Some thoughts about the London shows below.
First of all, they're in ridiculously good shape; you don't have to give them any age or other "handicap" to say it. Fantastic shows.
The performances were top-notch. It's a bit hard to be totally objective when it comes to comparing these two shows and things like crowd reaction as I was in the floor for both nights and had very different spots there, but I'd say the second night was indeed slightly better and tighter performance; somehow all the small details and such just clicked a tad bit better, but the first night was fantastic as well. Of course there was that hassle with The Trooper backdrop, but it was actually just a fun little curiosity and offered some good-spirited interaction and shared laughs for the band & the crowd.
In the first night there was a rare, although rather small, fuck-up by Adrian with the Stranger in a Strange Land solo. Might be due to Bruce blathering at the same time. I don't really get why he has to keep talking over Adrian's splendid solo anyway, but oh well...
A random memory from the first gig: one guy standing near me was
absolutely over the moon when Stranger in a Strange Land started and stayed that way for the whole song; he was so exhilarated that I bet he could’ve taken off to fly. I sang the second verse with him and he was just bursting with joy and all smiles for the song that it might be one of the most enthusiastic reactions I’ve seen in a Maiden show myself!
At least in my immediate presence, the crowd was slightly more respectful yet very enthusiastic on Saturday, where as on Friday I saw few people that probably could've been slightly more considerate to their surroundings... But overall, very pleasant and heartwarming crowd experience for me - again!
The crowd was probably slightly more enthusiastic thorough the set on Saturday, where as on Friday the differences in reactions for the favourites and... well, Death of the Celts and such seemed to be bigger. But again, hard to be totally objective as I had quite a different spots on these shows and from the GA/floor the reactions of people in the immediate presence affects the view quite a lot, I guess. I enjoyed the first show in the middle of the crowd, not super far away from the stage but not quite near the front either. I won the FTTB for Saturday and had the pleasure to enjoy
@Lego's company with that! Had great time and I'm very grateful that he got to the queue some hours before I evenarrived to the venue. Appreciated! A big thank you for great company thorough the day! My spot at the gig was on the second row, right in front of Janick, which was pretty much my intention as well, so very happy about that.
About the performances of individual songs:
- From the new stuff it's quite obvious that The Writing on the Wall is already a huge live song, but I'd say
Days of Future Past seemed to go down surprisingly well, at least on the second night! That opening riff drove some people nuts and I'm quite fond of the song to begin with; again, it's a bit hard to say anything about the true reaction of the audience in general as I was in the second row, in front of Janick, and too concentrated on rocking out and singing along...
Not the easiest track for Bruce, but it's a kick-ass live song for sure!
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Death of the Celts doesn't do that much for me in general, but it went down surprisingly well on Saturday; it was really cool to see Bruce doing his thing with the lyrics delivery almost right in front of me, as he sang good portion of the song very close to Janick's usual spot. Good performance and the stage show for this one works out really well
- Bruce finished the final chorus of
Alexander the Great with quite a long last note (Saturday). Cool! Again, one of the set highlights!
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Hell on Earth is a majestic live song. I know some people here feel it doesn't quite come out as strong live as on the album, but I love it. Seen it three times now and the performance on Saturday was definitely the best of those three; they just nailed it! The song itself is such an epitome of modern Maiden & Steve's songwriting, but in all the good ways.
I intend to see Maiden again - no question about that - and it might very well be that these shows can't be topped; that's fine for me. Amazing weekend.
However, if I, for whatever reason, would be unable to see Iron Maiden live again, I really couldn't have asked for a better show(s) to be my last ones.