Search - Iron Maiden :: The Final Frontier

Darn Good!

hallowed be me | 08/17/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Worth the 4 year wait. Definately a good album!!! Is it 80's Maiden? No. Do most fans want to hear The Number of the Beast Act #41? No. It's time to stop comparing newer Maiden to 80's. Since 95, this ISN'T, nor will it ever be, the same band again.



1st 5 tracks are really good rocking songs. Mother of Mercy, Coming Home & The Alchemist are very good! The song Sat 15...Final Frontier is bipolar & El Dorado is decent. 2nd half of the album, things get longer & trippier. Some say Progressive and some say not. WHO CARES! The music is inspired but slower paced. This doesn't make it bad, it means it's different! Maiden are so talented, I love hearing them jam out on this album. Every song on the 2nd half has the traditional post 2000 Maiden intro but, the songs really break out into a late 70's infused rock jam. At times, it doesn't even sound like them.



The guitars REALLY shine on this record(especially Adrian) as does Nikko on drums. One of his best performances! Bruce is getting up in age and he comes over a lil strained at times. But, he is in his early 50's! It's the best post reunion album imo and I would even take this ahead of Somewhere in Time. Enjoy the listen, it's a ride!

"

Give it time and listen!

warmertymes | 08/17/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Maiden worked on this CD for basically four years, so any reviewer who listens to it a couple of times before they beat it down isn't doing it or themselves any justice. It took me many listens to really get into AMOLAD and now I consider it one of their better albums (not one weak song in the bunch).

Now I know everybody always says that they've been Maiden fans since day one and that makes them some kind of expert on the band. Not quite for me, but how about since I first heard Killers back in 81. They lost me for a little while with No Prayer and the Blaze CD's but since then their music and penmanship have been fantastic. Is Maiden the same band as they were back then...of course not, who is? They have changed and matured musically. This is not your typical metal, you know...verse, chorus, verse, chorus, solo, chorus, fade out, written in two minutes in a drunken stupor. God knows there are enough of those groups and CD's out there. The lyrics on this CD are fantastic and desrve a good reading, especially if you do some research on the subject matter.

Just give this CD a fair shot and you will enjoy it, slightly more progressive than other Maiden CD's but definitely worth the purchase."

BEST POST 2000 MAIDEN ALBUM

MRT | 08/17/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I've made a track-by-track review.



1. "Satellite 15... The Final Frontier" (Smith, Harris)

Contrary to what you might have been led to believe by the official video, this song is actually 8:40 minutes long, half of it being a very, very, very unusual intro for Iron Maiden -- 4:40 minutes of an eerie piece of futuristic, space-like, void-feeling material, slow-paced but at the same time emanating disturbing melodies before those known hard-rock chords can soar. From then on it's the same thing you hear on the band's official video.



2. "El Dorado" (Smith, Harris, Dickinson)

Not much to say. GOOD SONG BUT I'm just very glad that it's probably the worst song on the album.



3. "Mother of Mercy" (Smith, Harris)

Rather slow-paced, not a rapid, furious & heavy-rhythm'ed as I had thought it would be before listening to it. It's a tune I actually wouldn't picture Iron Maiden coming up with. It's very Maiden in its simplicity, but at the same time the melody itself is not usual in terms of what we've witnessed in the past 15 years. Which is, I must say, something that pervades the entire album, this tendency to venture into the unexplored.



4. "Coming Home" (Smith, Harris, Dickinson)

Wow, a balad. But this sounds very much like a Bruce Dickinson ballad, rather than an Iron Maiden one. Think "Tyranny of Souls" (the album), though (not "Accident of Birth"). Very catchy chorus, and a very nice melody throughout. I'm thinking the band will be playing this one live.

5. "The Alchemist" (Gers, Harris, Dickinson)

Truly, this has nothing to do with Bruce's homonymous song. Not quite unlike what's Maiden's done since 2000, however. This one's more forward than the previous tracks (Satellite 15 excepted), with a nice chorus too, mainly because of the guitar trio coming up with those harmonic combinations that completely fill out the background. There's also some modulation thrown in, which you don't see a lot in Maiden. I personally enjoy the guitar melody on the bridge and chorus for this song. Solo exclusively by Janick, followed by the 3 guitars. Falls back to the chorus and the song ends (very similar to the "Coming Home" approach).



