The crazy thing about TBOS to me is that it reached double album length with Steve Harris taking a less active role than on the previous two albums and without any epics by Adrian Smith. On TFF we got 5 epics, 2 of which had Smith’s involvement, and all 5 having Harris’ involvement (including When the Wild Wind Blows which was all Harris). On TBOS, we have 5 songs that exceed the 7 minute mark, although imo only 3 really have that epic feel: The Book of Souls, Empire of the Clouds, and The Red and the Black (and even TRATB feels more like an extended instrumental jam at times). Overall, I find that TBOS is actually a little heavier on the short rockers than previous albums, despite containing two songs that eclipse Rime.
So with all that being said, I’m curious what Maiden’s trajectory will be on this album. Adrian indicated after TFF that he may have been interested in writing shorter songs on the next album, it also seemed that he was a little disappointed with the production choices on TFF and may be less interested in experimenting musically as a result of that. But I would love to get one more proggy epic from him, he does them best IMO.
I think we can assume an acoustic type of epic from Janick, those seem to continue growing in length.
I would say an epic from Dave is unusual but not impossible (see The Man Who Would Be King).
Bruce clearly sees Maiden as more and more of a creative vehicle, I would love to see at least one other Dickinson penned tune on the album, but any of his influence on the material is a positive (IESF and Speed of Light is perhaps the best 1 -2 punch of the reunion era).
Steve is the wild card here. I expect he will go back to having a heavy hand in all the songs (probably writing credits on every track) and we can probably assume a Harris epic that will at least exceed the length of TRATB (they progressively get longer each album). I think speculation that he may want to “outdo” Bruce with Empire of the Clouds is in line with the friendly competition element between the two. It’s also probably a rite of passage for a hardcore prog fan like Steve to write a sidelong epic.
So if Steve goes back to writing more and everybody’s involvement stays more or less the same, I expect an album that exceeds TFF in length, which will put it in double album territory, and possibly exceeding TBOS as well.
I wonder if an admin should start a locked thread for it on Wednesday. Maybe call it something like "Thread to be opened for the Belshazzar's Feast announcement on the 15th". Admins, what do you think? Or were you planning something like that?
