Brave New World has no fillers. The Mercenary and The Fallen Angel are great tunes. Dance of Death, however, has mediocre tunes (Wildest Dreams, Montsegur, Face in the Sand) and poor tunes (Age of Innocence and New Frontier).
See, I simply disagree with you on most of this. The Mercenary and The Fallen Angel both are very repetitive and feel like they are just to make the song long enough (The Mercenary to a worse degree, I do give The Fallen Angel credit for having 3 solos). I agree that Wildest Dreams is mediocre, though I would place it above The Mercenary and near to but above The Fallen Angel.
The other two you brought up as mediocre are both songs that I love quite a bit. Face in the Sand has a great atmosphere, excellent lyrics, and is overall just a great, desperate sounding song (which fits it to the lyrics). Probably top 50 for me (I don't have a ranking written down, but it's 3rd on the album for me behind the obvious two). As for Montségur, this is one that I feel gets maligned far too often, it's probably not top 50 for me but not too far out either. Once again, the lyrics are quite good except the repetitive chorus, which is not nearly as annoying to me as The Mercenary's repetitive chorus, and the vocal melodies on the verse that includes the line "laugh at the darkness and in god we trust" are simply divine in my opinion. I have moments where I almost understand the complaint of it sounding too happy, but I fall short of agreeing, partly because overall, the song is way heavier than most Maiden songs.
Once again, I don't agree that Age of Innocence is poor. I think that while there's nothing too special about it, it is a fairly average mid-length Maiden song, with a heavier mid section which I personally like, though I've seen people say they don't (the part where Bruce uses raspy vocals, "you can't protect yourself…"), and lyrics that are relevant and though you may personally disagree with them, not poorly written.
New Frontier is the worst song on the album, but it has a catchy riff and vocal melodies that I like. I certainly would rather have New Frontier than The Mercenary, and it's close to The Fallen Angel, probably just a bit below.
I do quite like Gates of Tomorrow and No More Lies, and I love Paschendale, Rainmaker, Dance of Death, and Journeyman, but that's only a bit more than half the album.
I do like Gates of Tomorrow, though I think it is too unremarkable to get a high ranking relative to the album. I used to like No More Lies a lot, but the over-repetition (in my opinion) of the chorus has dragged it down a bit for me, though I still like it. Paschendale, Rainmaker, Dance of Death and Journeyman are unquestionably classics.
To be fair, though, I haven't heard Face in the Sand and New Frontier in a long time, and they could be better than I remembered them. I listen to them later today.
Definitely give Face in the Sand another fair listen, and think about the overall message of the lyrics when considering the music and the tone of the song.
For those who are curious, since I've commented on the majority of the songs on the album now, here is my ranking of Dance of Death songs:
1. Paschendale - obvious classic
2. Dance of Death - another classic, I had this above PFD for a short time but I corrected my heresy
3. Face in the Sand - I find myself struggling to comprehend the idea of this song as anything but excellent and atmospheric
4. Journeyman - great change of pace, executed well
5. Montségur - heavy song with good lyrics and vocals
6. Rainmaker - the 2000s version of a classic Maiden rocker
7. The Age of Innocence - not as bad as people think, interesting middle section, nothing else remarkable
8. No More Lies - repetitive chorus but good verses
9. Gates of Tomorrow - has good parts but the whole is not excellent
10. Wildest Dreams - a bit cheesy, but I personally like this variety of cheese
11. New Frontier - not anything special besides catchiness