6. "Isle of Avalon" (Smith, Harris)

If it weren't for the bass right in the beginning, you wouldn't guess this is a Maiden tune, even though it is somehow in synch with what the band's been doing since Kevin Shirley took up the production seat with the boys. Mysterious-like melody, but fast-paced intro, which holds on for a good 2 and a half minutes before it finally picks up at around 2:50, with an interesting vigor. It falls again to a certain mystery-ridden melody right after, before a short Dave Murray solo kicks in at around 3:40, followed by some solid rhythm-base session, and then by Adrian playing a little with what seem to be synthetizers (you may hear some Somewhere in Time-like material at this point, even though the song itself is far from that). You gotta think in terms of epic-like material, in the same line as Alexander the Great, Seventh Son of a Seventh Son and Sign of the Cross. It's 9 minutes long, and it's one of those songs where you'll pay closer attention to the lyrics while some interesting tune plays in the background (and not the other way around). The chorus is very nice, however, and brings the melody forward.



7. "Starblind" (Smith, Harris, Dickinson)

I thought it would be another slow song, but then some distortion guitars kick in, gladly. The main part of the song (not the bridge or chorus) is a very solid crescendo, whih sounds very amazing to me, and they build just the right amount of expectation. Bridge's very good too, and you know you got something good on your hands. It's hard to correctly describe this song. It's not fast, but it's not exactly slow-paced either. It's a very interesting tune, really, with a few unexpected twist and turns, and sometimes some of its distortion guitar levels sound as though they had nothing but a Fender-like sound to it, as if they had only had said Fender amp to provide heaviness (this goes mainly for Adrian or Janick). Adrian seems to have used synthetizers for his soloes, however -- with some mean reverb on them. Bruce does very well here, singing a solid tune with variations, going from low to high-pitched notes in the same sentence. There's some modulation present here, too. All in all it's a good song, and you may feel hooked even though it's almost 8-minutes long.



8. "The Talisman" (Gers, Harris)

Beautiful beginning. The production and general feel very closely resemble what you hear in "The Legacy" (A Matter if Life and Death's last track). This actually perdures for 2:20 minutes until some power rhythm guitars kick in with more solid, heavy riffs making the bed where Bruce seems to comfortably lie in. Very forward tune, which I thought somewhat lacking at times, because it's a long album, and some of the tunes (like "Mother of Mercy" and "Coming Home" being put together, one after the other) sort of gives you the feeling that things are somewhat slow for a while. Also, much like "Dance of Death" and "A Matter of Life and Death", this album is filled with little, slow acoustic intros that tend to make you feel like there isn't much punch or drive to it. "The Talisman" can show a lot of raw power, however, which is always a good thing when it comes to Maiden. Nice vocal melodies at around 5 minutes into the song, with great soloes right after. They remind me some of the material on "Fear is the Key", probably because of the vibrato unit/tremolo bar being used. Good song.



9. "The Man Who Would Be King" (Dave Murray, Harris)

Again slow intro. But nice follow-up, with solid bass chords underlying the guitar melody -- which, to be honest, remind me a lot of "Out of the Silent Planet". The drums come in, in a crescendo, and then we got some heavy, forward-sounding riffs and Bruce's vocal lines (which now remind me somewhat of "The Thin Line Between Love and Hate"). All in all this is a tune of its own, truly. As you reach 4 minutes, you will be listening to some really (really!) different material. I'm betting you could never guess this to be Iron Maiden. Very unlike what's been done in 30 years of history. You'll understand what I mean when you listen to this. At around 6 minutes, when Bruce sings again, his vocal lines remind me of Dance of Death's "Wildest Dreams". This song's 8-and-a-half minutes long, and it does feel long (unlike other, longer Iron Maiden tunes, I must say).



10. "When the Wild Wind Blows"

Last -- and longest -- song on the album. As usual, a slow-paced intro, but gladly, off the top of my head, it doesn't remind me of any other Maiden song. It's as if it wants to, but it doesn't. Beautiful tune, really, and great change of pace at around 3:40. Adrian comes in with a solo at 4:46, followed by Dave, and both melodies are tremendously beautiful. This is possibly the song with most potential on the whole album, and I'm very pleased to say that even though it's 11:01 minutes long, ranking as the 3rd longest Iron Maiden song"