Maiden-culture...

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Hi,
I've been reading a bit the forum and I must admit I've learned a lot about ideas and ispiration behind most Maiden songs, though I've always loved their music without paying much attention to their "cultural" aspects...
Now my question is: how important do you think that is in making Maiden special ?

I would love to hear what you think!
Cheers
 
I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "cultural aspects". It sounds to me like you're asking about the relative importance of lyrics vs. music.

If that is indeed what you mean, then - for me personally - the music is much, much more important. I'm a musician, and I want to hear impressive musicianship.

Good lyrics are a bonus that can improve a good song, but it is rare indeed that good lyrics can save a song from bad music.

On the other hand, bad lyrics rarely ruin good music. The only such occasions are when the lyrics are offensive, or just simply incredibly stupid. (One of those rare occasions is "Hooks In You": a song which is musically acceptable perhaps, but lyrically dumb as a rock.)


However, you might be asking about the importance of knowing the background behind Maiden lyrics. For instance, does "Paschendale" seem better if you know it's about Third Battle of Ypres, and you know some things about that battle?

For me: perhaps, but not necessarily. Again using the example of "Paschendale": Since the very first time I heard that song, I've thought it was Maiden's all-time best song. Learning the background of it made it seem slightly more impressive, but I would have held it in high regard even if I had remained ignorant.

What about a song that I don't regard quite as highly ... say, "Tailgunner". I find this song listenable but nowhere near great. Did my opinion of it change after learning about tailgunners and the bombing of Dresden? No. Just because I understand the lyrics better doesn't mean I think the song is any better.

Knowing more about the subject of the lyrics may be interesting, but it almost never impacts my opinion of the song.
 
And as is commonly known, I hold an opposite opinion on music to SMX's.  To me, lyrics are the centrepieces of modern music, around which the melody and instruments arrange to reinforce the attitudes and ideas spouted therein.  However, to each their own, and we all have to take what we want from music, right?  However, I agree - bad music cannot be reclaimed by good lyrics.

I do think that the cultural influence is present in many Maiden songs - consider the quasi-Arabic sounds of The Nomad, for instance.  It's likely (considering Dave Murray and Steve Harris were the authors) that the music was created first and that the lyrics were written about the song, but I still thoroughly enjoy it and I think that openness to other cultures can certainly inspire both aspects of music.

Personally, I think the great amount of culture shown by, not just Iron Maiden, but many of my favourite metal bands is a very relieving break from mainstream music.  A lot of bands are tied into culture: Maiden, for instance, seems to enjoy writing about history (Paschendale), politics (2 Minutes to Midnight), and literature (Brave New World).  Iced Earth is popularly influenced by works of horror both classical (Horror Show) and contemporary (Dark Saga), as well as history (The Glorious Burden).  Bruce has some amazing songs in similar veins, like the original Wicker Man, Silver Wings (fuck, that song is aces), and of course his own personal literary trends in the entire Chemical Wedding album.

It's very interesting and fantastic and I highly recommend you read through the Commentary and the Wiki for more information and cultural interpretations...
 
It depends. Good lyrics are like the icing on a cake. For example, The Thin Line Between Love And Hate is, in my opinion, by all means a brilliant piece of music. It would be an incredible instrumental. But, the lyrics are wonderful, and they make the song better.

I prefer poetic lyrics about such things about emotions, love, hate, suffering, melancholy or whatever to anything else; Believe it or not, although I am a historian, I don't like the concept of history as a subject of a song. Granted, sometimes it works (Aces High, Paschendale or The Longest Day), but in my opinion, these only use a historical event as the background for describing an experience- whatever it may be. To me, Alexander The Great, Tailgunner or Montségur don't rip it lyric-wise, although they are good, musically. If I want to learn about the past, I read a book. If I want to hear someone else's interpretation of the experience, I turn to things like songs.
 
