IRON MAIDEN
St. Pete Times Forum, Tampa, FL
April 17, 2011
The good ship Iron Maiden does not visit the southeastern United States very
often these days. I don’t mean that as a criticism of the band.
It’s just a fact. At this stage of the game, Maiden gigs in the States
are an infrequent proposition, and when they do come, they typically skip the
Florida/Georgia/Alabama/Mississippi/Louisiana corridor altogether. So
when it was announced last November that Eddie and the boys would be performing
a pair of gigs in Florida as the sole U.S. destination of this leg of the Final
Frontier Tour, Jen and I leaped at the chance. Now, Tampa’s not close to
Ekman HQ. To the contrary, it’s more than 500 miles away.
Nonetheless, on a sunny, almost uncomfortably warm late spring Sunday
afternoon, Jen and I found ourselves at the Channelside development in Tampa,
surrounded by the port, the cruise ships, the sparkling new commercial, retail
and residential space. And thousands of black-clad hordes running the
full gamut of age and appearance, the one common bond being that nearly all of
them were wearing Iron Maiden t-shirts of every imaginable description.
The people-watching itself would have been worth the price of admission.
The venue of tonight’s show is the same arena where the Tampa Bay Lightning (NHL
franchise) play their home games, so it was very cool to see the place decked
out in Bolts paraphernalia given the team’s at-that-time nascent playoff
run. From the time that we entered the Forum, we had about 90 minutes
until the show started, so we passed the time by walking the perimeter
concourses, drinking in the atmosphere. For instance, Jen marveled at the
remarkable variety of gourmet food items available at the concession stands,
with eye-popping price tags. For my part, I pored over the merch stands,
where short-sleeve t-shirts (at $40 a pop) were being snapped up like bottled
water in the Sahara Desert. The amazing thing about the shirts was that
many of them were retreads of old designs (the Trooper, the Wickerman, etc.),
yet the Maiden marketing machine still commands (and receives) exorbitant
prices for them. I satisfied myself with a $10 poster depicting all of
the Maiden album and single sleeves, a $10 three-pack of plastic cups with
nifty Eddie designs, and a $5 Maiden koozie to keep my beer cold all summer in
the oppressive Alabama heat. We settled into our lower level seats just
before the lights went down, seated next to a honeymooning couple from St.
Louis sporting matching homemade white t-shirts reading “A Marriage Maiden
Heaven,” with “Bride” and “Groom” written on the back in that distinctive Maiden
font. You couldn’t make this stuff up, even if you tried.
Selected for the prestigious honor of opening the gig were teenage Floridians
Black Tide, whose debut album, ‘Light from Above,’ turned some heads a
couple of years ago. They really weren’t good tonight though. To
their credit, the youngsters did not seem the slightest bit intimidated by
either the expansive stage or the (mostly hostile) Maiden partisans in the
house. They worked the stage like pros, and showcased the moves and
confidence of a seasoned arena act. But most of the material was
wretched. They opened with their Metallica “Hit the Lights” cover, which
was fine, then delved into a series of unreleased new songs that sounded way too
calculated to appeal to a “modern rock” audience. By the time they closed
with the familiar (and very good) “Warriors of Time” off the debut album, it was
too late. Black Tide had lost the crowd. In fact, the biggest
reaction they received was the derisive applause that greeted the singer’s
announcement that they were about to play their final song. Oh well.
You don’t go to a Maiden show to see the openers anyway, right?
