Blaze Bayley, good or bad?

Which was the better album; The X-Factor or Virtual XI

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TAATG is my guilty Maiden pleasure. I love it. All the way. The only thing wrong with that live clip is Steve strumming his bass powercords all over the place. I've always hated that. The bass is a one-note-at-a-time instrument, unless it's distorted up to Cliff Burton levels.
 
It's not an issue of chords vs single notes; it's the way Steve strums it. He's imitating the playing of a guitar (i.e. using the same motion as if he had a pick in hand) rather than something more natively bass-like. In my opinion as a bassist since 1986: that's a questionable move, as the instrument isn't built to sound good that way.

However, using chords (or at least two strings sounding together) is actually a Steve Harris staple. "Killers" intro. "Rime" fog-machine section. When Steve plays his chords like a real bassist, it's fine. (Even awesome sometimes.)
 
SinisterMinisterX said:
It's not an issue of chords vs single notes; it's the way Steve strums it. He's imitating the playing of a guitar (i.e. using the same motion as if he had a pick in hand) rather than something more natively bass-like. In my opinion as a bassist since 1986: that's a questionable move, as the instrument isn't built to sound good that way.

However, using chords (or at least two strings sounding together) is actually a Steve Harris staple. "Killers" intro. "Rime" fog-machine section. When Steve plays his chords like a real bassist, it's fine. (Even awesome sometimes.)
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Killers intro and Rime quiet bit are one note at a time but he leaves the strings ringing. Yes, they sound great. Atmospheric, and a full sound. I agree with you about bass-imitating-guitar; it's wrong.
 
I thought he did ok on the two albums. X factor is a solid album. Virtual XI is generally most people's least favorite albums, but I think it's got some decent tracks on it. But when you listen to the live bootlegs with him on it it was kind of a butcher job he did on the classic songs, but he did fine with the material of the albums he was on.
 
Jayman said:
I thought he did ok on the two albums. X factor is a solid album. Virtual XI is generally most people's least favorite albums, but I think it's got some decent tracks on it. But when you listen to the live bootlegs with him on it it was kind of a butcher job he did on the classic songs, but he did fine with the material of the albums he was on.
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I thought he was always strong on his own Maiden material live, and even a bunch of Di'Anno songs. 95% of the Bruce stuff though, he didn't vocally have a prayer. The main problem I have with his two Maiden albums is that his vocals were ultra-straight takes. Listen to his Wolfsbane stuff, and he pours a lot of that wildman personality he used to have into his vocals--he was all over the place even in the studio, and that kept a lot of his verses etc. from being too boring/static. In Maiden, the most we got was a "Woo!" on "I Live My Way" and a couple other vocal inflections. Even onstage with Maiden he was really reserved, as if he didn't really know where his personality fit into the mix. But eh, just my perception of things 20 years later...
 
I think you're right about that, I think he did well on the dianno stuff also, but he just did not have the range for a lot of the classic bruce stuff. It was kind of difficult to listen to. Never saw them live with Blaze though. I've never listened to the Wolfsbane stuff or any of his other solo stuff so I really had nothing to compare his vocalist personality with, but I'll take your word for it. The thing is, when you hear Bruce sing the x factor stuff live it's really like a whole other dimension and it really brings it to life and feels like that's the way it should be sung. Especially when he did Lord of the flies on the dance of death tour that was great. But I've never really liked blaze's vocals enough to really want to check out his other stuff, but I guess I should.
 
Jayman said:
But I've never really liked blaze's vocals enough to really want to check out his other stuff, but I guess I should.
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Many fans will tell you Blaze's first three solo albums, "Silicon Messiah," "Tenth Dimension," and "Blood and Belief" are worth checking out. I'd definitely agree. I think my general recommendation would probably end at his fourth album, "The Man Who Would Not Die," although if you've gotten that far, I'd probably say check out his acoustic EP, "Russian Holiday" as well. The Wolfsbane stuff I'd recommend mainly for Blaze fans only, or check out some songs on YouTube to see that he actually had a lot of vocal attitude and spunk back in the day on songs like "Manhunt" and others from their first album.
 
If you want to hear the attitude and humour that Blaze could bring to a gig pre-Maiden, get the Massive Noise Injection live album by Wolfsbane. You can see how, if Steve was looking for someone to roughen-up Maiden's sound for the '90s, he would have picked Blaze.
 