Well, with the exception of Paschendale, Steve's best lyrics are about emotional subjects - Dream of Mirrors, Hallowed Be Thy Name come to mind.  But there are some songs about history that are gorgeously done, not even about history - Brighter Than A Thousand Suns is a way in which the written lyrics evolve the notion of historical events into this incredibly sad saga of man's race to become stronger than nature.

But it all comes down to this thing: what is written first, for each song, and what do the authors think while writing the lyrics or music?  I mean, to use the case of Paschendale, it's documented that as H was writing the music, he was reading all these books on the Battle, and about the First World War, and when Steve started writing the lyrics, he pulled from that as well (one of the reasons that makes this song so perfect in every way).  But when, say, Ghost of the Navigator was written, it's more of a hash of several ideas from a couple different writers, still a great song, but not with the grounds-up construction of some of the other songs.
 
Well, when I was saying "culture" I was mainly referring to history, literature and stuff, but maybe I should explain better what I mean by "special":
for me a band is special when I feel I have a deep connection with what they do, something that makes me say "hey, this is MY band!". I love a lot of bands, but for very few of them I feel they are a part of me.
I've always been intrigued to know how such a deep relationship is created and what it depends on...
As I've seen that here the level of the discussion is rarely shallow, I thought it was the right place and I'll ask: what do you think about this guys?
 
I agree that lyrics can be the icing on the cake. Sometimes they even mean more than just the icing, because they can make the music stronger:

Rime of the Ancient Mariner contains for me the best music that fits to "a" subject. The atmosphere, the threatening moods.. Those feelings when listening to this track, would be half as much, if I wouldn't know the background of it.

Brighter Than A Thousand Suns contains perhaps the best lyrics Bruce ever wrote! These lyrics are not the icing on the cake, they're almost the cake itself! These lyrics are terrifying and they work.

..or weaker:

For me, Montsegur's melodies are way too happy for the lyrics. Thus my opinion on the song is influenced very much by the combination of the lyrics and music.

Further I can understand it when someone says lyrics don't influence that much:
-The aggression of Prowler still stands for me if the song would be about a nun, lost in a labyrinth.
-22 Acacia Avenue could have been about a medieval fortress on that address, and I would have liked it as much.
-Bruce said that his worst Maiden lyrics are in Run Silent Run Deep. I don't give a rats ass about these lyrics, I never understood them that well. However I love the music!

I never gave much heed to Iced Earth's fantasy lyrics, e.g. Dark Saga or SWTWC. I liked the historian lyrics of Gettysburg and the dark and angry lyrics of Burnt Offerings. In the beginning I didn't care for the monster lyrics from Horror Show, but after seeing some good ol' horror films I find these lyrics way more important.

Judas Priest's Turbo album is another story. I actually do like more than the half of these catchy (commercial-sounding) tunes, but I guess the lyrics were the tricker to pull the pants of most metalheads. I mean, Parental Guidance, Private Property, Hot For Love... dreadful subjects to sing about in hardrock, in my humble opinion. However, I do like the vocals and music in e.g. Hot For Love. It's a weird experience to listen to this album.


BuriedOnPlanetDune said:
Well, when I was saying "culture" I was mainly referring to history, literature and stuff, but maybe I should explain better what I mean by "special":
for me a band is special when I feel I have a deep connection with what they do, something that makes me say "hey, this is MY band!". I love a lot of bands, but for very few of them I feel they are a part of me.
I've always been intrigued to know how such a deep relationship is created and what it depends on...
As I've seen that here the level of the discussion is rarely shallow, I thought it was the right place and I'll ask: what do you think about this guys?
Click to expand...

I like Maiden's non-comprimising attitude. Their dedication and their fire. The way they go for it on stage is just phenominal. Rush is the best band on stage, technically speaking, but Maiden is the best band on stage, spiritually speaking.
 
