WAR
It’s all well and good deciding on concept of using our mobile game Legacy Of The Beast to provide the inspiration for a retrospective tour, the idea being to go through different worlds on stage – but how do you do that? Inspiration came when watching World War II in colour, see that “ack- ack” gun blasting away, see that webbing, that camouflage… Now if that stage production was covered with this, hiding the production for a second world, well… And if that were the case, you start with a military / war theme… and if you do that, what opens the show… has to be “Aces High”, of course it has…With the Churchill speech naturally… Let’s have a Spitfire then, close to full size, flying on stage… Then “Where Eagles Dare”… Love to watch Nicko on this song, As its time changes are so brilliant and tough for a drummer!!... We will need a gap after “Aces High” to remove the Spitfire without it being seen… Use the bit from the movie… No, hard to get permission from Clint Eastwood so Bruce makes an intro long enough to remove the Spitfire… Cool backdrop with the snow and cable car too… Ok, but if we have a war theme we should also include “2 Minutes to Midnight” and “The Trooper”… of course, classic backdrops too… And wouldn’t “The Clansman” be great here? – Underrated song, very strong, different pace… PERFECT, and we can do really strong backdrop for this too.
RELIGION
And then we remove the camouflage, what should we see… lets talk to “Hangman” about designing a massive cathedral on stage .. so our World No.2 will be “Relligion”, with the removal of the webbing revealing a spectacular scene coloured by amazing stained glass windows – Let’s put Eddie in few but don’t overdo it…! We will need a long intro for the next song to make a changeover. Lets try to make it sound like the structure is grinding up out to the ground, tectonic plates rumbling… And what song to go into … “Revelations” is perfect, great lyrics and build and drama… So what else for religion?... Let’s do “For The Greater Good Of God” – A real musical extravaganza and a cornerstone of the set , sweeping and Majestic! Lets go a bit Pagan too, religion in the broadest sense, and lift the tempo again too with “The Wicker Man”. Also adds another great backdrop!... And then a real surprise… “Sign Of The Cross” is another overlooked classic, but not anymore!! … Let”s have that in … The pyro looks so great up there in the lighting rig too, Another dimension…. Bruce was delighted we included “Flight Of Icarus”… A song we hadn’t played since 1986. He wanted a huge Icarus model to hang at the back… Look so great and when it is deflated, it actually collapses naturally in such a sad and emotive way… By keeping the stained glass window arches but replacing the windows with black and with special lighting, we actually made the stage set for this look very Grecian, which was a bonus world for us , World No. 2.5!... Next? Well of course “Fear Of The Dark” had to be included as it’s such a communal song for us and the fans now.
HELL
And so into the 3rd and final world and of course , it just had to be … HELL!... We had to accommodate “The Number Of The Beast” and of course it works for “Iron Maiden” too. Which , as you well know we always close the set with. So the whole scene transformed again for this final set piece … Strange creatures appeared in the arches, the chandeliers came down again , aflame, gargoyles appeared on stage and a backdrop “Into the jaws of Hell” appeared. And the pyro hell…Looked Great! The backdrop changed for “Iron Maiden” and then naturally a monstrous Eddie devil head appeared, as it is tradition, for the end of the song, staring around over the fans. Then of course we really had to include “The Evil That Man Do”, “Hallowed Be Thy Name” and “Run To The Hills” for you guys as the encores – We do hope you all enjoyed the setlist as much as the band loved playing it.