The Official Book of Souls Tour 2016 Thread (Warning: Spoilers within!)

btx109 said:
Regarding setlists, keep in mind that Maiden have a lot of people to satisfy. First and foremost they have to please themselves. It has to be fun for them, otherwise playing would become a chore instead of a joy. On album tours they are promoting new product, so they have to learn & incorporate new material into their set. Since the expectation is for new fans to buy the album, they must choose which songs they believe are best represented in a live context, which might not necessarily be what hardcore fans believe are the best tracks. Hence, one of the reasons for no "EOTC."

Then there are audience considerations. For knowledgeable, hardcore fans like most of us they try to throw in a rare or deep album cut...on this tour it's "COTD," on the last Maiden England tour it was "Afraid To Shoot Strangers" and "Phantom Of The Opera." My two wishes for this tour were COTD and "Flight Of Icarus." I got one of them. And last tour, I LOVED "POTO"! I would love to have heard "Infinite Dreams" over "The Clairvoyant" but again, taking everything into account it was difficult to argue with "Phantom..." and "SSOASS."

Finally, you have brand new fans seeing the band for the first time and long-time fans who haven't seen them in years. I too heard people leaving Mandalay Bay grousing about not hearing "RTTH" or "2MTM." Hard for me to relate but I get it. Those classic songs for many are what the band is all about...the songs that they remember from high school or some other point in their past. So they're always going to play "The Trooper," "NOTB" and "FOTD." They'll always close the set with "Iron Maiden," which still gets me hyped. When you toss all of that into the pot, I think they do a fantastic job of assembling a well-paced, full production each tour with something hopefully to please everyone. With a catalog as deep as theirs, it's impossible to please everyone. For example, I LOVED the decision to play "AMOLAD" in its entirety, but I heard a large segment of the audience at Irvine Meadows booing halfway through the set. Unlike most bands Maiden has very few duds or filler material on their albums. They're remarkably consistent. Even an album like "NPFTD," probably my least favorite album, has some great cuts on it.

And lastly, the boys aren't young pups anymore. For what they give each night onstage, I think we're privileged to get what we do from them. Hell, I'd love to see "For The Greater Good Of God" again but my guess is we'll get that one the same time that they finally perform "Alexander..." live.
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Let's compare the setlist of this album tour and that of the previous one (based on En Vivo but taking into account that it underwent changes from its original form) and relish on how methodically they are designed. ;)

1. Satellite 15 / The Final Frontier - 1. If Eternity Should Fail
2. El Dorado - 2. Speed of Light
In both cases, the openers of the album. The Necropolis bit tend to create a first pause - which the segue of "TFF" into "El Dorado" managed to avoid - but I think it is a question of equipment (tuning? I haven't checked yet).

3. 2 Minutes to Midnight - 3. Children of the Damned
4. The Talisman (!) - 4. Tears of a Clown
5. Coming Home
An oldie or classic, followed by the slower song from the new album. (!) Remember that "The Talisman" used to be between "TETMD" and "FOTD" when the tour started in Russia in February 2011)

6. Dance of Death - 5. The Red and the Black
The first big complex one.

7. The Trooper - 6. The Trooper
'Nuff said :D (a good way to inject some power and speed back into the show)

8. The Wicker Man - 7. Powerslave
9. Blood Brothers - 8. Death or Glory
10. When the Wild Wind Blows - 9. The Book of Souls
The "thick of it", in which the climax is represented by the long, complex song from the new album (or one of those, when there are several on the album, in this case "TRATB" and "TBOS" - "EOTC" not being eligible for live performance).

11. The Evil That Men Do - 10. Hallowed Be Thy Name
(11'. The Talisman - in the first dates of the tour)
A classic that more or less has the same dynamic and crowd-pleasing function as "The Trooper" but a bit longer and/or more complex.

12. Fear of the Dark - 11. Fear of the Dark
13. Iron Maiden - 12. Iron Maiden
The "mandadory" end sequence of any Iron Maiden set: it seems that, while "Iron Maiden" has always occupied this spot, "FOTD" - after being played in the late middle of the set when it was new in 1992/93 - has grown to accompany it "naturally" (like ZZ Top's "Jesus Just Left Chicago" with "Waiting for the Bus" - though in this case, it is more of a technical coincidence they have exploited). Can someone research for how long it has been at this spot? From memory, it must be since "the X Factour" (20 years...).

Encores
14. The Number of the Beast - 13. The Number of the Beast
Another "mandatory" one - with the first comers and classic-oriented members of the audience, but still a shoe-in to get the crowd pleased and excited. The only time it was put aside was in the first leg of the AMOLAD tour. I feel that this song is just "predictable" or "boring" on paper only, not when you are in the crowd.

