Maiden albums you can’t get into?

CA Bryers said:
The album I still can't get into no matter how hard I try is TFF. The album kind of feels split between the two halves too--shorter songs up front, and then a bunch of longer epics bringing up the rear, but even most of those I like rather than love.

I had a really hard time with TXF like many here, and back then I had a lot more free time to put in the effort to get into it. Virtual XI was easier, since by then I liked Blaze a lot, and his performance was less drony than what came across in TXF and had more fire (though nowhere near as much fire as he had in the Wolfsbane days). Book of Souls was a bit tough too since it's overlong, patchy, and Bruce strains waaaay too much for my taste, but hey, a lot of people don't seem to hear it even on the latest tours, so maybe I'm wrong. <_<
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KidInTheDark666 said:
I think that it's interesting how some people who like AMOLAD find TFF bad or hard to get into. Sure, the albums have a slightly different sound and TFF has some experimental stuff on it but at the end of the day, the albums are songwriting- and performance-wise pretty similar. At least in my opinion. I personally love both albums.
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Yes, I do agree with your comments about Bruce's vocals in more recent times. I think he's a bit 'waily' on BOS and the last two tours. Actually, I think his 'wailiest' vocal is The Talisman, from TFF (an album which I really love, I must say). But all things considered (including throat cancer) I still think Bruce sounds great.
 
Brigantium said:
If I was going to pick a 'weakest' I'd go for TFF, but yes, I also see BNW as having a great start followed by some solid but not entirely inspiring and stand out stuff. Except maybe for that really nice instrumental that was wholly stolen.
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Which bit was that?
 
The Red and the Black said:
I’ve always struggled greatly with The X Factor. When I first heard it, I just couldn’t accept Blaze and his voice. It hasn’t really grown on me much over the years. I actually find Virtual XI much more listenable. It’s still Blaze, but the songs are poppier.

I also struggle with A Matter of Life and Death. It’s like a long gray muddy-sounding blob of slow meandering music that never really comes alive for me. I still hope to someday get into it.

I love everything else by Maiden.
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Agree with you about AMOLAD. I've gotten into it a little more in recent times (The Pilgrim is phenomenal) but I find it a really tough and grim listen. The preponderance of lyrically heavy songs about war what I have trouble with, I think. And yes, I know Maiden have no shortage of songs about grim stuff, but I always felt there was a dash of humour laced in there, of not taking themselves too seriously.
 
Brigantium said:
The Nomad. :bigsmile:
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But which song/artist have they 'borrowed' it from?
Ok, I did some research and heard Life's Shadow by Beckett. IMHO it's pretty conclusive- lyrics lifted almost verbatim and placed in 'Hallowed' and instrumental section lifted almost note for note and used in Nomad. What would possess Maiden to do this? it's not as if they can't write their own great music. And why do this when they have already previously covered Rainbow's Gold by the same band? It's baffling.
 
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RueMorgue said:
Yes, I do agree with your comments about Bruce's vocals in more recent times. I think he's a bit 'waily' on BOS and the last two tours. Actually, I think his 'wailiest' vocal is The Talisman, from TFF (an album which I really love, I must say). But all things considered (including throat cancer) I still think Bruce sounds great.
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If you look at the state of a lot of his peers in the metal scene who've hung around to this day, the way Bruce's voice is holding up is phenomenal in comparison. He's still got enormous power and his stamina onstage is second to none, but he's in his sixties now and a cancer survivor. Of course he's not going to sound as good as he did--hell, I still think he sounded great up until the mid-2010s. I'd never suggest he's gotten cringey bad the way Paul Stanley or DLR have gotten to the point he should hang it up--he's still very much holding his own.

I do wish they'd tune things down for him though (just like I wish they'd have done for Blaze on the Bruce stuff, but that's another discussion). Even on TFF and more so on BoS in the studio he was probably a little too ambitious for what his voice was capable of range-wise, let alone in a live setting. Down tuning would produce a lot less of the strain you hear in his voice and give him a bit more longevity as far as how long he plans to keep performing, I think, but you can tell in interviews that Bruce still takes a lot of pride in his voice and his ability to sing things the way they were recorded.
 
CA Bryers said:
If you look at the state of a lot of his peers in the metal scene who've hung around to this day, the way Bruce's voice is holding up is phenomenal in comparison. He's still got enormous power and his stamina onstage is second to none, but he's in his sixties now and a cancer survivor. Of course he's not going to sound as good as he did--hell, I still think he sounded great up until the mid-2010s. I'd never suggest he's gotten cringey bad the way Paul Stanley or DLR have gotten to the point he should hang it up--he's still very much holding his own.

I do wish they'd tune things down for him though (just like I wish they'd have done for Blaze on the Bruce stuff, but that's another discussion). Even on TFF and more so on BoS in the studio he was probably a little too ambitious for what his voice was capable of range-wise, let alone in a live setting. Down tuning would produce a lot less of the strain you hear in his voice and give him a bit more longevity as far as how long he plans to keep performing, I think, but you can tell in interviews that Bruce still takes a lot of pride in his voice and his ability to sing things the way they were recorded.
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I think the aspect of his voice that decreased the most is not his range, but his lung capacity. I mean nowadays even the last "loooow yeaaaaah" in the intro of HBTN is split in two. Also, his pronunciation on busy lines became weird after his cancer, which is understandable.
But he is still very good for his age and enjoyable to listen to.
 
I tried something last night: I pulled all of my Maiden vinyls off the shelf, removed the shrink wrap, and took the vinyls out of their sleeves. There's a small hole in the middle of each vinyl and, as it turns out, I couldn't squeeze into any of them with any part of myself. And before you say "bullshit, you didn't even try!" I want to reassure you that I absolutely did. Now, my hair is buzzed pretty close so it's not long enough, but I do think if my hair was longer I could take a small amount of hair strands and thread them through the hole. My son has long hair and, if folks are interested in the results, I can try to have him do it.

Additionally, when the albums were out of their sleeve, I tried to crawl into their empty jackets, to no avail. I could put my hand in there, but I'm curious what people would think if they saw my hand in the album sleeve without the vinyl. I don't know. I could jam fingernail clippings and other fall-offs from my corpus and put them into the sleeve, maybe even with the vinyl in it, but I risk scratching and ruining the vinyl. I'm not sure what else to do.

TLDR; I literally cannot get into any Iron Maiden album.
 
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