Blaze Bayley

They will be older the next year playing the same f***ing show. They made millions with the stadiums and festivals shows these years, They know it and they still want to do it. With the announcement of the 3rd leg. One word: Greed. Two words: Cabaret band. They were exposed to the world. The tour had been a success and they wanted to make more money playing the same 'shit'. Perhaps they feel obligated to play that show or pay the money back to the fans, promoters, etc…if they cancel, I don't know how that circus works. But the relationship of the band with the fans is not there.
Their website is shit, twitter and social media are non-existent and they just use it when they want to sell us something, books, beers, football uniforms (who the hell is going to buy that kind of shit?) A FClub forum and membership that is not worth it, an endless mobile game that even themselves have played it.

Well they are old guys, yes, and maybe we will have to hear how Nicko made the intro of Where Eagles Dare for one million times and how they waste their last years playing the same shit doing the same show.

Blaze is going old but he's working on new stuff, as I said before, He has been more productive in 5 years than Maiden in the last 15 or 20 years. He's got all my respect just for that.

Maiden's attitude throughout the pandemic has been really disappointing. After having boasted about the "special relationship they have with fans" (feel free to insert a Bruce Dickinson fan-related joke here), the radio silence during these challenging times has been deafening. It reinforces the idea that it all was a PR gimmick and nothing else coming from millionaires living in their ivory towers.
 
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Maiden releases by decades: The studio albums are decreasing

1980 - 1989: 7 studio albums + 1 Live Album
1990 - 1999: 4 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 2 compilations
2000 - 2009: 3 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 3 compilations
2010 - 2019: 2 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 1 compilation
2020 - ?: Can you guess the number? + 1 Live Album

It seems that Steve Harris burning ambition has gone out forever. Maybe they release the new album this year but I'm afraid it's going to be the last studio album.
 
Maiden releases by decades: The studio albums are decreasing

1980 - 1989: 7 studio albums + 1 Live Album
1990 - 1999: 4 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 2 compilations
2000 - 2009: 3 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 3 compilations
2010 - 2019: 2 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 1 compilation
2020 - ?: Can you guess the number? + 1 Live Album
Nice summary!
 
Maiden releases by decades: The studio albums are decreasing

1980 - 1989: 7 studio albums + 1 Live Album
1990 - 1999: 4 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 2 compilations
2000 - 2009: 3 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 3 compilations
2010 - 2019: 2 studio albums + 3 Live Albums + 1 compilation
2020 - ?: Can you guess the number? + 1 Live Album

It seems that Steve Harris burning ambition has gone out forever. Maybe they release the new album this year but I'm afraid it's going to be the last studio album.

Good news is they do not feel the need to release pointless compilations anymore. They probably were not selling as well as they expected them to.
 
As I wrote earlier, I admit being slightly skeptical about Blaze's more recent output... and he has been able to prove me wrong so far.

And yeah, I ordered War Within Me LP from his webshop. :) Been listening to it a bit more while driving to/from work and yeah, it's quite a good record indeed! Nothing absolutely mindblowing, but above-average heavy metal record that makes you feel very good! Sometimes good enough is... good enough!
 
I can't argue too much in what's been said in the last couple of pages. Blaze is clearly hungrier than Maiden these days (let's not grab the low hanging fruit of a weight joke with that, please), probably because he has to. I imagine he lives off his albums and tours, and certainly doesn't have a padded bank account like the Maiden boys. And clearly he cares about his fans much more than the Maiden boys do because he's acutely aware of the relatively small number of them there are, so he does everything he can to hold onto them.

As someone said earlier, Maiden are in their final lap of their career. They don't have anything to prove, and they don't have any incentive to do anything that isn't going to make them money. That's why they're holding onto the alleged 2019 album, because there isn't any money in the album itself, but there is in the tour that will go with it. And to be honest, I've never felt like Maiden has ever been a "fan's band" that has a good relationship with their fans. They don't, and for that reason they have no incentive to release the new album like so many other bands have during the pandemic. I'm sure they know it would be good PR, but they don't need good PR. This pandemic and the lack of pretty much anything apart from a so-so live album has proved they're a business in these final days, first and foremost. If they disappeared tomorrow, the boys would be just fine in retirement.
 
