Nikhil Dev

Iron Maiden are an English heavy metal band from East London. Formed in 1975 by bassist Steve Harris, previously of Gypsy’s Kiss and Smiler, Maiden have sold over 70 million albums world-wide. Iron Maiden has so far released 14 studio albums, four ‘best of’ compilations, nine live albums, and four boxed sets. The band won the Ivor Novello Award for international achievement in 2002.

Iron Maiden’s mascot, Eddie, is a perennial fixture in the band’s horror-influenced album cover art, as well as in live shows. Eddie was drawn by Derek Riggs until 1992, but has had various incarnations by numerous artists, the most notable being Melvyn Grant. Eddie is also featured in a first-person shooter video game and best of album - Ed Hunter - as well as numerous books, graphic comics and band-related merchandise.

The band has headlined several major events in its career, notably Rock in Rio, Ozzfest alongside Black Sabbath, Donington’s famous “Monsters of Rock”, “Download” Festivals and the “Reading and Leeds Festivals.”

The road from formation to the present started on Christmas Day 1975 shortly after bassist Steve Harris formed his own band after his bandmates in the group Smiler rejected many of his original songs. Harris attributes the band name to a movie adaptation of The Man in the Iron Mask he saw around that time, and so the group was christened after the medieval torture device.^[2]

Harris and guitarist Dave Murray remain the longest surviving members of Iron Maiden. The band had twelve different line-ups in the 1970s, paying their dues on the mostly punk club circuit in London’s rough East End while struggling to form a stable lineup of band members. Although Iron Maiden was a metal band influenced by Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, UFO, Yes, Wishbone Ash, Apocalypse, Queen and Judas Priest, the earlier music had undoubted punk overtones. Lacking “enough energy or charisma onstage”, original vocalist Paul Day became replaced by the outlandish Dennis Wilcock, a huge KISS fan who utilized fire, make-up and fake blood during live commitments. Wilcock’s friend, Murray, was invited to join, to the frustration of guitarists Dave Sullivan and Terry Rance. This fuelled Harris to temporarily split the band in the Winter of 1976, though the group reformed soon after with Murray as sole axeman.

Maiden recruited another guitarist in 1977, Bob Sawyer, who caused a rift between Murray and Wilcock, prompting Harris to sack both Murray and Sawyer.^[5] A disastrous gig at the Bridgehouse in November 1977, with a makeshift line-up including Tony Moore on keyboards, Terry Wrapram on guitar, and drummer Barry Purkis (later rechristened ‘Thunderstick’) resulted in Harris sacking the entire band.^[6] Dave Murray was reinstated and Doug Sampson was drafted in as drummer.

Star Studios in Bow, London played host to three rehearsals a week throughout the Summer and Autumn of 1978.^[7] A chance meeting at the Red Lion pub in Leytonstone evolved into a successful audition for punky vocalist Paul Di’Anno. Steve Harris reflected; There’s sort of a quality in Paul’s voice, a raspiness in his voice, or whatever you want to call it, that just gave it this great edge.^[8]”

Iron Maiden had been playing for three years, but had never recorded any of their music. On New Year’s Eve of 1978, the band recorded one of the most famous demos in hard rock history, The Soundhouse Tapes. Featuring only three songs, and a four-piece (all subsequent recordings featured a five-piece until 1999 when the band became a six-piece) the band sold all five thousand copies within weeks. One track found upon the demo, “Prowler”, went to number one on Neal Kay’s Heavy Metal Soundhouse charts in Sounds magazine.^[11] Their first appearance on an album was on the compilation Metal for Muthas (released on 15 February 1980) with two early versions of “Sanctuary” and “Wrathchild”.

For most of 1977 and all of 1978, Murray was the sole six-stringer in the band. This changed with the arrival of Paul Cairns in 1979. Shortly before going into the studio, Cairns left the band and several other guitarists played alongside Murray until the band finally settled on Dennis Stratton. Initially, the band wanted to hire Dave Murray’s childhood friend Adrian Smith, but Smith was busy singing and playing guitar for his own band, Urchin. Drummer Doug Sampson was also replaced by Clive Burr (who was brought into the band by Stratton), and in December 1979, the band landed a major record deal by signing an EMI contract at the label’s old building in London’s Manchester Square.