The greatest hits/best of album: If there was ever a product of a bygone era, it's this. For those of you born in, say, the mid 90s and onward, the greatest hits album was what people bought if a) they were new to a band and wanted to know which songs to start with, or b) only wanted the "hits" from a band. Said hits were curated by the band, the band's leader, record company execs who think they know what's best, or some combination thereof. It should go without saying that this was pre-internet, nevermind streaming. Insert your own 1800s joke here.
Said collection could be a boost that provides new interest in a waning band. It could turn out to be the product that provides a musician with the most consistent and largest pay cheque they can receive. There was a long period of time where The Eagles first such compilation, titled Their Greatest Hits (1971-1975) was the highest selling record of all time. Yes, of all time (reference to THAT asshole not intended). It was only usurped by Michael Jackson's Thriller in 2009, after his death (of course). Still though, anyone with two brain cells to rub together would kill to get the royalty statement Bernie Leadon was getting, never mind Don Henley.
The greatest hits album could also be something that frequently can (and does) cut the heels of a band's best selling original album. Frankly, the only reason Metallica is still selling so well is because Metallica never put out a greatest hits album. AC/DC never put out one either, at least if you don't count the soundtracks that they made. Yes, to maintain some sort of credibility and keep Back In Black sales up, AC/DC provided soundtracks that were nothing but their songs to two films: Maximum Overdrive, a mostly forgotten film adaptation of a Stephen King novel that is more known for said soundtrack at this point than the film, and, more famously, Iron Man 2. Bit of a bizarre case there. I remember when that was released I thought "Why? and why now?" Now lest anyone think those two "soundtracks" were all anyone needed from AC/DC, the former didn't have "Back In Black," or anything from the Bon Scott era aside from deep cut "Ride On," and the latter was missing "You Shook Me All Night Long," "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap," "Hells Bells" and "For Those About To Rock." Avoidance of said greatest hits (and unlike Metallica, there was a bit of a dry period for AC/DC in the 80s, I'm sure they were pressured like hell to make one) is, again, the reason why Back In Black is in fact, the second highest selling album of all time, right behind Thriller (yup, even it surpassed Their Greatest Hits (1971-1975)). Guns N Roses and Nirvana have greatest hits albums, which is odd for a band with really only three albums, but they certainly didn't stop Appetite For Destruction and Nevermind from selling 30 million records apiece (though it does stop them from being any higher at the moment).
A greatest hits album is also a bit of a curse. Most musicians look at them as tombstones. After all, why look back at your past when you think you're still pumping out hits? There's also the fact that for the most part, no "new" album of original material ever tops such a compilation. and god forbid you're stupid and arrogant enough to tack a "Volume 1" as part of that package. You're basically telling the government you're about to leak the Epstein files and to kill your career dead right then and there. Live albums also act as this albatross for similar reasons.
And well, if an albatross isn't connective tissue to Iron Maiden nothing is. That brings us to the topic of this blogpost: Iron Maiden's first (though not title volume 1 of course) greatest hits album, 1996's Best of the Beast. Now there are different versions of this compilation. There's the single CD, there's a double CD and there is a whopping 4 vinyl box set, and anyone who felt the need to buy original albums after that had too much money ("Rime Of The Ancient Mariner" and the song "Seventh Son of A Seventh Son" were on that thing). We will be discussing the single disc version of this compilation for two reasons: 1) it was the version you were most likely to find on CD shelves, and as a consequence of such, 2) it was yours truly's introduction to Iron Maiden.
I don't suppose my story is any different than most people: wandering around a record/CD store, one of Iron Maiden's albums covers caught my eye and I'd be all like ooooooooooo. Eventually I decided to go with said compilation (but I don't really remember buying it).
