IRON MAIDEN — Powerslave (review)

IRON MAIDEN — Powerslave album cover Album · 1984 · NWoBHM Buy this album from MMA partners
4.5/5 ·
Pekka
This could have been a huge, a massive, a humongous, a monstrous metal triumph, but somewhere during the sessions the creative juices started to thin a bit. Powerslave is perhaps the most uneven Iron Maiden album ever, with four of the eight tracks being unbeatable, brilliant classics of heavy metal and the four middle tracks being less stunning to different degrees.

After falling in love with Brave New World in 2000, Powerslave was my first touch with classic Maiden, but as I was in such a hurry to get all the Maiden out there as fast as possible, my first memories are very hazy. What I do remember is that from the beginning I've frowned upon the slump the album drives into midway through. Or so it seems. After the stunning opening pair of Aces High and 2 Minutes to Midnight we get four tracks that have been erased from the books of metal, but along the years I've come to the conclusion, that most of them would be great tracks on any other Maiden album, but preceded by the two mentioned and followed by the perhaps even more stunning closing pair of Powerslave and Rime of the Ancient Mariner, they are very badly overshadowed.

Losfer Words (Big 'Orra) is perhaps Maiden's finest instrumental track (with which our local Finnish speed metal legends Stone used to start off their rehearsals) and Flash of the Blade is actually quite a killer tune in its own right with some extremely high pitched Bruce Dickinson vocal harmonies, but still after all these years The Duellists remains quite unmemorable, despite its long instrumental section, as is the case with Back in the Village, except for its rather annoying chorus.

Half an album of larger-than-life masterpieces and another half very much varying in quality - the line-up was there, the playing was brilliant but Maiden missed their first true bulls eye by a hair. Better luck next time.
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