Band Review – Iron Maiden

Hello! First of all, I’d like to say that I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving! I’m back here again with another short band review. As you could probably tell from the title, this one will be about Iron Maiden. I hadn’t actually ever listened to them before this, so I had no idea what I was getting myself into. I did have some expectations, but those ended up being proven wrong haha, to my surprise.

I mainly wanted to listen to this band because I knew they were really popular, and also my car key lanyard was an Iron Maiden one. It was the only lanyard in the two stores that I went to that I would even consider, so I vowed to listen to them one day. I decided recently that I don’t want to be a poser anymore haha.

Additionally, I had also seen a lot of Iron Maiden’s various artwork and I really liked that as well. I wanted to further understand what they were about a little more, and learn what their music was about and what kind of a sound it had.

So, who are Iron Maiden?

Iron Maiden is an English heavy metal band from London that formed in 1975. They ended up being pioneers of the heavy metal movement in the UK, and gained a lot of popularity in the early 80s.

Expectations/Reality

Since they were said to be a heavy metal band, I expected pretty heavy metal, maybe something like Metallica or Pantera, but they honestly reminded me a lot more of hair bands like Kiss. Their vocals are what generally reminded me of bands like Kiss, but their instrumentals do sound pretty heavy-metal-esque. I do think I was maybe more expecting death metal compared to heavy metal, and that was a mistake on my part. I still do think that on the spectrum of heavy metal and rock, they are in the middle but leaning more towards rock honestly. That is just my opinion though, I know that they are a heavy metal band.

I also know that the definition of heavy metal and rock have changed a lot over the decades, so that probably also plays a factor in why I expected something heavier, and it turned out to be a lot more melodic and hair band-y than I thought they were going to be.

Thoughts

I do really like their music. I understand why they are so popular, and I would love to see them live one day, since they are still actively touring. I had to look that up to see if they were still touring, and I’m honestly surprised that they are. I’m very happy about that though, since they would be a super cool band to see live.

A few days after I listened to them for the first time, I went to a concert and in between bands, they played the Iron Maiden song Run to the Hills, which I knew at that point. I thought it was really coincidental that right after I listen to them for the first time, it comes on at a concert. It’s also a relatively repetitive song, which made it easy for me to also sing along with everyone else, even though I had only heard it a couple of times.

Songs I Like

I did like several songs that I listened to from them, but my top two, ironically, are The Trooper and Run to the Hills. These are their two most popular songs, which makes sense as to why they are also my favorites. In the future, when I listen to them more, I will most likely have other, or even different, favorites after that.

I really like the beginning of both of these songs and I think they are really catchy and well done. I also like how the lyrics are easy to understand and memorize so you can sing along relatively easy after listening to the songs a couple of times. It’s a little unfortunate, in my opinion, that a lot of the bands I listen to don’t really have easily understandable lyrics that I can sing along to. I usually have to look up the lyrics in order to sing along, and it was nice to not have to do that for this band.

Overall Thoughts

I did enjoy their music a lot, even though I don’t think it is something I think I’ll be listening to very frequently. I am glad that I did finally listen to them so I know what they sound like, and I do plan on listening to them more in the future to get more familiar with them. I wouldn’t be able to listen to them for a very long time, since I usually like listening to a lot of different kinds of music when I drive.

I was pretty surprised at how they sounded, since it wasn’t what I expected, but I still really did like the music. I can also really appreciate the art of making music like this and how good it is. I definitely understand why people like this band so much, and I am very glad that I gave them a chance eventually.

Conclusion

That is all I have to say about this band for now! Who knows, maybe one day I may make another post about them, updating my feelings, favorite songs, etc. I’m excited to be posting more frequently again, and I will try to get back into that. I know I say that all the time, but winter break is coming up and I will have time to write some blog posts to make during the upcoming months.

If you have any comments, suggestions of other bands to listen to, or any questions, please leave a comment below. I love reading all of the comments and I respond to every single one of them!

Thank you all so much for reading my blog post and supporting my journey! I appreciate every single one of you, and I hope I can keep entertaining for months and maybe even years to come. I’ll see you guys in the next one!