rate all 17 Maiden albums best to worst

MindRuler said:
Hmmm
Be Quick, Strangers, Judas, Childhood´s End and title track. That's 5.
Click to expand...

Be Quick, Strangers, Wasting Love, Fugitive, Childhood, Judas, Fear. Weekend Warrior is also good and underrated. FHTE is weird for Maiden, and a rip off, but still a good song.

Admittedly, the rest of the songs is very bad.
 
Vaenyr said:
AMOLAD has 10 bangers, but that's the great thing about opinions.
Click to expand...
The strength of AMOLAD is consistence. Most Maiden albums have both strong highlights and poor lowpoints. AMOLAD does not, it has pretty much the same level throughout the entire album. Very hard to pick most/least favourite from that album. I consider that a plus that FOTD does not have.
However, the consistent level is not that great. It's satisfactory. No less, but no more either. No ecstatic songs here, and the true bangers on FOTD are stronger than anything on AMOLAD.
 
1. Iron Maiden
2. Somewhere in time
3. Killers
4. Powerslave
5. The X Factor
6. Senjutsu
7. The number of the beast
8. A matter of life and death
9. Piece of mind
10. Dance of death
11. Seventh son of a seventh son
12. Brave new world
13. Virtual XI
14. The book of souls
15. No prayer for the dying
16. Fear of the dark
17. The final frontier
 
1. A Matter of Life and Death
2. The Number of the Beast
3. Powerslave
4. Seventh Son of a Seventh Son
5. Piece of Mind
6. Somewhere in Time
7. Brave New World
8. Killers
9. Senjutsu
10. Dance of Death
11. The X Factor
12. The Book of Souls
13. The Final Frontier
14. Iron Maiden
15. No Prayer For the Dying
16. Fear of the Dark
17. Virtual XI

Bottom three is absolute. Ranking from 11th to 14th was damn hard. I changed the order several times.
 
Vaenyr said:
Can't believe I missed that thread originally. Behold!

01. Virtual XI
02. A Matter Of Life And Death
03. Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son
04. Dance Of Death
05. Fear Of The Dark
06. Brave New World
07. Senjutsu
08. The Book Of Souls
09. No Prayer For The Dying
10. Somewhere In Time
11. The X Factor
12. Powerslave
13. Piece Of Mind
14. The Number Of The Beast
15. The Final Frontier
16. Iron Maiden
17. Killers
Click to expand...
Of all the lists, this is the most interesting. While I disagree on many points, I find it refreshing that this list strays off far with the usual fan-faves, which I sometimes feel are almost canon or laws.
Placing VXI atop is certainly interesting, as it means TAATG and DLTTEOAS must be considered great songs. I also wonder why XVI is so much higher than XF, as they have many similarities.
 
Senjutsu
Dance of Death
7th Son
Brave
Powerslave
Piece
Matter
Frontier
IM
Souls
Killers
Beast
Time
Prayer/Fear - dunno
Virtual/ X - dunno
 
Eddie's Uncle said:
Of all the lists, this is the most interesting. While I disagree on many points, I find it refreshing that this list strays off far with the usual fan-faves, which I sometimes feel are almost canon or laws.
Placing VXI atop is certainly interesting, as it means TAATG and DLTTEOAS must be considered great songs. I also wonder why XVI is so much higher than XF, as they have many similarities.
Click to expand...
DLTTEOAS is my all-time favorite Maiden song actually. I genuinely love every single song on that album, including TAATG, but I won't tell you that it's the best Maiden album. It's not. But it is my favorite. Obviously the most important part and the obvious explanation is nostalgia. I grew up with that album, got into Maiden with that album and have countless memories that I cherish to this day connected directly in various ways to that album.

Overall I vastly prefer the 90s and and reunion era (with some outliers here and there) to the first 5 Maiden albums. I actually realized the other day, that if Maiden stopped with SSOASS I would've liked their albums and would still listen to that one in particular, but they wouldn't have become my favorite band. A lot of that has to do with Bruce's voice. He was always a fantastic frontman and could hit some insane pitches in the 80s, but could barely control his voice. He frequently overshot the notes he was going for, especially live, and basically wrecked his voice during the World Slavery Tour. The Bruce that I adore as a vocalist is the one from 1995 to 2008-is. That's his golden era.

TXF never properly clicked with me. It has some great songs on it, but its weak production, weak performances, brooding tone and dreary atmosphere ask a lot of the listener and I'm usually not in the mood for that.

While TXF's songwriting showed a lot of the tropes we would see in the reunion albums and could be seen as a prototype of sorts, VXI is BNW's songwriting twin (in my opinion). I've written about this a few times, but I genuinely believe no other pair of albums (except the obvious Iron Maiden/Killers pair) is as close to one another songwriting-wise as VXI and BNW are.

The latter obviously features four songs that were leftovers from the former, but even the other songs have similar stylistic choices. Most songs focus on melodic and repetitive choruses. The melody-writing on both albums is pretty similar as well. BNW has the obvious advantage of a phenomenal production and amazing performances. But as we've seen with The Clansman on RIR (and LOTB) or Futureal released as a live B-side, the VXI songs fit well with the BNW songs in a setlist without feeling out of place.
 
Vaenyr said:
DLTTEOAS is my all-time favorite Maiden song actually. I genuinely love every single song on that album, including TAATG, but I won't tell you that it's the best Maiden album. It's not. But it is my favorite. Obviously the most important part and the obvious explanation is nostalgia. I grew up with that album, got into Maiden with that album and have countless memories that I cherish to this day connected directly in various ways to that album.

Overall I vastly prefer the 90s and and reunion era (with some outliers here and there) to the first 5 Maiden albums. I actually realized the other day, that if Maiden stopped with SSOASS I would've liked their albums and would still listen to that one in particular, but they wouldn't have become my favorite band. A lot of that has to do with Bruce's voice. He was always a fantastic frontman and could hit some insane pitches in the 80s, but could barely control his voice. He frequently overshot the notes he was going for, especially live, and basically wrecked his voice during the World Slavery Tour. The Bruce that I adore as a vocalist is the one from 1995 to 2008-is. That's his golden era.

TXF never properly clicked with me. It has some great songs on it, but its weak production, weak performances, brooding tone and dreary atmosphere ask a lot of the listener and I'm usually not in the mood for that.

While TXF's songwriting showed a lot of the tropes we would see in the reunion albums and could be seen as a prototype of sorts, VXI is BNW's songwriting twin (in my opinion). I've written about this a few times, but I genuinely believe no other pair of albums (except the obvious Iron Maiden/Killers pair) is as close to one another songwriting-wise as VXI and BNW are.

The latter obviously features four songs that were leftovers from the former, but even the other songs have similar stylistic choices. Most songs focus on melodic and repetitive choruses. The melody-writing on both albums is pretty similar as well. BNW has the obvious advantage of a phenomenal production and amazing performances. But as we've seen with The Clansman on RIR (and LOTB) or Futureal released as a live B-side, the VXI songs fit well with the BNW songs in a setlist without feeling out of place.
Click to expand...
I do love the melodies and solos and the colourful feel of VXI. Just wish they'd worked on the songs a bit better and given Blaze more time to put in a few better performances.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top