A Matter of Life and Death

by

Iron Maiden

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Iron Maiden still reign supreme as the absolute Kings of Metal and have since their first disk back in 1980. Now, countless releases later, A Matter of Life and Death shows that the "Colours" are not running in the slightest on the Iron Maiden Flag.

I remember back in 1999 hearing that Bruce and Adrian re-joined the band for Brave New World. That was indeed exciting news. After all, while they were out of the band they teamed up on two of Bruce's solo releases, and one of those releases, Accident of Birth, was as good as Maiden's Number of the Beast or Piece of Mind...I know...Blasphemous!

And what a disk Brave New World was! That too was as good as any of the best Maiden albums ever released. 6 years and another release (Dance of Death) later, the Irons are still way up.

A Matter of Life and Death is an Iron Maiden classic already. It's got the familiar sounds...you know...the ones we all have come to know and love over the past 26 years. The anthem choruses are there. The epic songs are there. The lead guitar duals are there.

The three-guitar onslaught is there. But that's a relatively new sound that's only been around since Brave New World. And that sound is working on all Iron cylinders on A Matter of Life and Death.

The first three tracks ring true to the sound established with Brave New World and Dance of Death. Track 3, Brighter Than a Thousand Suns, is an intricately woven together off time rocker that will be amazing to see pulled off live. Track 4 has that classic pre-Blaze years sound.

The disk gets better as you get deeper in. Tracks 8 and 10 are both 9+ minute epics, and perhaps the two best tracks on the album. All the tracks have their own sound. And not one of them should be "judged by its cover"; often times the way a track starts is not indicative of what you get two minutes into it. But that's well known signature style for Maiden.

Iron Maiden will not disappoint the die-hard fans with A Matter of Life and Death and they keep the sound refreshed enough to bring in new fans with every release. These guys are the epitome of Metal and the epitome of Metal done RIGHT.

Don't pass on this one, folks.

Iron Maiden will never get out of their rut as long as Steve Harris is in charge of EVERYTHING. I know he is the founder and leader, but he needs somebody to tell him that is a lousy producer. Well, either Kevin Shirley is just awful, or Steve overrides him at every turn. Just listen to everything Maiden put out with Martin Birch before NPFTD. It was excellence. I cannot fathom how the guys in the band listen to what they have been putting out and actually agree that this is the best they can do. There are some pretty good songs here and the guys perform wonderfully as usual, well, except for Janick Gers who is just an embarassment. There are some really great riffs and Bruce still sounds really good for a 48-year old. The sound on this album does not even compare to stuff they put out over 20 years ago. I agree with several other reviewers that they seem to be putting out the same stuff ad nauseum. I love Iron Maiden and AMOLAD is still head and shoulders above most other stuff out there, so you will still be getting a great album when you pick this up. It is just unfortunate that Steve Harris' ego is so out of control that he cannot smell his own funk.