Hallowed be thy Brain
Infinite Dreamer
I'll just break it down album by album.
Brave New World was the album that got me into Maiden. It wasn't the first one I heard, but the first one I heard new, and the one that convinced me that the band has got what I want. I associate many good things with the music, and I also have the feeling that many Maiden and heavy metal fans consider this one a classic. Mind you, it's 13 years old now, and certainly no longer 'recent'. Contrary to many people, I think it has a good production and sounds great.
All things considered, you can tell that songwriting-wise, it is more of a continuation of the avenue Virtual XI went than a return to the eighties. It's got some long songs that do kind of enjoy repeating their choruses a lot, and it's not terribly averse to repetion in general. However, I don't mind that, I accept that as a stylistic device, and I think it's fine. What I really love about the album is that it does extensive instrumental sections. The instrumental in Thin Line Between Love and Hate is one of my favourite passages in Maiden history. That's not to say I think everything on it is good. The Fallen Angel feels like a filler to me, and The Mercenary is a very weak standalone song, although it does work within the mood and atmosphere of the album.
Dance of Death is a step down, in general. The production is pretty awful, although I have said time and again that I attribute this to a poor business decision, because the album was marketed as a 5.1 DVD-A at the time. I never heard the DVD mix, but I was told it sounds a lot better. Anyway, there is some lacklustre song writing on the album. Wildest Dreams, New Frontier and Age of Innocence really don't cut it, Montségur and Journeyman also aren't the classics they were written to be. I like Gates of Tomorrow, but that's because it is a clone of Lord of the Flies, and that is my favourite song from the nineties. Other than that, however, the album still contains a bunch of great songs, some of which will always be among my favourites - Rainmaker, No More Lies, Paschendale. The song writing is more diverse than on Brave New World, for better or worse. Not everything that is different is automatically good, obviously.
A Matter of Life and Death is one of my three favourite Maiden albums ever, together with Piece of Mind and The X Factor. I have never felt so enthusiastic about an album before, while and after it came out. There is so much connected with it to me, including the first Maiden gigs I visited, and the friends I made thanks to it. The songs are simply amazing, and I am grateful to them for playing it live in its entirety. Maybe The Pilgrim isn't up to par with the rest, but other than that... I never get tired of this album, it has some of the most amazing moments of their discography on it... the mega-solo on Out of the Shadows, the intro to For the Greater Good of God, the chills from The Legacy, and all of The Longest Day. I love this album with heart and soul.
The Final Frontier was a bit of a let-down for me, because I wanted so badly to revisit the AMOLAD experience with it, and it just didn't do it that way. The album is not nearly as good in general, and even the live shows seemed to lack a bit of the magic from the previous tour- although the difference may be that I saw them in Paris in 2006 for the first time, and in Berlin in 2011 for the tenth time. There are a few songs that I hold to be among their very best, Starblind, When the Wild Wind Blows and probably Isle of Avalon. The rest ranges from very good (Coming Home, The Talisman) to it isn't what it could have been (El Dorado, Man Who Would be King) to failure (The Alchemist, Mother of Mercy). That probably sounds harsher than intended, but yeah, I guess you could say I feel a bit disappointed by the album. Again, the song writing is more diverse than on the predecessor, but at the same time, it lacks the atmosphere and thematic density that made AMOLAD so special.
I guess all this tells you very little of genuine interest.
I commend you for taking the time to write such a detailed response and I agree on everything you said especially on how good AMOLAD was\is