During the question-and-answer portion of his February 11 spoken-word show at The Vic Theatre in Chicago, Illinois, Bruce Dickinson was asked why IRON MAIDEN always uses UFO's "Doctor Doctor" as its "entrance music" at is concerts. He responded: "It has the added advantage that everybody knows we play 'Doctor Doctor' before we go on stage. So, before the intro tape, there's five minutes of 'Doctor Doctor'. It's brilliant, so people go, 'Oh, quick.' Stop having a piss, drink the last pint, get to your seats. 'Doctor Doctor' is playing. They'll be on in a minute. And for the road crew, it's also brilliant. It's, like, 'Stop masturbating in the toilet. Wipe your ass.'" Last year, MAIDEN bassist Steve Harris named "Love To Love", from UFO's 1979 album "Strangers In The Night", as one of the eight songs that changed his life. He explained to Metal Hammer magazine: "UFO have loads of great songs, and loads of great albums, but this version in particular, on 'Strangers In The Night', really struck a nerve with me. It's the light and shade and the dynamic build-up which does it for me. "I used to listen to 'Strangers In The Night' when I was driving the kids to school in the morning and it gets you fired up for the day. "UFO always had fantastic guitar players — Michael Schenker and Paul Chapman were brilliant — and Phil Mogg is a great singer. "MAIDEN played two gigs supporting UFO in 1981, in Long Beach and San Bernardino in California, and we'd have loved to have them out with us, but for some reason it never happened." Dickinson's two-month North American spoken-word tour kicked off on January 17 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida and will run through the end of March. Bruce's spoken-word show is split into two parts. The first section sees him take a humorous and often satirical look at the world from his own very personal perspective, treating the audience to private insights into his drive and ambition, peppered with plenty of MAIDEN anecdotes, and a myriad of other experiences encompassing not just the giddy heights but also the extreme lows, as told first-hand in his inimitable anarchic style, punctuated with photographs, videos and sometimes even erupting into song a cappella, to illustrate a point. The final section of the evening is devoted entirely to the aforementioned question-and-answer session, with the opportunity to pose questions on any subject whatsoever. As Bruce's answers are all completely improvised — the more left-field and quirky the question, the more interesting and compelling the response is likely to be. Dickinson is considered one of the world's most storied musicians. Aside from decades spent delivering high-octane performances with his larger-than-life persona in IRON MAIDEN, Bruce has lived an extraordinary off-stage existence too. A true polymath, his accomplishments include: pilot and airline captain, aviation entrepreneur, beer brewer, motivational speaker, film scriptwriter, twice-published novelist and Sunday Times best-selling author, radio presenter, TV actor, sports commentator and international fencer — to name but a few. Dickinson, who had a golf gall-size tumor on his tongue and another in the lymph node on the right side of his neck, got the all-clear in May 2015 after radiation and nine weeks of chemotherapy. Bruce will hit the road with IRON MAIDEN for a new North American leg of the band's "Legacy Of The Beast" tour in September.
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