All prog, little grrrrr
Who can deny Iron Maiden's legacy? 14 studio albums, four 'best of' compilations, nine live albums, and four boxed sets. They won the Ivor Novello Award for international achievement in 2002. But for all their success, devoted fanbase and hard work, Iron Maiden were only ranked #24 in VH1's "100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock" (I'd love to see the 23 above them, probably somebody like Bang Tango if VH1 has anything to do with it) and they were ranked only fourth on MTV's "Top 10 Greatest Heavy Metal Bands of All Time." Of course the above is all down to debate and opinion, I personally would rank them as number 1 due to their work rate, respect towards the fans and their relevance even after thirty years. 'A Matter of Life and Death' is the new release, and third release of the reunion line-up. After the success of 'Brave New World' and 'Dance of Death', expectations were high
Thankfully Iron Maiden have delivered the goods yet again because 'A Matter of Life and Death' is a dark, progressive, innovative collection of songs. It would be easy as a writer to use such clichés as "their best album since the 80's", "A timely return to form,' because these sort of comments are born out of hype and excitement rather than an actual appreciation of the music itself. I remember Metal Hammer at the time describing Virtual XI as being their best since the 80's which sort of illustrates my point, and as far as I can tell Iron Maiden haven't really suffered a significant dip in form to return back to it. What this new album is, is a natural progression for the band. They've followed the progressive elements in their music as illustrated in previous tracks such as 'Blood Brothers' and 'Paschendale'. A risky move it may have been, but I think it's an album Iron Maiden have been threatening to make for several years.
Apart from opener 'Different World' you could argue that all of the songs on 'A Matter of Life and Death' are cut from the same cloth. Apart from their length, they seem to adopt the slow start, crash in syndrome, and even after several weeks it's difficult to tell which song is which from the opening bars. Thankfully each track eventually develops its own identity to create some modern day Maiden anthems. 'Brighter Than a Thousand Suns', 'These Colours Don't Run' and the awesome 'For the Greater Good of God' are top draw cuts proving that although the mighty Irons maybe a different kettle of fish from twenty years ago, they've not lost their skill for writing potent heavy metal. Lead single 'The Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg' is a wonderful song and a great choice for a single because it's indicative of the album as a whole, unlike 2nd single 'Different World.' Album highlight however is 'The Longest Day,' which is a meandering titan of a tune which perhaps takes several listens to understand its understated brilliance. Bruce's melody, the grinding middle break both help to make it one of Maiden's best to sit alongside 'Hallowed be Thy nNme' and 'Powerslave.'
Of course we're not talking perfection here, very few albums can carry that accolade. Opener 'Different World' is a weak opening track, it sticks out like a sore thumb against the epic nature of the album. At best it's an also ran to 'Rainmaker', however I think the song would have more credibility on a previous album such as 'Brave New World'. Due to the powerful song-writing that follows it, 'Different World' tends to suffer from that 'Skip-track-syndrome'. The production is solid if not spectacular. Even with three axe men, Iron Maiden still fail to produce the solid guitar sound of such albums as 'Powerslave' and 'Number of the beast'. 'The Legacy' is perhaps a little too drawn out and 'The Pilgrim' suffers from being sandwiched between 'The longest day' and 'Brighter than a thousand suns.' 'Out of the Shadows' isn't going to set the world on fire, and there are too many songs that have that 'quiet finish' tagged on the end, seemingly as padding but it's very irritating, especially when the song has already arrived at a natural finish.
The album is a grower, there's no denying this fact, but there are enough 'immediate' ideas on this album to make you keep coming back for more. In a metal scene that is relying more and more on pace, aggression and brutality, it's a relief to know that there are still some bands who can write great songs without resorting to any of the above. In fact 'A Matter of Life and Death' seems like a fist to the face of such bands as Dragonforce and Cellador, who rely too heavily on out and out pace, by recording an album with very little speed in it at all. The depth of the song-writing and the innovation of the ideas suggest that this album will still be spinning in CD players or on IPODS for years to come when many have fallen to the back of the CD cupboard.
If feels with this release that Iron Maiden have finally thrown off the shackles of trying to write 'Hallowed Be Thy Name Part 2'. The album is refreshingly free of the trademark and over used galloping bass, instead, adopting a much sombre, grinding style. It works brilliantly, and I would suggest that this album is the album Iron Maiden tried to make when Bruce left the band ('The X factor' just didn't cut it in my opinion). I think the mighty Maiden have taken the progressive metal element to it's extreme, another album like this would be taking things a little too far. It will be interesting to see what the band come up with next, but thankfully that'll be many moons away, so I'm not worrying about it yet. Here's to the tour in December, I've got my ticket, have you?