A couple of minutes before 9:00 p.m., the familiar strains of UFO’s “Doctor
Doctor” wafted over the P.A. and the crowd went wild. The house lights
dimmed, and for the next 4+ minutes, we were assaulted by video screens and
prerecorded music for the intro to “Final Frontier.” To be honest, it
dragged on for far too long. I understand the value of building up
dramatic tension and excitement, but this was too much. Finally, the band
stormed the stage just in time for Bruce Dickinson to belt out the lines “I’m
stranded in space / I’m lost without trace,” and we were off to the
races. For the next two hours, Iron Maiden delivered one of the finest
arena gigs I’ve ever had the privilege of seeing. The individual
performances were tremendous, with Bruce sounding remarkably strong as he hit
every note and played the frontman role with unparalleled skill. During
“Fear of the Dark,” he sprinted in mid-verse from one end of the catwalk above
the perimeter of the stage to the other with the energy and enthusiasm of a man
half his age, belting out every lyric without a trace of weariness. In
“The Wickerman,” Brucie must have done a half-dozen flying leaps over the
monitors at the front of the stage. And in “Dance of Death,” he
masterfully portrayed the narrator’s encounter with the spirits of darkness as
he reenacted the spine-tingling dance upon hot coals in the circle of fire,
bathed only in a single light from above. Dickinson is as much a thespian
as he is a heavy metal singer, and it showed in his performance. Only
during newbie “The Talisman” did he stay rooted to one spot in front of the
monitors for the bulk of the song (perhaps receiving teleprompter help for the
lyrics in this lengthy, wordy track?).
But Maiden is about way more than Bruce Dickinson. His bandmates were his
equal in every respect. There’s Steve Harris, the quintessential heavy
metal bassist, as spry and fit as he was 30 years ago, crisscrossing the stage
with agility and elegance before striking his classic, foot-on-the-monitor,
singing-along-with-the-lyrics pose. There’s Davey Murray, understated and
mild-mannered, his lips curled upward in a faint smile as he amiably peels off
killer licks and leads aplenty. There’s the intense Adrian Smith, a model
of focus and quiet power whose riffs form the backbone of classic tunes like
“Two Minutes to Midnight” and “The Wickerman.” And there’s the
unbelievably daft Janick Gers, who twirls in circles, throws shapes, tosses his
guitar in every manageable direction, and prances and dances his way through
the show, giddy as a schoolgirl. And somewhere back behind the set pieces
designed to look like a space station was drummer Nicko McBrain, although we
scarcely saw him because he was so far tucked away. He did take Janick’s
guitar at the end of the set, however, and hoist it above his head,
proclaiming, “This is for me restaurant.”
From a setlist standpoint, Maiden are to be applauded for their steadfast
refusal to become an oldies, play-the-hits kind of band. Tonight’s set
was a well-balanced mixture of old classics, songs off ‘The Final Frontier,’
and post-reunion cuts from the last decade or so. Everything fit together
seamlessly. Sure, the crowd showed signs of listlessness during the
lengthy, ponderous, somber “When the Wild Wind Blows,” but that’s one of the
strongest songs on the new album and it sounded fantastic live, albeit not in
an adrenaline-rush, throw-the-horns, guzzle-your-beer arena concert kind of
way. But there was a certain balance, an equilibrium created by the
setlist, to where everything fit, everything belonged, and nothing seemed out
of place. The three-in-a-row combo of “Dance of Death,” “The Trooper,”
and “The Wickerman” was damn near unstoppable though, and perhaps the most
exhilarating span of the evening. To peer over at Jen, see her leaping up
and down with joy, and singing “Your time will come” at the top of her lungs
made this heavy metal husband very happy indeed.
I could continue to dissect the gig in detail, but there’s really no need.
The tour was filmed and no doubt there’ll be a live DVD documenting the entire
show in time for Christmas. But what is important, and what struck me
tonight, is this: Iron Maiden truly are a treasure to the world of heavy
metal. For them to be this vibrant, this alive, and this much atop their
game well into their 50s is an absolute gift to all of us. Oh sure, you
can nitpick here and there if you want. But unlike all of their peers,
Maiden have remained true to themselves since Day 1, have followed their own
template, and have refused to cowtow to the latest trends or the easy
cashgrabs. They remain in peak physical and musical shape, and they
obviously love what they do. I don’t go see arena shows very often
because I vastly prefer the intimacy of a small club to the corporate-rock
contrivances of the arena. But, even after all this time, Maiden do the
arena metal gig better than anyone else in the world. Up the Irons!
Setlist: Satellite 15 … The Final Frontier, El Dorado, 2 Minutes to Midnight, The
Talisman, Coming Home, Dance of Death, The Trooper, The Wickerman, Blood
Brothers, When the Wild Wind Blows, The Evil That Men Do, Fear of the Dark, Iron
Maiden. Encores: The Number of the Beast, Hallowed Be Thy Name, Running Free.
