RIP, Clive Burr (original drummer for Iron Maiden)

Dead at 56 after long battle with MS:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/music-news/9929177/Clive-Burr-the-ex-Iron-Maiden-drummer-dies-aged-56.html

Played on first three Maiden albums, including the breakthrough "Number of the Beast."

 

Iron Maiden: the most prolifically good band of the 1980s?

 

Still don't understand why radio blackballed them.

 

Because a lot of their songs were 8 minutes long and about military history. There's definitely an audience for that, but mainstream radio ain't it.

I thought they were awesome when I was 15, but as a buddy of mine once said about Ronnie James Dio, "At the end of the day, you can only sing so much about dragons and shit."

 

If J.S. Bach had been born in 1950-something instead of 16-whatever, he'd have been a guitar player in Iron Maiden. If you believe in reincarnation, maybe he is.

Listen to some Bach, listen to some Maiden and hear it. They're Bach on steroids and HGH. Intense, repetitive, furious, insistent ... the only way it could be any more similar is if they ripped him off note for note.

 

A lot of the early stuff wasn't epic length or else it would not have even made it on the airwaves in the UK. Enough of the music made it on radio and MTV here that by 1985 they were selling out arenas in the USA.

 

"Run to the Hills" has the most memorable drum intro of any song I can think of. Very simple pattern, but very powerful.

And every album in their classic period (Number of the Beast through Seventh Son of a Seventh Son) had a few songs with catchy melody hooks, memorable choruses, and a short enough length to have deserved more airplay on mainstream rock stations at the time (ie. "Run to the Hills," "Flight of Icarus," "Still Life," "Aces High," "Two Minutes to Midnight," "Wasted Years," "Can I Play With Madness"). Granted, the songs were generally still about military history or literature -- kind of on the nerdy side -- but they were never given a chance. And they were selling out arenas as headliners by 1983 (at least the 10-12,000 seat arenas in second-tier cities like the one where I grew up).

And their material since Adrian Smith and Bruce Dickinson rejoined the band in 2000 is a lot stronger than most people realize. But most people will never hear it. Modern rock stations won't play it, classic rock stations won't play it and even hard rock stations won't play it -- they're too busy playing shitty nu-metal. It's a shame.

 

I heard "Run To The Hills" on Dallas radio the other day (I think on KEGL, but it might have been a bumper on a talk show).

The only reason I can think of Maiden not getting on the radio much in the late 1970s and early 1980s was that rock formats shied away from the heaviest of metal for a long, long time. The crossover popularity of AC/DC helped immensely to break down the barrier, then Def Leppard came along. Both seem pretty tame now, but back then, that was a lot harder than what normally aired. I'm sure MTV also played a role.

Attitudes of both the mass audience and PDs changed toward metal in general. Of course, that didn't help Maiden much, because their songs were so conceptual and often too long to be radio-friendly. But they did get some spins of songs like Flight of Icarus.

RIP Clive.

 

Maiden provided the template for bands like Metallica and Slayer to build their initial - very loyal - audience through albums and concerts. I think three of the U.S.' Big Four bands surpassed Maiden and other NWOBHM bands. But Maiden was so awesome from Number of the beast to to Piece of Mind to Powerslave, just three seminal albums.

Finally saw them in 2003. At Long Beach Arena. Only show by anyone I've ever left disappointed. 75 minutes, then "good night!"

No thanks.

Their newer stuff is solid. Lot of good songs on Brave New World. Thanks to Spotify, I can hear them. Radio is dead.

 

Saw them around '96 or so. It was an outdoor show on a small stage. The set design consisted of a painted tarp with the logo. That was it. I'm fairly certain the place wasn't sold out by a long shot.

Blaze Bayley was the singer. Good enough pipes, but what they don't tell you is he was horribly injured in a motorcycle accident some years ago and moved about the stage like a nursing home patient. For Maiden this is just unacceptable.