NO PRAYER FOR THE DYING - Your thoughts…

After 7Son this album is a total let down. Songwriting wise and production wise. Beginning of the new bronze? tin? lead? era, end of the Golden Age, etc. I think (behind the curtains) this album may be influenced by what was popular at the time. Guns 'N Roses, etc. A nose dive of the Mighty. Also, Adrian left which is a major minus. In retrospect we all see, that Steve should have listened to Adrian, to continue Maiden in a more progressive direction, but Steve being Steve fucked all up (this time, other times he, as creative Mastermind, was Great) Spin in it all you want, this album marks the beginning of Maiden decline.
No Prayer for the Dying song is very good. Mother... musically is good but lyrics from today's perspective are atrocious. Tailgunner is poor man's Aces High. Do we need poor man's Aces? Bring Your Daughter... may be silly but it's good. It's fun. The Assassin is a filler song. Hooks in You has grown very much on me in recent times.
 
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michaellegge said:
Well, it is. It’s just not the original cover. Is that your only thought?
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It's a decent 7/10 album, the second best of the 90s. It's not Maiden at it's best, especially lyrically, but it's solid enough and consistent, which makes me appreciate it more than Fear of the Dark and Virtual XI, both albums that have much better high points than NPFTD, but are nowhere near as consistent or coherent.
 
For me the worst iron maiden albums
1.Dance of death
2.No prayer for thr dying
3.Virtual Xi
I cant name xfactor with that albums,beacuse xfactor is an awesome album different of any of their discography
 
I don't love it, but I don't think it's a bad album. I enjoy it, it's a medium album by Maiden's standards, but a very nice-to-good one - with some good ideas, playing(!) and stuff. The problems? Production (but not melodies/solos or bass in the mix) and some of the material. It can't shine all the way.
Overall I think the album is consistent, but some parts are weak (mainly the choruses). Actually, except for a couple of songs, the material is quite nice, solid (enough) and effective (title track, a gem, Tailgunner, Fates, Run Silent, Daughter and the music of Assassin and the closer). Following SSOASS was also not kind, although some of the ideas and even the sound (riffs, drums or parts to some extent) can be linked with the 80's style/vibe of the band. Tailgunner was a ''new'' riffing for the band, the rest is more or less classic NWOBHM vibe/style. It was a time for a weaker album by the band, like with any band.

It's clear it's not Maiden at their best, they needed more time (yep, music and lyrics wise) and some other ideas. Even the cover! Plus no Adrian and no songwriting help from Janick, that's important too. Songs like Tailgunner, Hooks, Assassin, the closer... Holy Smoke... feel run of the mill material. I've always wondered if 2-3 longer songs (at the level of the album) would have helped it. Like to have some standouts (and I assume interesting) and complex material, although that wasn't the band's intention.

I think they managed to execute their idea for a stripped/raw approach better with the next album (with some exceptions) and maybe after an album like SSOASS they really needed something different, but Adrian was probably right. It was all good. They should have tried the experimental approach for one more album, given the success of the previous 2. But not material like Hooks In You or his ASAP stuff. He probably didn't record any solos or parts for it?
What happened? They/Steve/Bruce wanted to follow the sign of the times, like with the next album. I mean, Steve is a prog fan! What else.
Adrian said he didn't like the approach and the heavy material, but unless it's because of the production, I don't think the material is that heavy. Heavier and early days vibe, yes. Although why would the band want to go back to their roots instead of POM? I guess both are fitting. Anyway, I think the right thing was to follow SSOASS up with indeed something heavier (but melodic and not that different from their style - Bruce's AOB is a perfect example) to make a statement and continue to develop their sound. Although I guess it was necessary for them to go through this hard rock phase as musicians, but not for 2 albums. More for FOTD though (No Prayer is more Maiden for sure; from Fear, 5 pure songs). It just wasn't their thing. With a heavier album after SSOASS, material like for TXF will also be fitting for a continuation.
 
I really don't like No Prayer. I will forever maintain that a band "going back to their roots" results in a bad album filled with average-at-best songs 99.9% of the time. NPFTD is no exception to that. Maybe I would like it more if it had better production. That would at least give the songs a little more life. I also really don't like the raspy singing style Bruce was going for at this time. It reminds me of Axl Rose (this is not a compliment).

