Iron maiden

Founded by bassist Steve Harris in the mid ‘70s, Iron Maiden were already firmly established as heavy metal’s brightest hopes when they stormed the world with their third album (and first with vocalist Bruce Dickinson) The Number Of The Beast in 1982. Throughout the decade that followed, Maiden recorded and toured relentlessly with seven new studio albums and seven World Tours in the ‘80s alone. Cementing their reputation as the hardest-touring band on the planet and with the unmistakable figure of band mascot Eddie adorning every album cover and T-shirt , Iron Maiden created a world of their own; one that welcomed fans from every culture, creed and social sphere with a guarantee of heartfelt conviction and unprecedented professionalism.

With milestones like the marathon World Slavery Tour of 1984/5, headlining Rock in Rio in both 1985 and 2001 and Castle Donington’s Monsters Of Rock festival in 1988, (still the biggest ever event there with 107,000 attending), Maiden set new standards, while continually reinventing themselves both musically and visually.

Despite radio play around the world being limited to occasional heavy metal speciality shows and the band’s refusal to deal with celebrity and lifestyle-based mainstream media and magazines, of which there are now so many, the band took metal to many new frontiers; to Poland and behind the Iron Curtain in 1985, around South America initially in 1992 and many times since, to the Middle East in 2007, India in the same year and many other new places all around the planet that rarely get visited by major bands.

The ‘90s proved to be a difficult time for heavy metal bands in general, but Iron Maiden ploughed doggedly forward, notching up yet more success with albums like 1992’s acclaimed Fear Of The Dark and even weathering the departure of Bruce Dickinson in 1993. The band made two strong albums with new singer Blaze Bayley and continued to honour their commitment to intensive touring, delivering the goods at