Motion for Reconsideration
20th Anniversary
If you ask the average person to rattle off the names of five classic metal bands, you can be reasonably certain Iron Maiden
will be one of them. The band is almost universally beloved by metalheads. Their output from The Number of the Beast through Seventh Son of a Seventh Son is considered one of metal’s few sacred cows. I grew up in a very small town without any friends who knew more about metal than I did. first learned of the band from a book. See, before Wikipedia, Allmusic, and Metal Archives, there were actually books that listed thousands of albums and had ratings accompanied by short descriptions of the bands. My mom had one of these, and I pored over it looking for metal bands. I never got around to getting any of their albums for a long time, and finally got into the band while in law school. Since I came to them relatively later in life (compared to most metalheads), it should mean something when I say their output from 1982 through 1988 absolutely deserves that sacred cow status.
But they are not without their faults. Tomorrow, May 12, marks the 20th anniversary of Fear of the Dark. The record follows No Prayer for the Dying, and between the two of them they constitute what is considered the low point of the Bruce Dickinson years. It’s easy to dismiss a bad record as the result of a bad lineup, but that excuse can’t be applied here as Adrian Smith was not a primary songwriter, nor is the rhythm guitar a serious problem.
