BRAVE
NEW WORLD Part 2
( Bruce Pissed at "Old School T.O." ! ! )
Written
/ Photos by Purple Jade
Aug 1st
/ 00 - Air Canada Centre
Two songs into the set, Bruce Dickinson launched
a scathing attack on "old school" Toronto.
Highly emotional, Bruce went off at the venue
space, ticket sales and general apathy of the
city: as opposed to Montreal, where "12,000 are
waiting for us!" (Attendance in Toronto was 4,250).
Praising the crowd for coming, he launched into another
still highly emotional rampage against those " who
were sitting at home listening to f*%king Talking Heads
or something".
The
crowd was making a huge amount of noise and
Bruce was screaming out to us our "mission" was
to tell as many of THEM as we could find "to get
a F*%KING life and go to an Iron Maiden Concert!!!!!"
Thank you Bruce and Iron Maiden for a killer concert!
Up the Irons!!!!!
Pix with special thanks to Guiseppe Viola for "aiding
& abetting a felon". ;-)
The set list was more or less the European (Amsterdam)
as follows:
1. The Wicker Man 2. Ghost Of The Navigator 3. Brave New World 4.
Wrathchild 5. 2 Minutes To Midnight 6. Blood Brothers 7. Sign Of
The Cross 8. The Mercenary 9. The Trooper 10. Dream Of Mirrors 11.
The Clansman 12. The Evil That Men Do 13. Fear Of The Dark 14.
Iron Maiden 15. The Number Of The Beast 16. Hallowed Be Thy Name
17. Sanctuary
BRAVE NEW WORLD
Part 1
( Do I
smell fish ? )
Written by : Purple
Jade
METALMANIA
July 12th/00
There's some strange doings here in TOTOLAND (Toronto)
surrounding the upcoming Iron Maiden cancert, Aug 1st.
The concert was announced on a Thursday preceeding the
The July 1st, long holiday weekend. There was no one in
the city on a long holiday weekend - except for me; but
the ticketsellers would be closed until Tuesday. I'm broke
so I can't get there until Wednesday...in a blind panic -
money in hand ! Now, I
find it odd that all the seats are
the same price - I'm looking at a map of the Air Canada
Centre (venue) as the ticketseller announces his best seats
available - OK, that's where I planned to be anyway - best
seats in the house !
So off I go with my pair of tickets, back home.
Later that evening, John conjures up the venue on the computer
and discovers...A CURTAIN which screens off A FULL three
quarters of the auditorium ! GASP ! What does this mean ? This
is the band that's "bringing Rock & Roll back". Don't
they
know that here in TOTOLAND ?
After a few days when the initial shock has worn off, I contact
my internet buddy in California - surely he can get to the
bottom of this ! I send him the venue URL, although I tried this
earlier and couldn't get through - he can't get through either
and asks me to check the
URL... OK, so I get mad easy ! As I'm
mumbling something about "dumb Americans", I send the
ticketsellers URL and tell him to try to get through that way to
see the venue map. He gets back to me , Oh Blessed Sanity - he's
found the Map ! ! With calipers in hand, he has deduced the
seating
capacity, less the curtain, and come up with 7,000 seats
available;
as compared with my slightly hysterical 5,000 which he reassures
me
is not right !
He ponders the question of 3 major acts on the bill (he's
including
Queensryche). In a further gesture of gallantry, he suggests that
any ticket would be a good seat ! Now I'm really bugged - does he
expect ME to sit in anything but the best seats ? ? ? Of course
he doesn't
know until I write him back that we don't get Queensryche, we get
Entombed instead ! Well folks, I can hear his UGH from where I am,
thousands of miles away, he said Halford would be good though...
I'll
try to hang on to that thought at the concert when I'm "entombed"
between Halford and Iron Maiden ! !
