince me that there's any song out there that benefits from such a drawn out fade out (Holst's Planets being an exception due to how inventive the execution was).
 
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