The heavy metal scene of the late 70s was widely regarded as stagnant, with only a handful of bands proving their ability to survive and produce music of quality. It was at this time that a new breed of young British bands began to emerge. This movement, which began to break cover in 1979 and 1980, was known as the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal, or N.W.O.B.H.M. Iron Maiden were one of the foremost bands in the genre. Younger and meaner, the N.W.O.B.H.M. bands played faster, more energetic heavy metal than any of their forefathers, punk bands.
Iron Maiden was first formed in 1976 by bassist Steve Harris, who would soon join up with rhythm guitarist Tony Parsons, drummer Doug Sampson, and vocalist Paul Di'Anno. Named after a medieval torture device, the music was suitably heavy and hard on the senses.
Unable to solicit a response from record companies, the band sent a three-track tape, featuring Iron Maiden, Prowler and Strange World, to Neal Kay, DJ at north London's hard rock disco, the Kingsbury Bandwagon Soundhouse. Kay's patronage of Iron Maiden won them an instant welcome, which prompted the release of The Soundhouse Tapes on the band's own label. Before obtaining a record deal, the group played in local areas throughout the '70s, receiving a fair amount of London airplay. Parsons was replaced with Dennis Stratton, Samson by Clive Burr and the band made its record debut in 1980 with their self-titled “Iron Maiden” album. Although the release was recorded in a hurry, it was nonetheless a hit in the U.K. due to the single “Running Free”, which reached number 24 on the UK charts and brought an appearance on BBC Television's Top Of The Pops. Refusing to mime, they became the first band since the Who in 1973 to play live on the show. In its wake, Iron Maiden became immensely popular among heavy metal fans, inspiring fanatical devotion, aided by blustering manager Rod Smallwood and apocalyptic mascot Eddie.
Iron Maiden's 1981 follow-up, Killers, displayed a harder approach to their music than before, and also saw the replacement of Stratton with Adrian Smith. Due to his uncontrollable alcohol addiction, Di'Anno was forced to part the group and would soon be replaced with vocalist Bruce Dickinson in 1982 for the band's groundbreaking release, “Number of the Beast”. This album, boasting such songs as the title track and “Hallowed By thy Name”, would come to be known as one of the greatest rock recordings of all time. The release of “Number Of The Beast” was crucial to the development of the band. Without it, Iron Maiden might never have gone on to be such a force in the heavy metal arena. The album was a spectacular success, the sound of a band on the crest of a wave.
Since the unexpected worldwide success of “Beast” made them international rock superstars, they changed very little of their style for their next album, “Piece of Mind”. It continued their success and was a major hit in the UK and USA. Clive Burr was replaced by Nicko McBrain on the sessions. It was not dissimilar to the previous album, showcasing the strong twin-guitar bite of Murray and Smith, coupled with memorable vocal lines and a sound that perfectly suited their air-punching dynamic.
They undertook two major tours before recording 1983's “Powerslave”, which would go on to be another cult hit. With the arrival of “Powerslave”, some critics accused Iron Maiden of conforming to a self-imposed writing formula, and playing safe with tried and tested ideas. Certainly, there was no significant departure from the two previous albums, but it was nonetheless happily consumed by the band's core supporters, who also purchased in sufficient quantities to ensure UK chart hits for “Aces High” and “Two Minutes To Midnight”.
The product of Powerslave's 11-month tour was 1985's “Live After Death”, a double live album the featured all of their biggest hit singles. By the release of “Live After Death”, Iron Maiden had already established themselves as a powerful and unique metal band.
Their long-awaited 1986 supplement album, “Somewhere in Time”, showed a bit of departure from their past releases, showcasing the use of synthesizer guitars and songs more relevant to the same themes.
1988's Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, a concept album like its predecessor. It retained its commercial edge giving the band their second UK number 1 album and yielded hit singles in “Can I Play With Madness”, the surprisingly sensitive “The Evil That Men Do” and “The Clairvoyant”. Soon, it became Iron Maiden's most critically acclaimed album since “Number of the Beast”. After another exhausting tour, Smith departed and the band took a one-year hiatus. Finally, news of the band surfaced again. Harris felt that the direction pursued on the last two albums had been taken as far as possible, and a return to the style of old was planned with Smith’s reliever, Janick Gers.
