One thing that surprises me about the speculation here and in the setlist thread is that nobody (myself included) is entertaining the possibility that they do five songs from one album and then five songs from the other album all clustered together. If they really are doing five each like some folks think, it could make sense as they can also alter the stage like they did on LOTB.
It's also something I took into consideration when I submitted my entry in the setlist contest. Ultimately while cool, I feel that the flow of the setlist will work better if you alternate instead of just hammering a slog from one album and then another slog from the next. Playing around with all your picks, to me, is the best option.
Like, if I break down the setlist I set up (which I may have done before), I think that starting off with CSiT is a good choice to introduce the scope of the show, and you can then hit people over the head with "Days of Future Past", allowing Bruce to be like "WELCOME TO THE FUTURE PAST TOUR MY FRIENNNNNDS!" Chuck in "The Trooper" for maximum hype, build that hype further with TWOTW and SIASL, and now you've got four rockers out of the way and we can start experimenting with the longer, more intricate material. "The Parchment" is great here, acting like TRATB on the TBOS tour, and from one bass outro into a bass intro - "Heaven Can Wait", which will open the door to "The Time Machine". The outro to "The Time Machine" has the lyrics "
Eerie collection, darkness is there - wedded to danger, betrothed to despair." What better way to introduce "Fear of the Dark"? The outro of which perfectly leads to "Hell on Earth", and then we erupt into "Iron Maiden" as the main set closes.
Something like this just feels very refreshing. To me every song complements the next and adds a lot of excitement, especially to a song like FOTD that's been played to death as is. Utilizing "The Time Machine" and its outro as the introduction to "Fear of the Dark" suddenly adds a new dynamic to the song as part of the setlist.
The first two legs of LOTB had an incredible setlist, a pretty much perfect collection of songs that gave you the best from a lot of eras of the band's career, featuring big hits and deep cuts. But after the incredible hype that is "Flight of Icarus", I do think the "Fear of the Dark" didn't quite click the way it should've. Moving TNOTB in front of "Iron Maiden" was a cool move, but this part of the set was less exciting than the first two thirds (although "Run to the Hills" was a fantastic closer).
What the third LOTB leg got right was the way it rearranged some of the songs and saved some surprises for the very end. I was not overly excited for the D.C. show based on setlist alone, but as it played out before me I was honest to god more stoked after the concert than I was before it. The three
Senjutsu tracks were a killer start (and they could've blasted through the whole album for all I cared), and then you just got hit by weighty track after weighty track with only "Flight of Icarus" to break things up. Moving "Hallowed" up was also a game changer. And then when you got to the encore you still had the war set, and man did "The Clansman" work so much better as a near-finale piece. Even if "The Trooper" and "Aces High" were a little more sluggish this time around, at the same time, you got to stay in the world for a little bit longer, and that was cool (also one of the reasons I don't mind them slowing down some of the SiT tracks if they get a good balance that way).
LOTB 3 was a fine but unimpressive setlist on paper, but experiencing live I completely changed my outlook on it. Even tired songs can get a second wind if you sequence them right, and while segregating the songs by album would still make for a cool show, you can absolutely make it better with the right alternating back and forth.
@Diesel 11 posted some really nice stats on the setlist prediction thread and only 9 people have Darkest Hour in their setlist. I. could see this being a pretty big dark horse pick, as it is a pretty simple and slow song that might be easy for the band to put together quickly
I also didn't include it in my picks, but I bet it gets played.
I also concur here. I'm not betting on it per se, but I've had that thought in the back of my mind for a while. It's a big, epic ballad, so it can easily take the place that "Blood Brothers" did on the third LOTB leg. The problem I run into is which song would I drop then? Sure, at 7+ minutes in length you could consider it one of the "longer" songs on the album, but I feel like Steve would push for two of his epics, Bruce would want to play "The Time Machine" (per previous interviews), and "Days of Future Past" is a shoe-in for the name only. That leaves us with "The Writing on the Wall", and I really think that it'll be sticking around for this tour since it's such a big song. But nothing is set in stone here and even obvious picks may get overlooked for some wild entry no one saw coming.
May has otherwise been moving by fast, but when it comes to waiting for this tour to begin, god it's slow as hell. I'm super hyped.
www.setlist.fm