Here is the track-listing of the single disc version:
- The Number of the Beast
- Can I Play With Madness
- Fear of The Dark (live)
- Run To The Hills
- Bring Your Daughter.... To The Slaughter
- The Evil That Men Do
- Aces High
- Be Quick Or Be Dead
- 2 Minutes To Midnight
- Man On The Edge
- Virus
- Running Free (live)
- Wasted Years
- The Clairvoyant
- The Trooper
- Hallowed Be Thy Name
Some of you are likely wondering "Where's Wasted Love" or "Why does Blaze Bayley's era get two songs and Paul Di'anno's only have one" or "Why isn't The Trooper track 1?" What's funny is I only had so much capacity for "new music" back then, and even on greatest hits albums, after track 9 or 10 or so I start looking at everything after that as unnecessary extras. Mind you I had already heard "Hallowed Be Thy Name" thanks to a friend burning it on me for a CD, so I at least had familiar territory to end on. It would sometimes be a slog to keep going after "2 Minutes To Midnight," cos fuck, sometimes its like how does ANYTHING follow that? Point being, having "The Trooper" that deep into it...well to some its the perfect one two punch, to others it feels like such a song should be near the beginning (and I'm fairly certain a large amount of Maiden's fanbase felt it should be track 2 moreso than "Can I Play With Madness."
But let me answer those three questions, a) Spotify didn't exist yet so it felt like popular opinion hated it, being an also ran from the very tired Fear of The Dark. b) because Steve liked Blaze better than Paul (and still kinda does), and the second song is technically a new song to give fans something new as an excuse to get the album (or at least coax the artist into thinking they're still relevant/having a hand in making it). c) See b, and the fucked up part is, it's not even Paul singing it, it's the live version from Live After Death (and a single edit at that)!
Now it's time for me to get on a soap box and say something that's been bothering me for many years. Steve, what is your fucking problem? What is your fucking with Paul Di'Anno's era? Ok yea the guy called you Hitler and a couple of other unsavory things, and he has rather erroneously convinced the world that Iron Maiden's early days were punky (which I agree, is not true at all), but that doesn't mean you get to leave off classics like "Sanctuary," "Wrathchild," the studio version of "Running Free" and "Iron Maiden" (you know, the song that you HAVE to play every night?) off your greatest hits albums! And yeah ok, Paul studio songs will SOMETIMES appear, they've appeared on Edhunter and The Essential Iron Maiden. Two out of fucking five greatest hits albums?! That's an exception, not a rule! Blaze songs are more likely to appear on these things than Paul is! And look, I'm a defender of the likes of "Man on The Edge" and "Futureal," but them getting preference over the Paul classics I listed above? No one outside of Brazil wants that. Worst of all, Paul's voice isn't even on the fucking pinball machine. You can't even put him on your fucking pinball machine soundtrack? Granted there's no Blaze songs on there either but still! And don't tell me this has been Bruce's doing because Bruce has been kinder to a former singer of such band than really anybody!
So yeah, fuck you Steve Harris. Fuck you for making it a pain in the ass to have Paul Di'Anno's songs on your compilations or game soundtracks or whatever. Those first two albums did quite some heavy lifting! Not as much as the next 3 albums but they did more for you than Blaze's albums did.
Let's talk about the sequence journey. The album starts with the certified hood classic "The Number of The Beast," not only a perfect introduction to the band, but a fine track one in a situation like this. Steve Harris' daring songwriting, Adrian and Dave's magical yet dark guitar tones, and of course, the one and only voice of Bruce Dickinson. Much ado has been made of Dickinson's "fairyfication" of Bruce's voice as the 80s progressed, but on The Number of the Beast tracks, he is anything but. He is violent, dangerous, psychotic; Paul was dark and dangerous, but there was a rock star 'cool' to him. There is no such 'cool' with Bruce here, he is a rabid dog that wants to eat your throat out in the messiest way possible.