Thanks to my
American friend : Brian Coles - Electric Basement
From Electric
Basement
5000
OLDSCHOOLERS GET A LECTURE: (Thanks to Purple Jade for the info) When IRON MAIDEN,
HALFORD and ENTOMBED rolled into Toronto, Canada to launch their
North American tour, they were greeted by about 5,000 loyal
metalheads. While the bands and audience gave it their all,
Maiden vocalist Bruce Dickinson took the time to verbally
encourage the oldschool metalheads to show their support for the
genre. The stop, which included a sectioned off arena, was
undoubtedly one of the smaller audiences the band would encounter
on their continental trek. Many of the other venues have
sold upwards of 10,000 to 20,000. Electric Basement
From
Canoe Jam Music
Wednesday, August 2, 2000
|
Smokin' Iron
Maiden show
By
JOHN POWELL
--Jam! Showbiz
IRON MAIDEN
Air Canada Centre, Toronto
Tuesday, August 1, 2000
TORONTO -- Anyone who's been a
headbanger as long as I have - twenty one years and
counting - has seen it all. Drum sets that revolve in mid-air.
Band members repelling from the ceiling. Enormous
inflatable bunny rabbits bouncing to the music. A lead
singer beheaded by a guillotine. Robocop storming the
stage, gun drawn.
Leave it up legendary Brit rockers Iron Maiden to
once again blaze a new trail by filling a lingering void
which has plagued the heavy metal genre for years: pagan
virgins "burned alive" in a twenty-foot tall
wicker statue. A kick ass stunt to be sure though I would've
taken it one step further by barbecuing the Backstreet
Boys, Britney Spears and all of their putrid, wretched
clones too.
Someone please start that fire. I promise to bring
the marshmallows.
Returning to Toronto with their Brave New World
tour, Iron Maiden was back bigger and better than ever.
Back was original Maiden lead and rhythm guitar player,
Adrian Smith, who couldn't make it last time around due
to a death in the family. Back too was the large scale,
thematic stage show that Iron Maiden is famous for though
the band only used about a third of the available Air
Canada Centre arena.
Before Maiden took the stage, Entombed and former
Judas Priest frontman Rob Halford, slayed the crowd.
Halford and his band stoked the fire set by Entombed into
an blazing inferno with a set based on his new album
Resurrection and some rip-roaring Priest material that
had the crowd giving the heavy metal icon an appreciative
standing ovation.
Flanked by the Brave New World cover - the face of
demonic band mascot Eddie forming in the clouds above a
futuristic London, England, his eyes moving back and
forth as if searching for his next victim - and a strange
set comprised of metal bars positioned haphazardly
everywhere like someone had upturned a giant Mechano set
and two sliding, repelling devices on other side of the
stage for lively lead singer, Bruce "Air Raid Siren"
Dickinson, to swing from, the band kick started the show
with three cuts from the new album: Wicker Man, Ghost Of
The Navigator and the title track.
Benefiting most from Maiden's lethal four man
guitar contingent (Dave Murray, Adrian Smith, Janick Gers
and Steve Harris), was Ghost Of The Navigator which had
even more power and precision to it when performed live.
Just as Running Free and Rime Of The Ancient Mariner have
had whole new meanings attached to them since the Live
After Death release, so too will Ghost if it is included
on Maiden's next live album.
Reaching back into their diverse catalogue Maiden
counterbalanced the new material with The Trooper,
Wrathchild and Two Minutes To Midnight. Noticeably absent
from the play list was Run To The Hills, a venerable
Maiden favorite.
Strengthened by Smith's additional guitar work, Two
Minutes came off sounding the best it ever has though
Blood Brothers was a complete dud failing to maintain the
pace the pair of Maiden oldies had inspired. Taking a
break backstage, Dickinson had to come out and encourage
the crowd to clap along with the tune as their enthusiasm
had curled up and died part way through it.
Sign Of The Cross, The Trooper, Fear Of The Dark,
The Clansman and amazingly enough, Dream Of Mirrors with
its brilliant, cascading light show, got the most
spirited head bobbing and fist waving of the evening
besides the encores later on.
For his part, Dickinson was once again the driving
force behind the show. Whether it was guiding the crowd
in the many sing-a-long sessions or dashing from stage to
stage, Dickinson's exuberance could not be contained. He
had a pretty easy night too as the crowd, who never sat
down once Maiden hit the stage, sang many of the choruses
for him. Unable to hear himself over the crowd, he
repeatedly surrendered the mike waving it back and forth
like a conductor.