~ Review by Kit Ekman ~
St. Pete Times Forum, Tampa, FL
April 17, 2011
The good ship Iron Maiden does not visit the southeastern United States very
often these days. I don’t mean that as a criticism of the band.
It’s just a fact. At this stage of the game, Maiden gigs in the States
are an infrequent proposition, and when they do come, they typically skip the
Florida/Georgia/Alabama/Mississippi/Louisiana corridor altogether. So
when it was announced last November that Eddie and the boys would be performing
a pair of gigs in Florida as the sole U.S. destination of this leg of the Final
Frontier Tour, Jen and I leaped at the chance. Now, Tampa’s not close to
Ekman HQ. To the contrary, it’s more than 500 miles away.
Nonetheless, on a sunny, almost uncomfortably warm late spring Sunday
afternoon, Jen and I found ourselves at the Channelside development in Tampa,
surrounded by the port, the cruise ships, the sparkling new commercial, retail
and residential space. And thousands of black-clad hordes running the
full gamut of age and appearance, the one common bond being that nearly all of
them were wearing Iron Maiden t-shirts of every imaginable description.
The people-watching itself would have been worth the price of admission.
The venue of tonight’s show is the same arena where the Tampa Bay Lightning (NHL
franchise) play their home games, so it was very cool to see the place decked
out in Bolts paraphernalia given the team’s at-that-time nascent playoff
run. From the time that we entered the Forum, we had about 90 minutes
until the show started, so we passed the time by walking the perimeter
concourses, drinking in the atmosphere. For instance, Jen marveled at the
remarkable variety of gourmet food items available at the concession stands,
with eye-popping price tags. For my part, I pored over the merch stands,
where short-sleeve t-shirts (at $40 a pop) were being snapped up like bottled
water in the Sahara Desert. The amazing thing about the shirts was that
many of them were retreads of old designs (the Trooper, the Wickerman, etc.),
yet the Maiden marketing machine still commands (and receives) exorbitant
prices for them. I satisfied myself with a $10 poster depicting all of
the Maiden album and single sleeves, a $10 three-pack of plastic cups with
nifty Eddie designs, and a $5 Maiden koozie to keep my beer cold all summer in
the oppressive Alabama heat. We settled into our lower level seats just
before the lights went down, seated next to a honeymooning couple from St.
Louis sporting matching homemade white t-shirts reading “A Marriage Maiden
Heaven,” with “Bride” and “Groom” written on the back in that distinctive Maiden
font. You couldn’t make this stuff up, even if you tried.
Selected for the prestigious honor of opening the gig were teenage Floridians
Black Tide, whose debut album, ‘Light from Above,’ turned some heads a
couple of years ago. They really weren’t good tonight though. To
their credit, the youngsters did not seem the slightest bit intimidated by
either the expansive stage or the (mostly hostile) Maiden partisans in the
house. They worked the stage like pros, and showcased the moves and
confidence of a seasoned arena act. But most of the material was
wretched. They opened with their Metallica “Hit the Lights” cover, which
was fine, then delved into a series of unreleased new songs that sounded way too
calculated to appeal to a “modern rock” audience. By the time they closed
with the familiar (and very good) “Warriors of Time” off the debut album, it was
too late. Black Tide had lost the crowd. In fact, the biggest
reaction they received was the derisive applause that greeted the singer’s
announcement that they were about to play their final song. Oh well.
You don’t go to a Maiden show to see the openers anyway, right?
