Artist: Iron Maiden
Album Title: Annwyn
Release Date: 2028
Style: Folk Metal
Rating: Masterpiece
View attachment 25510
Nope. It was never intended to be. The last album of Maiden would come a year later and it's a concept album, in big part acoustic and down tempo. There are not one, not two but 3 instrumentals and many narrated passages in Welch languages. Kevin Shirley will be the producer but in an amazing turn of events the final co-producer will be Adrian Smith.
Maiden took a full 2 months to write and fully rehearse the songs in Bron-Yr-Aur, where Led Zeppelin conceived their fourth album. Then they took 1 more month to record the basic tracks in Battery studios, London with Kevin. There, co-producer is Steve. They then flew to Santorini where they took 2 weeks off with their families and clean their minds and reset their perspectives.
After the 2 weeks, they organised a few listening sessions the band only plus Kevin, deciding which parts to re-work what to cut what to add. And the did the unthinkable and re-record the album in Black Rock Studios. This time co-producer was Adrian, while Kevin was left alone to mix it without any interventions.
In many ways, this was the acoustic project Bruce wanted to do back in 1986, though by no means a full acoustic album. This would be the 19th studio album by Iron Maiden to fulfil a prophesy mentioning that Iron Maiden would release 19 Studio albums.
There will be only one single released from Annwyn, titled Gweir a 6 minute folk metal ballad. B' Side of the single a Maiden take of Dickinson's Jerusalem and in inspired cover of Jethro Tull's Bourée where Adrian plays the flute parts of Ian Anderson in unison with Dave and Janick the acoustic guitar. Maiden's Bourée has a fast instrumental electrical part in the middle.
All in all the album is hailed by critics but leaves the fans divided. A few years later it will be acknowledged by many as the most mature and noteworthy Maiden record ever.