Second track, controversially, is "Can I Play With Madness." Now, I've always liked this song, but I get why certain fans would be upset with not only this song's presence, but being the second thing you hear on a compilation when you have choices like Run To The Hills, "2 Minutes To Midnight," any Paul Di'Anno song mentioned above, or hell even "The Trooper!" This is the first of three Seventh Son of a Seventh Son songs here. That's a lot for a 16 track one disc retrospective. That's as many as Number of The Beast, and more than Piece of Mind, Powerslave, and Somewhere In Time. Hell there are quite a few music video singles that were left off of this thing in favor of well, this and "Man On The Edge." I always felt Steve held a grudge against metal fans in '88 for being upset that Iron Maiden was following their own path rather than just making Master of Puppets or Peace Sells. I do agree with his assessment that Seventh Son got a bit of a raw deal in favor of the new underground trend (and don't kid yourself, as great as thrash was, as important as it was, it was a trend that rose and fell). But time and the youth have been very kind to Seventh Son. It's in a three-way tie for highest rated Iron Maiden album on metalstorm.net, and is the second highest rated Iron Maiden album on my old sparring partner RateYourMusic.com. It is also in their top 30 metal albums of all time chart (above Number of the Beast and From Mars to Sirius, below Still Life and Volume 4). It is worth pointing out that it is not a bolded song when you look at the album's page.
Again, I always liked "Can I Play with Madness." I loved it's chorus, the speed style over cowbell(!) driven groove, the keyboard/hi-string guitar lick under the hook, the breakdown/speedup near the end, "Can I Play With Madness" was a fine, kick it up a notch track in this context. I also wish to note that I wasn't paying attention to the lineup too much when soaking this compilation in. So the revelation (that wasn't intended either, honest) that this was the same singer on both songs was a slight shock.
It was also a slight shock when this same Bruce Dickinson greets a rowdy European crowd with a very violent, raspy, almost mutant like announcement of "FEAR!" "OF" "THE" "Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaark." God the way he said that would have given younger me nightmares. It's so unlike him too. I have been a student of Bruce Dickinson for almost 30 years and that pronunciation still beguiles me. For as much as vocal coaches are demanded to examine the live version of this song, I always wished they would have picked this Real Live One closer just to wrap their head around his pronunciation of that "dark."
I have to admit I'm pretty tired of "Fear Of The Dark" as a live staple, and if it was never played again I wouldn't miss it, but what a mind blow it is to hear an audience be conducted like, THAT. The likes of Ozzy and James Hetfield to my ears could make audiences sing along, but nothing like this. Hell, looking at it historically, there was nothing really about this song in the studio that would lead you to believe it would be a literal crowd sing-a-long. There's no gang vocal "whoa-oa-oa-oa-oa-oa-oa-oa" along with the guitar line priming a future audience to do such. It was just a title track, and Maiden always play a title song of an album on it's maiden (lolol) tour, and they just happened to strike oil of volcanic proportions. And you could NOT wait to be a part of one yourself. And I get that's why it's still in the set, but it's like come on, there's plenty of Iron Maiden songs to do that with at this point.
"Run to the fucking Hills." If you're like me and you heard the chorus out of context from the rest of the song, you aren't quite prepared for that stadium stomp followed by one of the greatest goddamn harmony riffs. Another one that can be chalked up to being sad when it disappears, but the hook and the solo make up for it. If not for the line "raping the women" this would probably be a little higher up the popularity food chain, even though that is what the soliders did back then. Sadly a song like this couldn't be made today without the MAGAFAGATS crying "woke."
The next 5 songs bounce around middleish period Maiden; a song Bruce wrote solo that Steve nicked just in time for Iron Maiden to have their only #1 UK hit single (the only reason this is here, its damn near forgotten these days, and I think I might have been at the last show where they ever played it live), another Seventh Son track (thought I don't think this one gets too many complaints), the first of two Powerslave songs (and another contender that could have opened this compilation), Maiden's own nod to thrash in the form of Be Quick or Be Dead, and the immortal "2 Minutes To Midnight" to cap off act two. As I mentioned above, more than once I would just stop the CD after marvelling at this audio showstopper.
I don't care what anyone says, "Man On The Edge" was just as good as any Iron Maiden single, if possibly their best single of the 90s. It was also proof that yes, Janick as a lead player was sloppier than a pornstar in a gangbang, but as a writer he could hold his own.
