Your Maiden blasphemy

We're talking about the 15th and 14th place in my Maiden albums rank: Respectively VXI and BNW. That being said they're really distinct records with really different virtues and defects.
I do think that BNW had the potential to be an awesome album. IMO It features great passages but it suffers from a handful of problems within the majority of its tracks. Repetitive structures (BNW and DOM despite featuring some great moments kinda go round in circles) great sections tarnished by awful passages (once again BNW - chorus - and DOM - intro), discombobulated and forced song structure in long tracks like the aforementioned and GOTN or even TTLBLAH's excessive outro (It should at 6.20 mins IMO), combined with "borrowed" riffs (Nomad, GotN and Wicker Man) and a couple of fillers really hold the final outcome down. And man it has superb moments: The Wicker Man is absolutely great if one makes an effort to forget Priest's Running Wild (that chorus and outro are top notch !), GOTN has some amazing passages (not a fan of the chorus and following bridge but appart from that...), BNW is simply beautiful until that uninspired repetitive chorus kicks in and the whole thing starts chasing its own tail, Blood Brothers is a really powerful and emotional waltzy journey, OOTSP is a great song and TTLBLAH is simply my favorite song of the whole thing (even regarding the overlenghted outro).
On the other hand to spot VXI's wins and fails are easily detectable track by track. Futureal is a great track with lots of energy and well balanced. The Clansman is not Rime Of The Ancient Mariner or other classic Maiden Epic but it sure is an excellent composition. The Educted Fool has a great, solid build with a great chorus. Como Estais Amigos is cool quiet act to close the album and Lightning Strikes Twice also has its charm. The problem is the remainder of the tracks: TAATG is... well... TAATG. WTWC is absolutely dull and uninteresting and DLTTEOAS is an utter clusterfuck. Plus Blaze's delivery is a bit subpar compared with Bruce's singing.
So yeah... although being just one position behind BNW in my rank, VXI could never pass it because it has no more potential regarding composition than the one it presented. BNW's a different case. It could be easily a top 10 maiden album wasn't it for the defects that IMO it suffers from.
 
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chaosapiant said:
Speaking of VXI and BNW, I've always had the opinion that Brave New World is just VXI 2.0. It's better produced and Adrian and Bruce are back on it, but a lot of the songs have the same feel between the two albums. Dream of Mirrors sounds straight up like a VXI song. So does Blood Brothers and the title track.
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There's a reason for that:
https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/iron-maiden-guitarist-admits-band-used-leftover-ideas/

By the way, this has been discussed before on this forum:

What is the fourth Virtual Xi song in Brave New World?

Hey guys... I know Adrian said that Dream of Mirrors, The Mercenary and The Nomad were all written for Virtual XI and there was a fourth one he couldn't remember. Does any one know which one it was? If I had to guess I would say Blood Brothers. Its got that very dark, sad tone present on Virtual...
forum.maidenfans.com
 
So let me get this straight... Zeppelin made "a much better variant" of Spirit's tune by adding way more than 2 different notes at each compass? God...

 
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karljant said:
It´s not a variant... it´s the same riff with a different lick at the 6th and 7th compasses. Better or not it's still copy/ paste.
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Running Wild is just an E power chord strummed. It's hardly like Priest invented it. At least Wicker Man adds a c and g.
 
Well.. it seems I have found an utterly unsuspectable unpopular "opinion": The Wicker Man's main riff is a blatant rip off of Judas Priest's Running Wild. Oh mine I should really have a grip on my wandering imagination... the far fetched stuff my mind fabricates. :facepalm:
 
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