Blaze is an amazing vocalist, and could have taken Maiden in an excellent new direction post X Factor. But Virtual XI (and I DO love this album) is a failure by Maiden standards. And it's not really Blaze's fault. They seemed to be going for a Somewhere in Time style album with the wrong singer. The X Factor was a step in the right direction, and the first album that sounded like a real follow up to 7th son. Blaze's voices should have been the bridge between Di'Anno and Dickinson between his Wolfsbane-day rage and his operatic, baritone delivery. But instead he ended up just sounding flat and somewhat confused with Maiden, and had no place live with them. I'd have liked to have seen a third Blaze album with Maiden to see if Steve could ever commit to a single style with him, but alas. But Blaze IS a good singer, and some of Maiden's best songs come from those two albums.
 
I thought he did pretty good on Afraid to shoot strangers, as far his own songs Virus, Angel and Gambler, Como Estais Amigos and Lord of the Flies are probably the ones I enjoyed with him more than Bruce. I felt Bruce made Sign of the Cross, The Clansman, Futureal and Man on the Edge better.
 

Here's a much more, dare I say, glam inspired Blaze (?!) on vocals here...

I like what @2Mins had to say about Blaze. Steve obviously impressed by his onstage persona with Wolfsbane, and his nature offstage on the No Prayer tour when Wolfsbane opened for Maiden.

Another (X) factor I think is that, Blaze had the voice Steve was looking for to suit the darker style Maiden went for in the 90s. I think Steve was inspired and influenced by the rising rock/metal scene in the UK at the time, bands like Paradise Lost, My Dying Bride etc, and Blaze fit that bill...
 
I must say that although TXF was a bit boring at first listen, it has gradually grown upon me and has crawled into my top 3, as a matter of fact. The album is brilliant, very dark, very “real” (as Sixes has nicely put it) and it’s quite a different voyage than we’ve come to expect from Maiden.
It’s probably all because of Steve’s problems/life changes at the time (a divorce, a death of his father, a new producer and the animosity between him and Bruce), but it’s very un-Maideny, but great nonetheless.
In all honesty, I actually prefer Blaze here. He fits the album, its dark nature, in a way Bruce never could. Not in the 90’s at least (however considering WTWWB has been rumoured to be a Blaze era outtake, it might be different now). Don’t want to sound silly, but Blaze’s voice… sounds… muddy to me, and it works here.
Also, what with this being the album full of personal problems and self doubt, I can definitely relate to it more when it’s being sung by that “dark guy/Mr. Unfortunate” Bayley than our favourite ever-ranting airline pilot. I mean - look at Chemical Wedding (the album). Those are lyrics that fit Bruce. Or Starblind. Leave “I’m here on my own” and “what I wanted was a mission” to Blaze.
My favourites? Everything, with special mention going to Sign, TEOD, Fortunes, Flies, Judgement, 2. A.M. and The Unbeliever.

VXI is a different matter, though. Some of the songs are unreasonably overblown (“Don’t you think I can torture?”), some could use more love and polishing (“Maybe lightning CHUA-CHUA!”), some could have been played with more energy and vigour (the “Freedom” part in the Clansman is definitely too tame - the potential of the song lies in its dynamics, I think, and those definitely leave something to be desired) and so it’s somewhat weaker. Still better than your average metal/non-Maiden/Maiden fan will tell you.
It has its share of classics, Futureal is positively amazing, Como Estais Amigos is an astonishing ballad once again using Blaze’s different voice to achieve greatness and TEF a WTWC are always welcome on my setlist.
So, great, if uneven.
I don’t think Bruce would have helped, though.

Thanks to this thread, I’ve heard Virus for the first time. Great song. Should have put it on VXI instead of Stranger.

I still have to try out Blaze solo, but talking about his abilities as a singer… He couldn’t tour with Maiden (for which I don’t blame him - to sing Bruce’s songs every day on two prolonged tours in a row and to be consistently great at that is not something I would expect from every singer), but his voice is very pleasant (there are times his voice sounds more pleasant to my ears than Bruce - usually after finishing TFF) and from what I’ve heard people love his solo career. So it's on to Silicon Messiah now!
 
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