Let's talk about the aforementioned "new" song, "Virus." Well, it's actually not as boring as I remember it. It ain't worthy of anything on the 80s albums, but it's better than any of the faux-prog slop Steve writes now. I would gladly take Virus over anything Iron Maiden's written after 2006. But yes, typical slow intro-outro that we've come to know and hate (at least I have), but it does build to a solid payoff.
Next up was the other one that threw me for a loop: a single-edit of the Live After Death version of Paul Di'Anno classic "Running Free." I mean they had a song from the recent live album, might as well have a track from the album that everyone* likes, amirite? I've already spoken my feelings about this version above, but I forgot to mention the really awkward edit of the transition from audience singalong back to the song's finale. Even back then I always skipped this one. Not to mention I would never see this in the tracklisting of live albums available so there was never that meta-reassurance.
Another song that didn't show up on any live albums was "Wasted Years," but this was an instant hook, and a much better Somewhere In Time track than the staple that usually shows up, "Heaven Can Wait" (which is a decent song, but the only reason it showed up on live albums was cos Steve wrote it).
I should mention at this point that this was another point where the fatigue of "too much new music" sets in, and wanting to turn the album off. Especially after another showstopper, "Wasted Years," concludes. I'll admit now that "The Clairvoyant" is a solid song, but it's not what a new listener needs to carry them over the hump. Then again, I'm not sure if "Infinite Dreams" (admittedly a favorite) would have helped matters at this point either.
But we're in the homestretch now, and if you ask someone to name two essential songs (that aren't Paul Di'Anno era) that haven't shown up to wrap it up, they will likely name "The Trooper" and "Hallowed Be Thy Name." And they close things out in that order. Because "The Trooper" was so deep in the album, it had a lot of work to do to not convince me not to hit the skip button. If I'm being honest, some days I'd let it play, somedays I wouldn't. To be truthful, I always loved the intro/outro riff more so than the main harmony riff that everyone fellates. I'm not so contrarian to say everyone is stupid for liking it, but the older I get the worse it sounds live. Honestly most of Maiden's harmony riff songs don't translate well live (that especially includes "Aces High," sue me). Daring move to stick it near the end to proverbially pick things up, but if I was putting this thing together, I would have made this track 3 after a Paul Di'Anno classic.
Finally, "Hallowed Be Thy Name." I was already familiar with this song thanks to me writing down a handful of song titles from Raising Hell, and asking a friend to burn me a CD with one of those songs on it. Hilariously, I get to it on said CD-R and, while I liked what I was hearing, I couldn't remember what it was and how I even requested it. Asking my friend what it was he reminded me that I wanted an Iron Maiden song for some reason, to which I laughed at myself. Once it got to that iconic song-title drop near the end, I a) immediately remembered what I asked for, and b) was befuddled a bit because I thought the title was "Halloween Be Thy Name." And yes, on that CD-R, it was also the last track, almost as if my friend knew. It's just a law of physics. If you have a CD-R or a playlist and Hallowed Be Thy Name is on it, it's the last track. No matter what it follows. Freebird, Stairway, Dopesmoker, don't matter, "Hallowed Be Thy Name" concludes it.
Wasn't expecting to do an impromptu track-by-track journey, but there you go. I loved what I heard there and seeked out everything that was available at the time, which was everything up to the iconic Brave New World, itself not only a youth impresser so much that these men old enough to be my dad still got it, but living proof that metal made in the year 2000 didn't need to be whiny children feltching about last resorts and digging. I've said on multiple occasions that after that Steve Harris went right back to being out of his gourd thinking he's in Genesis, but the Iron Maiden discovery journey was one of the more magical moments of my youth. Something I will cherish forever.
So 30th anniversary, Best of the Beast. Greatest hits compilations have long been forsaken in favor of playlists, but I will be grateful to you forever, and I hope some other 15 year old finds you in whatever CD stores of you are still standing and is also convinced to play with madness and up the irons.
*except me. Live After Death is mid as hell
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