I honestly am howling laughing at a lot of these comments comparing Blaze to Maiden. I loved Blaze when the band first came out, two great albums and then the cracks began to show with losing Jeff Singer over playing Maiden covers, and the "pity me, pity me" lyrics of Blood and Belief, then losing the rest of his band. The next two albums are solid, and I particularly like Promise and Terror, but everything since then has been laughable.

Are people honestly telling me they would listen to those z-list albums if there was anyone but Blaze Bayley singing on them? Really bottom tier cliche metal that are incomparable to Silicon Messiah and especially Tenth Dimension.

I'd rather Maiden release good albums once in a blue moon, than disappear up their own arsehole like Blaze has done, I don't need the ego massaging of a live stream of Steve telling me that his life depends on the fans, or Janick and Dave doing a cockney knees up version of Don't Look to the Eyes of a Stranger featuring Thomas Zwijsen.
 
I honestly am howling laughing at a lot of these comments comparing Blaze to Maiden. I loved Blaze when the band first came out, two great albums and then the cracks began to show with losing Jeff Singer over playing Maiden covers, and the "pity me, pity me" lyrics of Blood and Belief, then losing the rest of his band. The next two albums are solid, and I particularly like Promise and Terror, but everything since then has been laughable.

Are people honestly telling me they would listen to those z-list albums if there was anyone but Blaze Bayley singing on them? Really bottom tier cliche metal that are incomparable to Silicon Messiah and especially Tenth Dimension.

I'd rather Maiden release good albums once in a blue moon, than disappear up their own arsehole like Blaze has done, I don't need the ego massaging of a live stream of Steve telling me that his life depends on the fans, or Janick and Dave doing a cockney knees up version of Don't Look to the Eyes of a Stranger featuring Thomas Zwijsen.
I agree with most of what you are saying about quality. Blaze has never matched that on a musical front with the possible two exceptions of Silicon Messiah and Tenth Dimension. The albums he has released since have not been groundbreaking but they have been solid. But hey that is my opinion. I wouldn't call them z-list though. You haven't heard some of the music that my students produce! (sorry that was mean)

My main gripe with Maiden these days is the complete transformation into a cabaret and product orientated band. It pains me to say that as they are the band that got me into music and the reason I am playing and teaching music 25 years later. I resect that it is the end of their career and they want to take it easy. But come on, they along with other bands around the world have shown that the fans are not at the top of the priority list. What about some archive releases? More rare footage of concerts that they have in their archives? They pulled some out for Download Festival. What not make the whole show available? They know they have a massive fanbase, many of which of hardcore fans. The fans would love it. I just feel that this type of thing would have continued the engagement with fans at a low cost to them. The stuff is there. Why not just release it?

I used to not whinge about things like this but seeing Blaze appears for interviews recently has made me realise how silent and inactive Maiden have been during this pandemic. They are not silent about flogging beer, games and book tours. They have been silent in releasing the things that people love them most for: the music. Ok they released a live album but it is not the greatest. They could have made a better album by releasing songs from multiple venues when you could have caught Bruce at his best (2018).
 
And me, who uses both streaming and physical releases to listen to music.

I suppose it’s possible that the band is banking on keeping archive material to themselves for as long as they are still around to release new studio and live material. When they hang up their coats, perhaps that’s when rare live shit and songs written, recorded, but never released see the light of day. Something to keep the legacy alive even when the band has disappeared.
 
And there are a couple of generations of old farts who still buy albums and in several formats.

A generation I proudly belong to! I think the writing was on the wall for our old ways as soon as the single ceased to be a going concern for Maiden.
 
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