The extravagant on-stage theatrics saw Dickinson
crucified during Sign Of The Cross, a fifteen-foot tall
Eddie (the Ed Hunter version) stomp out and harass the
band as well as the aforementioned Eddie wicker man
replica housing four sacrificial virgins whom Dickinson
attempted to rescue. Dickinson failed in that regard but
so confident was he in the Toronto crowd that he stopped
singing during an encore of Hallowed Be Thy Name allowing
the fans to continue with the song as he playfully
admonished someone for lighting up a smoke backstage.
Naughty. Naughty. Virgins torched. A smoker's soul saved.
There's nothing like heavy metal justice. Rock on. 
1.
Wicker Man
2. Ghost Of The Navigator
3. Brave New World.
4. Wrathchild.
5. Two Minutes To Midnight.
6. Blood Brothers.
7. Sign Of The Cross.
8. The Mercenary.
9. The Trooper.
10. Dream Of Mirrors.
11. The Clansman.
12. Evil That Men Do.
13. Fear Of The Dark.
14. Iron Maiden.
Encores
1. Number Of The Beast.
2. Hallowed Be Thy Name.
3. Sanctuary.
|
From The
Toronto Sun
Wednesday,
August 2, 2000
|
Metal
stays hard for rockers Iron Maiden
By
KIERAN GRANT -- Toronto Sun
IRON
MAIDEN
Air Canada Centre, Toronto
Tuesday, August 1, 2000
TORONTO
-- Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson had a
bone to crush, or rather pick, with Toronto last
night.
"Out in Montreal and Quebec City we
get 12,000 people waiting for us," the
veteran British singer huffed a few songs into
his band's set at the Air Canada Centre, where a
crowd of 4,250 turned out to see them.
"Go out and tell the lame-asses in
this town they haven't experienced real music
until they've been to an Iron Maiden concert."
Fired up from a rousing rendition of the
Maiden classic 2 Minutes To Midnight, Dickinson
also mused over Toronto's supposed multitude of
"women in comfortable shoes" and
proclaimed alternative the death of alternative,
or alternative metal, or new metal, or something
to that effect. Well then.
Not content to relegate their songs to the
retro '80s heap or to resort to the wink-wink-nudge-nudge
novelty appeal that many of their contemporaries
now survive on, the band took off down a path
cleared by latter-day metal monsters Entombed and
former Judas Priest singer Rob Halford, and
played with pretty much the same vigour they did
20 years ago.
After all, while their escapist, sword-and-sorcery
metal is loaded with old-world imagery, they are
touring a new album called Brave New World.
"We are not scared to do new songs,"
said Dickinson, again waxing defiant against some
unseen enemy. "We did not get back together
to do greatest hits and farewell, we did the best
album we've ever done."
It must have warmed his cockles as the
crowd pumped their fists and chanted along with
new tunes Dream Of Mirrors, and the title track.
But Maiden are smart enough to know who
makes up most of their audience -- males born
between 1965 and 1975 -- and they haven't turned
their sweat-streaked backs on what made them
famous: Skull-numbing volume, fantastical images
and lotsa pyro.
Maiden currently boasts an all-star lineup
of original guitarist Dave Murray and bassist
Steve Harris, guitarist Adrian Smith and
Dickinson -- who joined Maiden before 1982 album
The Number Of The Beast catapulted them to fame
-- drummer Nicko McBain and guitarist Janick Gers.
Unlike his bandmates, Dickinson has long
since cut off his rocker's mane and traded his
spandex for denim and leather. His banshee's wail
is also intact, riding atop favourites The
Trooper and Fear Of The Dark.
New tunes sounded downright seamless
alongside the classics, including show-stopper
The Number Of The Beast. Judging by the booing
after a too-brief encore, a few more "greatest
hits" wouldn't hurt (where was Run To The
Hills?).
After a rather anti-climactic walk-on by
their mascot Eddie -- a green foam rubber monster
-- they peaked with a fresh routine based around
Brave New World track The Wicker Man.
1.
Wicker Man
2. Ghost Of The Navigator
3. Brave New World.
4. Wrathchild.
5. Two Minutes To Midnight.
6. Blood Brothers.
7. Sign Of The Cross.
8. The Mercenary.
9. The Trooper.
10. Dream Of Mirrors.
11. The Clansman.
12. Evil That Men Do.
13. Fear Of The Dark.
14. Iron Maiden.
|
Encores
1. Number Of The Beast.
2. Hallowed Be Thy Name.
3. Sanctuary.
|
The Toronto Sun
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