Iron Maiden at Continental Airlines Arena Concert Review

Iron Maiden. A band so legendary that pop culture makers reference them as the very epitome of heavy metal. Their classic period albums are some of the best metal ever produced, their influence on the bands that followed them is incalculable and their front man sets the bar for pure stage presence. Even more importantly, it’s been over 30 years since bassist Steve Harris first started Iron Maiden and they’re still producing good music – and going on strong tours with it.

This time around, Maiden is supporting their latest effort, A Matter of Life and Death and doing so in a fashion that some would call an interesting experiment and others would call pure trash: playing the album in its entirety before launching into the traditional Maiden classics. Strange and unusual, you say? Most definitely, but Iron Maiden is a band that’s always managed to resist bowing to the expected conventions. That said, the really strange about this year’s set list is that even though most would probably agree that going with a more traditional catalog selection sprinkled with cuts from the new album would have made for a better show, Maiden’s choice to play all of A Matter of Life and Death on stage actually worked – because the band did their best to make it work.

Making it Work, Part 1: A Well-Design Stage Setup

Normally I don’t give much thought to stage setups. At the most (Metallica, Megadeth) the band will pull out flame jets and some fireworks to with the usual lighting rigs and a cool backdrop or two. Iron Maiden’s set, however, was something special: a huge open area decorated like a World War I combat trench with twelve-foot walls, upper-area walkways, monitors decorated like sandbags and several different military-themed backdrops, all relating back to the militaristic cover of A Matter of Life and Death. And there were props, too: skeletons in parachutes hanging from the rigging on the side of the stage, Eddie the Head in an enormous tank that appeared behind the stage during “Iron Maiden” and again on stage as a fifteen-foot-tall soldier during “The Evil That Men Do.”

Making it Work, Part 2: Knowing How to Use That Stage

It also help that the band knows how to use every inch of that space to their advantage, a fact that was readily apparent from the moment Bruce Dickenson opened “Different World” by leaping over one of the stage monitors. From that moment on, he was in constant motion, moving around the stage, stalking the walkways, inciting the crowd and keeping the energy moving from the stage into a crowd that had decidedly mixed reactions to the idea of listening to an entire album they were not completely familiar with. The rest of the band followed suit, taking the spotlight for solos and duets, moving around the stage at a frenetic pace and giving us enough to watch that you didn’t want to look away in case you missed something interesting.

Maiden’s efforts were enough to keep the crowd interested through all of A Matter of Life and Death. Then, after a quick “thank you for sticking around,” Maiden launched into “The Evil That Men Do,” setting the arena on fire. For the rest of the night, the band had the crowd in the palm of their hand, with every voice raised in song – an incredibly impressive way to end a show.

A Mixed Bag

Even with the killer ending, this show was a mixed bag. As impressive (and fun) as it was to watch Iron Maiden keep a large crowd interested while the band played through new and relatively unknown material – and to end the night with five “classics” as a reward – the experiment overall was a failure. I think it was very clear, from both the crowd and the band’s reaction to playing the last five songs, that constructing a more varied set list drawing from the entire Maiden catalog would have made for a more successful show.