With new guitarist Janick Gers, they resurfaced with “No Prayer For the Dying” in 1990, a record that returned to the classic sound the group used when recording their earlier releases. The live show was also scaled down in a return to much smaller venues. ”No Prayer For The Dying” was indeed much more like mid-period Iron Maiden, and was predictably well received, bringing enormous UK hit singles with ”Holy Smoke” and “Bring Your Daughter”. The latter, previously released in 1989 on the soundtrack to A Nightmare On Elm Street 5, had already been awarded the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Song that year although it gave the band its first number one U.K. hit.
By the time the group finished their 1991 tour, Dickinson expressed desire to leave and work to promote another band he had found. Also, he had a solo project, “Tattooed Millionaire”, a book, “The Adventures Of Lord Iffy Boatrace”, and the initiative of re-releasing Iron Maiden 's single catalogue in its entirety. “Fear of the Dark”, the band's last album with Dickinson, debuted at number one on the U.K. charts and became one of their biggest selling albums to date.
After their supporting tour, two live albums were released in 1993: “A Real Live One”, which contained live versions of their newer hit singles, and “A Real Dead One”, which featured the more "classic" Maiden songs live.
Dickinson's replacement, Blayze Bayley, marked his debut in 1995 with “The X Factor” where he easily proved his worth. This was a daunting task, having had to learn Maiden 's whole catalogue and win over patriotic Dickinson followers. Even if the record failed to chart as well as some of its predecessors, it was still a minor success in England.
Iron Maiden marked the end of 1996 with “Best of the Beast”, a double compilation album. In 1998, little interest in the “Virtual XI” album prompted Bayley's termination
In February 1999 it was announced that Bruce Dickinson and Adrian Smith had rejoined the band, restoring the classic 80’s line-up. To the great delight of their loyal followers an excellent new album was not long in following.
The Maiden's 2000 reunion album where former band members Bruce Dickinson and Adrian Smith returned to write new songs and perform music reminiscent of their "golden era" came to light the sparks of a glorious past. Based on the 1932 novel by Aldous Huxley about a futuristic, supposedly happy world where everyone is controlled by a totalitarian system that completely and utterly manipulates their feelings and movements. The title was a quote of William Shakespeare's last play, The Tempest from 1612: "How beauteous mankind is! Oh brave new world, that has such people in it!" The album cover depicted Eddie's menacing face in the stormy clouds over a futuristic London. In the posters for the tour accompanying the album, Eddie was holding the Earth like a crystal ball.
The 2003-04 tour was a strange one in the way that it was split in two parts, the division occurring with the release of the band’s most recent album so far ‘Dance Of Death’. The first part, funnily named "Give Me Ed... 'Till I'm Dead", was reminiscent of the Ed Hunter reunion tour as the setlist was composed of old songs, some of them not having been played in many years. Iron Maiden then had to play the shows with a setlist that would please the fans while avoiding new songs that hadn't been made public by then.
Iron Maiden in my opinion was and is one of the most influential bands of the heavy metal genre. The often-imitated band exists for almost 30 years, pumping out wild rock that came into being in the late seventies, with an infinite number of 80's and later bands owing to their style. Although failing to ever obtain any real media attention, critics claimed them to be satanists due to their dark musical themes and their use of grim mascot "Eddie", they still became well known throughout the world. It is believed that their best period was the early one, with their most known albums, Killers, Number of the Beast and Peace of Mind. In my opinion 7th Son Of A 7th Son and Fear Of The Dark are the best. Their later years have been spent stagnating musically, particularly around the time that Blaze Bailey was at the vocals, resulting a low popularity in the late 90’s. But with Bruce Dickinson returning in 2000 on “Brave New World”, Iron Maiden proved they still have plenty of life left in and have remained consistently popular throughout their career. Iron Maiden was one of the first groups to be classified as "British metal", and along with Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, and Judas Priest, they set the rock scene for the '80s.


Current Line Up
Steve Harris - bass
Bruce Dickinson - vocals
Andrian Smith - guitar
Janick Gers - guitar
Dave Murray - guitar
Nicko McBrain - drums


Discography
Iron Maiden – 1980
Killers – 1981
The Number Of The Beast – 1982
Piece Of Mind – 1983
Powerslave – 1984
Live After Death – 1985
Somewhere In Time – 1986
7th Son Of A 7th Son – 1988,
No Prayer For The Dying – 1990
Fear Of The Dark – 1992
A Real Live One –1993
A Real Dead One – 1993
The X-Factor – 1995
Best Of The Beast – 1996
Virtual XI – 1998
Brave New World – 2000
Edward The Great – 2002
Dance Of Death - 2003