Adrian Smith

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Interview with Adrian about the A.S.A.P. project from the late 80's. Cool find.

Some interesting things:

- he thought he can pursue the band as a kind of parallel thing to Maiden. With this album he wanted a totally different style, otherwise what's the point. He had an idea for such an album for a long time and mentioned that the other Maiden members would not have had the time to help him at the time. They had their stuff, obviously without Dave. He was really pleased with the album.
- he had 3 demos before Maiden's 1988 tour.
- about 45% of the songwriting is his. ''The Lion'' and ''Silver And Gold'' are old songs of his. ''After The Storm'' was one of the demos. He had the title track for 5 years. Songs like ''Down The Wire'' and the music of ''Misunderstood'' were things that they sort of amalgamated each other's ideas and worked on them as a whole.
- ''Fallen Heroes'' is one of his favorite songs from the album.
- they tried to record the album ''live'', like Maiden(?). That sounds weird coming from Adrian.
- he doesn't think his playing on the album is different than with Maiden. The wild-whammy bar stuff is Andy.
- he mentioned that the stuff on this album is slower than with Maiden and he can do different things.
- he tries to make his solos with Maiden more melodic because he is not a technical guitarist. I guess playing with Roy helped for that.
- he doesn't think Maiden members were surprised by this album and style. With Maiden, he is a cog in a well-oiled machine, which is great in a way.
- he and Bruce write more conventionally than Steve and it's obvious which songs are written by them and by Steve. There's a fine line between what Maiden can and cannot do. But his input balances out.

I wonder if some of the songs (for example the old demos) were presented to Maiden in 1986. Obviously Maidenized. After all, their style isn't that different from Wasted Years. I would love Adrian to release all stuff and demos from the Untouchables era because it's music of its time and that's exactly what's great. Or some live performances.
 

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Kalata said:
Interview with Adrian about the A.S.A.P. project from the late 80's. Cool find.

Some interesting things:

- he thought he can pursue the band as a kind of parallel thing to Maiden. With this album he wanted a totally different style, otherwise what's the point. He had an idea for such an album for a long time and mentioned that the other Maiden members would not have had the time to help him at the time. They had their stuff, obviously without Dave. He was really pleased with the album.
- he had 3 demos before Maiden's 1988 tour.
- about 45% of the songwriting is his. ''The Lion'' and ''Silver And Gold'' are old songs of his. ''After The Storm'' was one of the demos. He had the title track for 5 years. Songs like ''Down The Wire'' and the music of ''Misunderstood'' were things that they sort of amalgamated each other's ideas and worked on them as a whole.
- ''Fallen Heroes'' is one of his favorite songs from the album.
- they tried to record the album ''live'', like Maiden(?). That sounds weird coming from Adrian.
- he doesn't think his playing on the album is different than with Maiden. The wild-whammy bar stuff is Andy.
- he mentioned that the stuff on this album is slower than with Maiden and he can do different things.
- he tries to make his solos with Maiden more melodic because he is not a technical guitarist. I guess playing with Roy helped for that.
- he doesn't think Maiden members were surprised by this album and style. With Maiden, he is a cog in a well-oiled machine, which is great in a way.
- he and Bruce write more conventionally than Steve and it's obvious which songs are written by them and by Steve. There's a fine line between what Maiden can and cannot do. But his input balances out.

I wonder if some of the songs (for example the old demos) were presented to Maiden in 1986. Obviously Maidenized. After all, their style isn't that different from Wasted Years. I would love Adrian to release all stuff and demos from the Untouchables era because it's music of its time and that's exactly what's great. Or some live performances.
Click to expand...
Silver and Gold was performed at The Entire Population Of Hackney gig. Nicko was slated to play drums on Silver and Gold, but just got married, so couldn't do it.

I assume that Silver and Gold demo was a part of the demo cassette he presented to Steve which contained rough demo of Wasted Years.
 
matic22 said:
Silver and Gold was performed at The Entire Population Of Hackney gig. Nicko was slated to play drums on Silver and Gold, but just got married, so couldn't do it.
I assume that Silver and Gold demo was a part of the demo cassette he presented to Steve which contained rough demo of Wasted Years.
Click to expand...
I didn't know that about Nicko to play on ''Silver And Gold'' song. It makes sense because of the 1985 gigs. Years later we got ''Solar Fire''. I'm not sure if the title track would have worked for Maiden, maybe something like ''The Lion'' for the NPFTD album.

The only song credited solely to Adrian on the album is ''When She's Gone'', the bonus song. Maybe it was also part of the demos. What a great melodic rock.

Songs from the album played live in 1985: ''Fighting Man'', ''School Days'', ''When She's Gone'' and the title track. The first 2 are not written by Adrian according to the notes.
 
Inspired by the discussion, I thought about which are the demo songs worth of an album (so at least 8 songs) that Adrian had with The Untouchables band. Let's speculate:

So his demo songs in 1986 probably were: Wasted Years, The Lion, Silver And Gold, When She's Gone, After The Storm.
Then taken into account the Psycho Motel songs (the band evolved from The Untouchables) that are solely credited to him (the music direction has changed, but the heavy stuff can also turn into melodic hard rock) and the 3 songs played live in 1992 - the collection of songs could be:

City Of Dreams (released)
Judgement Day (played live)
Singin' The Blues (played live)
Big Trouble (played live)
So Much Love (written in 1991, unreleased with an ASAP feel)
Break These Chains (same as above)
Sins Of Your Father
World's On Fire
Psycho Motel
Killing Time
Time Is A Hunter
City Of Light
Last Goodbye (bonus song)
Rain
Underground
Welcome To The World

16 songs. It might be possible, right.
 
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RICHIE KOTZEN Looks Back On First Collaboration With IRON MAIDEN Guitarist ADRIAN SMITH - "Adrian's Wife, She Had The Idea And Said 'You Two Should Try To Write Something Together" (Video)

Smith/Kotzen is a musical collaboration between Iron Maiden guitarist, Adrian Smith, and The Winery Dogs frontman, Richie Kotzen of The Winery Dogs. Their self-titled debut album was released on March 26, 2021. Guesting on the X5 Podcast, Kotzen told the story of meeting Smith and how their...
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