Iron Maiden is one of the most successful Heavy Metal bands of all time and their best-selling albums were recorded with vocalist Bruce Dickinson, who, after joining the band in 1981, helped take their potential to another level. Although musicians usually love most of the songs they write and release, there are always some they feel a bit embarrassed about and think could have been much better. Dickinson once revealed which two Maiden songs he feels that way about.
2 Iron Maiden songs Bruce Dickinson doesn’t think are good
“Invaders”
The first song is “Invaders”, the opening track of their best-selling album “Number of the Beast” (1982). Since it was released, Bruce and Steve Harris already mentioned several times they didn’t like the song. He mentioned the track when talking about Maiden’s reunion album “Brave New World” (2000). “I think this (new record) is pure, like the old ones. Nothing but 110% energy into writing and not thinking about anything else. If you look at ‘Number of the Beast’, even that one had a few (songs) that Steve and I look back on and say ‘nah… could’ve been better. Should’ve been something else.’ ‘Invaders?’ (shrugs) Nah,” he told Lollipop magazine in 2000.
Maiden never played the song live, which proves they didn’t really like it that much. In Maiden’s biography “Run to The Hills“, Steve Harris said: “(Invaders) could have been replaced with something a bit better, only we didn’t have anything else to replace it with at the time. We had just enough time to do what we did, and that was it.” Curiously, the song was covered a few times by Dream Theater during their concerts back in the early 2000s when they played the entire “Number of the Beast” album live.
According to Bruce, a tour was already scheduled when they were recording the album, so it had to be done quickly, and they even had to decide which track would be the single before anything was recorded.
He said:
“What we gained on the swings we lost on the roundabouts. When it actually came to the recording it was all done in one mad, unholy rush. (Then) we had to pick the single before we recorded anything, because of the schedule.”
“We were, like, ‘Oh, fucking hell! We haven’t recorded any of the songs yet. How do we know which one will be a good single?’ I mean, they were all such killer songs on ‘Number Of The Beast’, we could easily have picked the wrong track completely. But the schedule said we had to pick a single. So we asked Martin what he thought and he said ‘Run To The Hills’. So, thanks to Martin’s prize-winning ears, that’s what we did. It turned out to be exactly the right choice,” Bruce Dickinson said in Maiden’s biography.
“Gangland”
The other track, “Gangland,” also from “The Number of the Beast”, is one that both Bruce and Harris are not fans of. Unlike “Invaders,” which was written by Harris, this song was a collaboration between drummer Clive Burr and guitarist Adrian Smith. Also was never played live.
Like Bruce recalled in his biography “What Does This Button Do?”, “Gangland” was the first song they recorded for the album. At the time they thought it was “too good to be a b-side”. “The first song we recorded was intended to be a B-side. It was called ‘Gangland’ and featured a writing credit for Clive Burr, on the basis that the drums were as integral to the track as the guitar riffs. We were all like little puppy dogs recording it. We stayed till four or five in the morning, listening back.”
Bruce Dickinson continued:
“‘Too good to be a B-side’ was the general feeling. I wasn’t so sure; I thought it a bit presumptuous seeing as we had nothing else to compare it to. I was the new boy, however, and at least everyone had their tails up before the main event, which was a track called ‘Run to the Hills’,” he said.
Adrian Smith once explained how the track was written, saying that Clive Burr started playing a drum pattern inspired by Cozy Powell and Ian Paice, two drummers he loved. Smith then decided to play something on guitar based on what Gary Moore would have played.
According to Steve Harris, it was one of the first experiences their late drummer had with songwriting. He said in Iron Maiden’s biography that he should have intervened at the time. “There’s a couple of tracks on it which I think are not quite so good. One of them is one of the ones I wrote! Gangland’ was, like, Clive’s first attempt at songwriting. I should have just put my foot down and said, ‘Look, this is a 137”.
Steve also noted that in his opinion, if “Total Eclipse” was in the album instead of “Gangland” it would have been much better. Despite those songs, “Number of The Beast” is Iron Maiden’s best-selling record. It sold an estimated amount of more than 20 million copies worldwide.