Virtual XI

[Spruce Goose]

(Mother Russia was my least favourite Maiden song until the one-two punch of Face in the Sand and Age of Innocence).

I love those 2 songs

 

[Mark]

Were those two songs on DoD? If so that'd explain why I don't know them. I'm still sad that there's an era of Maiden I am unfamiliar with

 

[Blitzkrieg]

it just doesn't gel together as an album.....Download the radio edit of The Angel and the Gambler if you can because it's far superior without the 15 minute chorus...... Blaze is great on the entire album.

Agree with this. Virtual XI is one of their weakest albums overall, but it has heaps of killer material. Como Estais Amigos and The Clansman are fantastic, Futureal is rocky and cool, and I have a soft spot for Lightnight Strikes Twice. Blaze is great on When Two Worlds Collide (seems to foreshadow some of his solo stuff), and the other songs aren't bad either (if you listen to the edit of Angel and the Gambler).

Just when I think the world is coming to an end because me and Spiff agree on something...

Mother Russia was my least favourite Maiden song until the one-two punch of Face in the Sand and Age of Innocence

...I absolutely love Mother Russia and Face In The Sand, and Age Of Innocence I have no problem with.


As for Janick, love him or loath him, I think he was crucial to holding the band together through the 90s, and wrote some of the strongest material in that era.

 

[Priest of Evil]

Were those two songs on DoD? If so that'd explain why I don't know them. I'm still sad that there's an era of Maiden I am unfamiliar with

Dont feel sad.

I'm yet to explore the Blaze era, beyond the song Futureal featured on the Maiden clips DVD - it is a great song and weighs in VXs favour for me eventually buying it.

Putting aside the abomination on the front cover, I really DoD. I probably enjoy the recent Bruce stuff more than NPFTD or FoTD, I find it more consistent from start to finish.

 

[Spiff]

All Maiden albums have standouts. This has Futureal and The Clansman. But the rest of the songs.. I can listen to. Over. And enjoy. The choruses are catchy and work well. It's all very simply written, it's just, really quality music. After all these years of hearing people rag on this album, I'm shocked I like it so much.

The only complaint I suppose is the repetition in choruses... but this is Maiden after all. Lightning Strikes Twice is a good song, but you hear him sing it so often you almost go out of breath along with him, haha.

Very good, Herr Lazer. Now go and get Blaze's solo albums! They're excellent. Silicon Messiah is the ideal place to start.

Hey, here's a live clip:



It's a single camera thing, but very good quality. His band these days doesn't seem to be the most electrifying of live acts. Awesome song though.

 

[Goreripper]

Adrian wasn't fired per se - he couldn't make up his mind on whether he was committed (they'd had a similar discussion before 7th Son I think?), so it was kind of mutually agreed that he'd leave (with pushing from Steve).

Honestly, at this time Steve must have been taking crazy pills - he made two huge fuck-ups in the space of weeks; letting Adrian go because Adrian expected a certain high-quality in Maiden's writing, and then hiring the Dancing Wizard, Janick, to replace him.

That's probably closer to the truth. I've just never forgiven Harry for letting H go. The man is a songwriting genius! No wonder the next few albums sucked ass.

 

[Spiff]

Well, you can't blame Adrian's departure for No Prayer for the Dying - the album was all written and everything. Tellingly, the best song on the album was co-written by Mr Smith.

Fear of the Dark is just an unadulterated mess.

 

[Goreripper]

But part of the reason he was torn was because the songwriting was in the toilet. He didn't contribute much to No Prayer because he was off doing ASAP, if I recall.

 

[Spiff]

Silver & Gold, now there's a good album. A shame he didn't really do anything of note until Accident of Birth (no, the Psycho Motel albums aren't anything of note - well, I've only heard the first one but it's nothing special).

I still maintain that he should have joined Def Leppard (at least for a while) and a pre-brainwashed Vivian Campbell join Maiden. That would have been tops, and now we'd have Viv in a three-guitar line-up.

 

[Shannow]

Spiff,
the ASAP albums are worth owning, if only for their heritage.

Interesting concept the Def Leppard thing.

 

[Mark]

ASaP was completed prior to NP sessions starting (it was done before Tattooed Millionaire, even).

Spiff, the second Psycho Motel album is awesome. Their second vocalist was much better.

I think the main reason Adrian didn't contribute much to NP was simply because they rushed the writing - rather than write 10 or whatever great songs, Harris was content with just writing 10 songs, and then recording them as quickly as possible to keep an 'energetic' vibe; after the precision of SSoaSS (by precision, I mean the attention to detail of the whole album, and quality musical performances), I'm not surprised Adrian had the shits with the whole enterprise. And as we saw, Maiden's QA went out the window with every album until BNW (with the exception of actually a rather decent X Factor).

Blame Janick - he encouraged everyone to be lazy from 1990 onwards. Blame Janick.

 

[Southy]

I still say my biggest prob with VXI is the lack of production. I have never been a massive fan of Np Prayer... and I haven't actually listened to FotD in I dunno how fucking long

 

[phlogiston]

Janick writes a mean song too, though.

 

[Mark]

He's come out with some decent ones, yes. My main bugbear is his stage performance, particularly his sloppy, lazy lead playing, and how 9 years of this impacted negatively on Dave.

Fucking Janick.

 

[Spiff]

Spiff,
the ASAP albums are worth owning, if only for their heritage.

There was only one ASAP album, Silver & Gold (which I mentioned in my previous post). Good album, but all the best songs are at the beginning (apart from the closing track).

Down the Wire is equal to, or better than, anything on Bruce's solo albums. Awesome, awesome song.

 

[Mark]

The Lion (from ASaP) was actually brought into either the SiT or SSoaSS sessions, but the band (ie, Steve) didn't like it. Fool!

 

[Spiff]

Yeah, I think the title track was as well.

 

[Spiff]

Poor quality Silver & Gold video, for those who don't know the song:



A shame he doesn't sing anymore (back-up excepted, of course).

 

[Shannow]

There was only one ASAP album, Silver & Gold (which I mentioned in my previous post). Good album, but all the best songs are at the beginning (apart from the closing track).

So it's one ASAP, and two psycho motels...worth getting them all. I fucked up on which was who.

 

[Blitzkrieg]

...9 years of this impacted negatively on Dave.

Fucking Janick.

Dave blew me the fuck away with his performance in Melbourne...