El Dorado

How good is El Dorado on a scale of 1-10?

  • Total voters
    14
Yep definitely w@nker. I've just realised what song el dorado reminds me of in a strange vaguely remote way...caught somewhere in time. The singing style, bridge, chorus and solo breakdown...although nothing alike I feel a warm feeling the two are related.
 
I mentioned this in another thread, but the song this reminds most of is 2 Minutes to Midnight.
Not that they sound the same, but both fill the same role on their album, are about the same length, and are structured similarly.
They both grab you by the balls right off the bat and keep the foot to the floor.
Each has a killer chorus and a great lyric about selfish, greedy bastards leading others to ruin.
 
mckindog said:
I mentioned this in another thread, but the song this reminds most of is 2 Minutes to Midnight.
Not that they sound the same, but both fill the same role on their album, are about the same length, and are structured similarly.
They both grab you by the balls right off the bat and keep the foot to the floor.
Each has a killer chorus and a great lyric about selfish, greedy bastards leading others to ruin.
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Funny you say that. I was thinking the same thing, and also how it would have fit so well on Powerslave.  Bruce's vocals have a similar tone.
 
LooseCannon said:
THAT's what it means. FUCK. I'd been rearranging letters. Never even thought of wanker. Damn my non-Britishness.
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I realised it yesterday when reading from the album booklet. :P  And that's after listening to the damn song pretty much all summer.
 
Well, if you need a story
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It's still "if you knew the story". The booklet has the line printed (and it makes more sense).

Amazing! I also was trying to rearrange the word banker into something else, never would have thought of that solution. :blink:

As for the song... I stand by what I originally wrote about it. It's a great, catchy song that rocks very hard; the riff is simple yet very effective and sticks in your head, the drums are powerful, the chorus is an earcatcher. Great solos too. Nothing in there that's not to like! :ok: I might have played the song to death already before TFF's arrival, but it still rocks in context of the album.
 
Spolier alert!
El Dorado, as expected, is way better live than it is on the album. Ever since Sonisphere it's grown on me, to the point where I no longer think its the weakest link.

After listening to El Dorado for some time now, I have two observations to make about it.
One: the biting lyrics that strongly hint at criticism of the greedy wankers responsible for the economic crisis (in both the US and elsewhere) reminds me a little of Be Quick or Be Dead, but with more subtlety and intricate imagery (the boat imagery is, like LC pointed out, a clear reference to the actual myth of El Dorado, the seeking of which may also have had its roots in human greed).
Two: The galloping riff that made Maiden famous and which is present throughout this song is its saving grace, together with the lyrics. As before, this song is not my favorite on the album, but it has grown on me because of these two factors.
 
A friend (not per se a huge Maiden fan but he still likes many of their songs) was here and I played him five TFF songs (next week the other 5), not in the album order, but more in my own order. I played these songs in this order:

Satellite 15...The Final Frontier
El Dorado
The Talisman
The Man Who Would Be King
Coming Home

Guess which song he liked best? Yep. El Dorado. Hadn't expected it. I'm pretty sure when he hears the other five, he's going to have a tough time deciding which he likes best.
 
Foro your selected playing order...The Talisman could have actually worked at number three on the album, slotting in between El Dorado and Mother of Mercy. This would have given the first half an epic (a bit like AMOLAD with BTATS and DOD with DOD) and still left 4 epics at the end.

Not that there is anything wrong with the current order. Its perfect, IMO.
 
The order on the album is something else which struck me on first inspection. All the epics come at the end (you can't really count the intro). Which to me is an odd choice because it gives the album an imbalance. But on the other hand, it makes for a nice progression from short to long. Meh, it's not a concept album so I don't know that the order matters that much anyway.
 
I think it actually is appropriate to count Satelite 15 ... The Final Frontier as two separate songs. It definitely feels that way.
 
But lyrically they are not seperate. That's why I can understand it.

I gave Mid-Distance Runner's idea another thought, and like this I indeed might have had more tolerance for The Talisman's minor points, if it wasn't squashed between all those other epics.

Speaking of The Talisman, I think it will grow on me sooner or later, but I'd never understand it if this song would be played live and these not: The Alchemist, Starblind or Isle of Avalon. These songs are just from a higher level, just as the album closer.
 
Natalie said:
The order on the album is something else which struck me on first inspection. All the epics come at the end (you can't really count the intro). Which to me is an odd choice because it gives the album an imbalance. But on the other hand, it makes for a nice progression from short to long. Meh, it's not a concept album so I don't know that the order matters that much anyway.
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I thought the same thing about the order. I can almost picture the first five songs as side one of an album the band could have released in the late '80s. Stylistically they could have been half of a successor to Somewhere in Time. The other five, no way.

I even went as far as to play around with the order on iTunes. My favourite variation began with the same first three songs, but then I went Avalon and Talisman. King, Alchemist, Starblind, Coming Home and Wind was side two.

Guess I'll always be a child of the vinyl era.

Just playing though, cause there's nothing wrong with the order as is.
 
For the sake of archiving:

For this album, El Dorado was the 2nd song that was recorded, on January 11, 2010.
 
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there was a topic for that...... It's cool but not the first time and like the past nominations the song will probably lose.
Edit: After looking at the other nominations, I think Maiden have a pretty good chance.
 
I downloaded this from IM.com when it was made available and I was very impressed indeed, it sure did whet my appetite for the TFF album, it is a good solid track 10/10.
 
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