A couple of minutes before 9:00 p.m., the familiar strains of UFO’s “Doctor
Doctor” wafted over the P.A. and the crowd went wild. The house lights
dimmed, and for the next 4+ minutes, we were assaulted by video screens and
prerecorded music for the intro to “Final Frontier.” To be honest, it
dragged on for far too long. I understand the value of building up
dramatic tension and excitement, but this was too much. Finally, the band
stormed the stage just in time for Bruce Dickinson to belt out the lines “I’m
stranded in space / I’m lost without trace,” and we were off to the
races. For the next two hours, Iron Maiden delivered one of the finest
arena gigs I’ve ever had the privilege of seeing. The individual
performances were tremendous, with Bruce sounding remarkably strong as he hit
every note and played the frontman role with unparalleled skill. During
“Fear of the Dark,” he sprinted in mid-verse from one end of the catwalk above
the perimeter of the stage to the other with the energy and enthusiasm of a man
half his age, belting out every lyric without a trace of weariness. In
“The Wickerman,” Brucie must have done a half-dozen flying leaps over the
monitors at the front of the stage. And in “Dance of Death,” he
masterfully portrayed the narrator’s encounter with the spirits of darkness as
he reenacted the spine-tingling dance upon hot coals in the circle of fire,
bathed only in a single light from above. Dickinson is as much a thespian
as he is a heavy metal singer, and it showed in his performance. Only
during newbie “The Talisman” did he stay rooted to one spot in front of the
monitors for the bulk of the song (perhaps receiving teleprompter help for the
lyrics in this lengthy, wordy track?).
But Maiden is about way more than Bruce Dickinson. His bandmates were his
equal in every respect. There’s Steve Harris, the quintessential heavy
metal bassist, as spry and fit as he was 30 years ago, crisscrossing the stage
with agility and elegance before striking his classic, foot-on-the-monitor,
singing-along-with-the-lyrics pose. There’s Davey Murray, understated and
mild-mannered, his lips curled upward in a faint smile as he amiably peels off
killer licks and leads aplenty. There’s the intense Adrian Smith, a model
of focus and quiet power whose riffs form the backbone of classic tunes like
“Two Minutes to Midnight” and “The Wickerman.” And there’s the
unbelievably daft Janick Gers, who twirls in circles, throws shapes, tosses his
guitar in every manageable direction, and prances and dances his way through
the show, giddy as a schoolgirl. And somewhere back behind the set pieces
designed to look like a space station was drummer Nicko McBrain, although we
scarcely saw him because he was so far tucked away. He did take Janick’s
guitar at the end of the set, however, and hoist it above his head,
proclaiming, “This is for me restaurant.”
From a setlist standpoint, Maiden are to be applauded for their steadfast
refusal to become an oldies, play-the-hits kind of band. Tonight’s set
was a well-balanced mixture of old classics, songs off ‘The Final Frontier,’
and post-reunion cuts from the last decade or so. Everything fit together
seamlessly. Sure, the crowd showed signs of listlessness during the
lengthy, ponderous, somber “When the Wild Wind Blows,” but that’s one of the
strongest songs on the new album and it sounded fantastic live, albeit not in
an adrenaline-rush, throw-the-horns, guzzle-your-beer arena concert kind of
way. But there was a certain balance, an equilibrium created by the
setlist, to where everything fit, everything belonged, and nothing seemed out
of place. The three-in-a-row combo of “Dance of Death,” “The Trooper,”
and “The Wickerman” was damn near unstoppable though, and perhaps the most
exhilarating span of the evening. To peer over at Jen, see her leaping up
and down with joy, and singing “Your time will come” at the top of her lungs
made this heavy metal husband very happy indeed.
I could continue to dissect the gig in detail, but there’s really no need.
The tour was filmed and no doubt there’ll be a live DVD documenting the entire
show in time for Christmas. But what is important, and what struck me
tonight, is this: Iron Maiden truly are a treasure to the world of heavy
metal. For them to be this vibrant, this alive, and this much atop their
game well into their 50s is an absolute gift to all of us. Oh sure, you
can nitpick here and there if you want. But unlike all of their peers,
Maiden have remained true to themselves since Day 1, have followed their own
template, and have refused to cowtow to the latest trends or the easy
cashgrabs. They remain in peak physical and musical shape, and they
obviously love what they do. I don’t go see arena shows very often
because I vastly prefer the intimacy of a small club to the corporate-rock
contrivances of the arena. But, even after all this time, Maiden do the
arena metal gig better than anyone else in the world. Up the Irons!
Setlist: Satellite 15 … The Final Frontier, El Dorado, 2 Minutes to Midnight, The
Talisman, Coming Home, Dance of Death, The Trooper, The Wickerman, Blood
Brothers, When the Wild Wind Blows, The Evil That Men Do, Fear of the Dark, Iron
Maiden. Encores: The Number of the Beast, Hallowed Be Thy Name, Running Free.
~ Review by Kit Ekman ~