BuriedOnPlanetDune said:
...but maybe I should explain better what I mean by "special":
for me a band is special when I feel I have a deep connection with what they do, something that makes me say "hey, this is MY band!". I love a lot of bands, but for very few of them I feel they are a part of me.
I've always been intrigued to know how such a deep relationship is created and what it depends on...
Click to expand...
One thing is certain, that it is very rare that a band and its audience has such a relationship as Maiden does with their fans. This is quite possibly due to the way Maiden interacts with us (the fans) - so many times they have been criticised for paying too much attention to pleasing the fans and some have suggested that it has almost come to the point of selling out.

As an example, a few years ago I saw WASP at the Hammersmith Odeon in support of their Headless Children album. I was due to go with a friend but they had to pull out, so as a souvenir for them I stayed behind afterwards to get the bands autographs - bearing in mind this was not to long after a lot of people were unhappy with Metallica at the same venue for not bothering to sign some autographs to the waiting fans - they just got into a limo and drove off. Well, time was getting on but there was no sign of them - but 'Arry came walking out with his (then) wife, heading towards his parked car (how Rock n' Roll :D). He was instantly recognised and then mobbed by nearly half of the people waiting. He stayed chatting to a load of us until we all left - his wife got pissed off and stormed off to the car demanding the keys, but still he stayed and chatted. While this was happening, WASP came out in their limo and did a Metallica - I do remember seeing Blackie's face as  they drove past - I'm not sure he got the attention he may of expected because of 'Arry.

It's things like that that make them special.
 
I've found that while it doesn't necessarily affect my perception of Song X as good or bad, it does play a very important part. It might not automatically make it better or worse, but it can deepen the relationship I have with a song. For instance, as I read up on Paschendale, the imagery cemented and deepened the experience of listening to the song compared to when I was just "hearing it". It makes it more rewarding to relisten to songs when you find more ways to relate to them, through the added knowledge of the history behind them. But it doesn't necessarily make them better or worse, because usually I've made up my mind before I go into any real analysis of the lyrics.
 
The cultural impact of Maiden's music, at least as I perceive it, is that it can be educational.  Best example:  Until hearing Maiden's version of Rime of the Ancient Mariner in the eighth grade, I had never read Coleridge's poem.  Shortly afterward, I did a lengthy independent study school project on Coleridge's poetry.  I more recently read an excellent two-volume biography of Coleridge.  That is just one example -- the band's lyrics over the years have introduced me to a number of historical and literary subjects about which I previously knew little or nothing.  Here is a very nice article from the National Review, a conservative American political magazine, and hardly the typical forum for an article about a heavy metal band:  http://www.nationalreview.com/miller/mi ... asp.  The article is a few years old, written on the 20th anniversary of the Powerslave album.  The author is about my age, and his reaction as a young teen to that album, and to ROTAM in particular, was remarkably similar to mine. 

Of course, sometimes Iron Maiden's lyrics can be miseducational -- for example, elsewhere on this Board is documented the historical inaccuracies in "Alexander the Great" -- but if Maiden's lyrics stimulate you to further reading and you figure out the true facts on your own, there is inherent educational and cultural value in that, even if the lyrics may have got it wrong.  I will leave it to others to explain the historical value of Maiden's work.  In a shameless and self-aggrandizing plug of an earlier (relatively unread) thread I recently started, there are also a remarkable number of literary references in Iron Maiden's work, which I attempted to summarize in a "reading list."  Here is the link:  http://forum.maidenfans.com/index.php?t ... 7.0.  I am going back and reading (or in some cases, re-reading) a few of the books on this list, in part based on the fact that I enjoy the songs on which they are based. 
 
Well, I think that kinda gave me the idea...
before letting this thread die I would ask whether, among those "cultural songs", there is any that really gets through to you better than others and if you are able to explain why/how.
I'll start it off by saying that one of the songs I like most is The Flight of Icarus: Piece of Mind is one of the first tapes I've ever owned.
I was so young and I didn't even know much english but I still could feel raptured by the music and the heroic idea of the myth, that for me represented man's strive for overcoming its limitations and "flight high"...
What about you guys?
 
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