That said, I do like the No Prayer for the Dying (the song) and BYDTTS. Mother Russia is okay too. I like Tailgunner & Holy Smoke less than I used to, but they're still some of the better songs on the album.
 
Good album, far from their worst. It is in their upper middle tier for me. Some lackluster tracks, but also some very good stuff. Titletrack, Holy Smoke, Mother Russia, Run Silent, Daughter... all pretty good. Assassin is decent. FOTD is better, XF too, but NPFTD is still better than everything post BNW.
I really dont see where all this dislike is coming from. Production is a bit stale, but still better than on at least 4 other maiden albums.
Oh, and only the original cover rocks. The re release version can kiss my ass.
 
One of the main problems of No Prayer is that it comes after a list of very good/excellent/legendary albums. And also compared to the one that followed, as a whole it may be better but it has no stand out tracks whereas FotD has the title track, Afraid and Be quick . So I think that most of the time, its not the album I'm gonna run to listen to it but when I do, I think its not as bad as the general opinion may say.
Tailgunner is guite a good track, No prayer for the dying seems like a shorter version of Infinite dreams, Run silent run deep is an excellent song with a very good instrumental passage. And Mother Russia, despite the lyrics, musically speaking is quite good as well. It remembers me of a more simple and direct version of 7th son, the title track.
So as a whole it is better than some albums but the fact that there are no stand out tracks, that Maiden forgot about the album very quickly (and their odd choice of the songs they've played during that tour? Really, playing Public Enema Number One, Hooks in You but not playing Run Silent Run Deep?!?!) is, at least for me one of the reasons this album has this "bad" reputation
 
Azas said:
I think (behind the curtains) this album may be influenced by what was popular at the time. Guns 'N Roses, etc.
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I too have thought No Prayer is a reaction to the boom of Guns 'N Roses. I mentioned this elsewhere, but it's possible Slash's public statements about going onstage with ridiculous icebergs maybe caused the band to rethink their overly theatrical approach. The sound was raw and dirty, Bruce is rasping as much as he's singing, and the lyrical topics are, by and large, far more contemporary than what the band was known for at the time--not to mention once on tour, the theatricality was stripped way back. Who knows.

As for my thoughts on the album, it's one that's grown on me. I don't hate it, I don't reeeeally love it, but I like it a lot. Of the two '90s Bruce albums, I go back to Fear a ton more...but that's also the timeframe of when I got into the band, so that may be a factor.

Eddie's Uncle said:
Paschendale is pretty much the only thing that saves DOD from being their worst album (which is Final Frontier).
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Final Frontier is odd to me. I just did my annual relisten of the whole catalogue, and there's some legitimately great stuff on there. The title track, El Dorado, Isle of Avalon, The Talisman, Starblind...but it's baffling that the album as a whole never really clicked with me like so many others did. I never really get the urge to listen to it, and when I do, I never come away thinking I was wrong to be...largely unaffected by it.
 
I think my most recent post on the album still holds true regarding what I think of it:

Perun said:
People keep talking about NPFTD as if it were some disfigured freak in the attic whose true personality needs to be appreciated or a well-meaning but crazy experiment resulting in a nuclear meltdown. I sometimes wonder if people really listened to the album. It's not the 180° turn or bare-to-the-bones rock 'n' roll strip people keep making it out to be. Just because Maiden used amp stacks for stage backdrops during the tour doesn't mean this is what the album really is like.

Let's take a close look at what is "different" with NPFTD:

1. Bruce has a raspier singing style on most songs. Okay, it makes for a different sound on the surface. However, if you're being really honest, the difference is not as pronounced between SSOASS and NPFTD than between NPFTD and FOTD. The latter is the one where we really lose Bruce on a few tracks.

2. The synths are toned down. Now, let's take a long, good look at this one. Maiden were never a "synth" band. Synths were an eleventh-hour addition to SIT, and they make absolutely no difference in the songwriting there. They add to the flavour of the album, but that's it. Nowhere are they actually integral to the songs there. Except, maybe, on Sea of Madness. On SSOASS, it's actually much of the same. The only two songs that make heavy use of the keyboards are Moonchild and the title track, and only the title track really puts them in prominent focus throughout. That's it. NPFTD also has synths, as people like to overlook. FFS, listen to Fates Warning or Mother Russia and tell me these songs doesn't feed off synths or studio magic.