15. Hallowed Be Thy Name - 14. Blood Brothers
16. Running Free - 15. Wasted Years
This part seems to be where Maiden has been the most original compared to the previous tour, even though each song can be labelled a 'classic' (even "BB" for a lot of Maiden fans - I for one still consider it a rather new song, but it is starting to change ;) ). The only analytical aspect I can make out of these for the moment is that there is one song which is about relatively 'passively' appreciating it ("HBTN", "Wasted Years") and another one which requires more crowd participation ("Running Free", "Blood Brothers"), and that this order has been reversed from one tour to another.

To conclude, this comparison shows how well thought-out Maiden setlists are in so far as they offer a mix of predictability and surprise, while taking into account at the same time the physical capacities of the musicians (see "The Talisman", displaced because it was too much for Bruce's voice at this moment of the concert).
 
Black Bart said:
To conclude, this comparison shows how well thought-out Maiden setlists are in so far as they offer a mix of predictability and surprise
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I've always thought that Maiden sets are very well balanced. They go from song to song without it feeling forced in any way, and often don't need breaks between songs. The Maiden England set was probably the most extreme in that way, the barely had pauses between songs and just went from song to song at an intense pace. It was a terrific set to witness live.
 

Hallowed Be Thy Name from Las Vegas. Bruce sounds good, and he helps Nicko play the drums. Great clip :D I think the song actually benefitted from being dropped last tour, they should do it with FOTD next year.
 
Another one for guitar nerds: Last night in Monterrey Dave played his Tobacco Sunburst California series strat (on which his signature is based) on the 3 encore songs. It has more polished sound to his black main one.
 
Black Bart, yes the "Necropolis" spoken bit at the end of IESF allows for a quick guitar changeover. That song is in the lower key of D, then they go back to standard tuning for SOL.
 
I haven't watched a huge amount of tour footage so far, but I'd always wondered if the outro would serve the purpose of allowing a guitar swap.
 
Lego said:
As much as I'd love to have a GMETID-style setlist with nearly all albums represented, their farewell tour will probably just be Somewhere Back In Maiden England part 3. Aces, 2 mins, wrath, TETMD, etc.
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I beg to differ on this. I mean, I'm not expecting they to bring to the table some deep cuts, but I can't see they doing their last tour without Wicker Man and Dance of Death. There'll be 4 or 5 songs post 2000, that's for sure. But I'm not expecting to hear The Prisoner or Strange in a Strange Land on the end (but I'm 97,538% sure that they'll play Alexander on their last planned gig, and only there)
 
And the Dream Theater sub-conversation reminded me that I need to hear their new album. Both their and Anthrax (usually, i wouldn't be in a such hurry, but the latter will be Maiden opener here, and I hate to hear songs that I don't know live. Megadeth tricked me once with Kingmaker, that's enough)
 
The guitar techs are waiting at the drapes with guitars for each of the musicians while the tape plays. Probably the reason why the guitar isn't played played live. Speaking of which, Bruce singing the intro instead of it being played from the album was a stroke of genius. Totally sets the tone for the whole show. Seeing the guys walk out onstage in the darkness then boom! they tear into the song...spine-tingling opening. Great, great song to open with.
 
The acoustic could be played by Dave, because he doesn't swap guitars after IESF (plays the song in standard), but he probably didn't record it (sounds like H), so they went with tape. Does anybody know does Dave now use Victory amps live? There was talk about that last year but nothing since.
 
Also another thing... Do they use click track on Powerslave? Because the backing vocals sound like a sample of the original recording and not like the keyboard like in 2008.
 
Cornfed Hick said:
I generally don't take photos or videos of concerts -- and I'm annoyed at the army of people who obstruct my view with their phones -- but I did quickly snap this image, which I think is pretty cool:
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There was a part where there were at least 5 phones in front of me. I don't mind that people take a photo every now and then, but I really hate people who film everything, and I want to slap their phones to the ground.
 
Poto said:

Hallowed Be Thy Name from Las Vegas. Bruce sounds good, and he helps Nicko play the drums. Great clip :D I think the song actually benefitted from being dropped last tour, they should do it with FOTD next year.
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Wow! His voice is much better than on first and second concert. It looks like it was really just a matter of warming up or something. Great performance!
 
Adrian's guitar pick, chapter one...

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Back to the Vegas night (sorry it's all I think about) I had actually forgotten the heart being ripped! There is so much happening on this tour... It's hard to remember it all!! The band amazes me with all the theatrics, so much to take in, yet you never get the feeling of overkill. It's a truly precise, perfectly designed and performed spectacle. And seeing it from the pit, that close to the lads?? I am definitely spoiled now. April at the forum L.A. I'm upstairs how will I ever manage??
 
I half wish I'd avoided that particular spoiler as it would have been a really cool surprise. Can't wait for it, though. Roll on June. :D
 
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