Where Have You Been All My Life?
November 28, 2008 11:46 am MusicStuffDespite the fact that I spent the last post extolling the virtues of Death Magnetic and Chinese Democracy, I’ve spent the past few days listening rocking out to Iron Maiden’s The Number of the Beast. Now THAT’S a metal album: 40 minutes of sheer headbanging awesomeness, really pushing home the point that metal (as a genre)’s best days were arguably the mid-80’s.
It’s funny, though… I’ve always known that Iron Maiden was awesome, but I’d never actually sat down to listen to an album of theirs until now, and was only familiar with a few of their songs. Now, I’m going to devote my life to all things Maiden, and to spreading the word of their majesty and mastery of heavy metal.
Or not. I’m pretty busy these days. 
Up next: Emilia crawls! Film at 11! (or whenever I get around to posting it)
Woot :
Date: November 28, 2008 @ 3:30 pm
Dude - you are stealing my music collection.
Do yourself a favor and get the “Sound house tapes”. It is the original raw sound of Maiden. It isn’t polished, but I take from your posts that you’d be ok with that. It’s raw high energy Maiden.
I have the entire discography on tap here… it’s well worth it. I have a cd of interviews for the truly hard core as well.
Are you in the Sack-town area?
Woot :
Date: November 28, 2008 @ 3:40 pm
I guess the point of that album is that you’ll hear phrases that will be repeated and altered later. I always like finding a bands influences and transitions.
The next album (1980’s self-titled) has the first version of Charlotte the Harlot, sanctuary, and phantom… not bad.
81 has the first Wrathchild, which is worth you-tubing. Lots more… but this is where they start to sound like the you’d expect.
Jean-Paul :
Date: November 28, 2008 @ 3:50 pm
Nope, we’re in Beechville.
I’ll make it a point to explore more, but when a band’s music tends to run together, there’s a point where you get a certain amount of it that it starts to become stale. Some artists have managed to stay somewhat fresh from one recording to the next (U2), and other artists who have managed to successfully reinvent themselves time and again (Madonna), but one of the big problems with hard rock/metal is that there’s only so much you can do to reinvent yourself. Metallica has somehow managed to do it (although many will say that St. Anger was a misstep; I don’t know, I’ve never listened to the album), but, say, AC/DC has made the same record 20-odd times.
In short, as long as I limit my involvement in a band to only a few albums, I don’t have to worry about oversaturation. Unless they’re all awesome. In which case, ok.