3. A lot of people claim the album has a different or "back to the roots" approach to songwriting. I strongly contest this. Fates Warning sounds like it was written for SSOASS and it probably was. Run Silent Run Deep is a confirmed Bruce track from the SIT sessions and it shows. Public Enema Number One would be a good fit on either album, probably even more on SIT. The Assassin takes a few cues from the Di'anno era in the intro and song structure, but if you listen to the instrumental section, you can hear a lot of SSOASS on there as well. The guitars underneath the verses are bona fide SSOASS minus the echo effect. The only difference between Mother Russia and the Maiden epics on preceding albums is that it's played faster and is thus shorter; the Russian march tune is something entirely new but recalls similar experiments from Alexander the Great. BYDTTS is a different avenue that Bruce explored and has nothing to do with the Di'anno era IMO. Hooks in You is an AOR song as Adrian wrote for ASAP. Again, listen to the guitars in the chorus. Or the chorus overall. Holy Smoke sounds more like Can I Play With Madness than most people would care to admit. It's in the interplay of bass and guitars. Tailgunner is just about the only song that sounds like nothing they did in the preceding five years, and it has some cues from Killers, the song. The chorus on the other hand is a completely new beast. Not to mention the instrumental section has so much from the SIT and SSOASS era that it's not funny anymore. This isn't POTO or Wrathchild guys, no matter how much you want to believe it.
So what do we have from the songwriting: The intro of the Assassin and some parts of Tailgunner that are direct callbacks to the Di'anno era, some AOR in Hooks in You, and a sidestep with BYDTTS, and the rest really sounds like a progression from SSOASS if you care to pay actual attention to the music.

4. The lyrics: I'll be brief about this, because they have no consequence for the music and don't actually matter. If you switched the lyrics of Mother Russia and Alexander the Great, both would still be the same songs. People argue NPFTD is a more "serious" or "political" or whatever album. Again, I call bullshit on this. There are exactly three topical songs on NPFTD: Holy Smoke, Public Enema Number One and Mother Russia. This is more than on all preceding albums, I agree, but it's still only three of ten songs. The title track and Fates Warning are of the same introspective theme as the whole SIT album. Arguably, The Assassin, Hooks in You and BYDTTS are callbacks to the general vibes of the Di'anno era (sex, violence, horror), but of these, I think only The Assassin really goes down to the simplicity and naivety of that time. The other two are clear and unmistakable Bruce lyrics, going down whatever avenues he wishes to explore. Read his Iffy Boatrace books if you think this is the first time he came up with this sort of stuff. Finally, we have Tailgunner and Run Silent Run Deep, which on the one hand deal with the WW2 topic that Maiden have done before, but at least in the case of the former give it a new and critical spin that goes very far from the glorifying storytelling approach of previous war songs.

5. Sound and production: This is where I see the only really great departure from previous albums. It's a big issue obviously, because what else is music if not sound, but I think it has led to great misjudgements about the songs, their writing and their influences. I'll say it how I see it: The production sucks and NPFTD sounds bad when compared to the preceding Martin Birch albums (This is my opinion. I am not saying it should be yours). There are a lot of poor calls here, most importantly the volume of individual instruments in the mix and the speed with which everything is played. Both are characteristic features of live performances and mix, so yeah, the decision to give it a "live sound" is where you could argue the album falls apart if you want to make this argument (if you do not think the album falls apart, I am not here to tell you it does, and I am not saying you should think it does). If it were not played as breathlessly and was given the same sound as SSOASS (I'm not an engineer or producer, I don't know the proper terminology), we'd probably be wondering what all the fuss is about.

Now, in my very own personal opinion that I do not ask you to share or agree with, NPFTD is a below-average Maiden album. I personally think it has a few poor songs and the production harms it a lot, but I do not think it is a bad album. However, whether we agree or not on it's quality, let's stop fantasising about what it is and isn't, and just actually listen to the music.
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