Iron Maiden: The History Of Iron Maiden - Part 1: The Early Days

Maiden! Maiden!

Scream for me, Dortmund!

- (wild cheering) - Go!

The Dortmund show, of course,

had the metal '80s heavy hitters all in the same building.

We were supposedly the headline act and there was, you know,

Ozzy Osbourne and the Scorpions and Def Leppard and Priest

and Michael Schenker and I don't know who else.

It was just an amazing, amazing bill.

They had one stage this end and one this end

so they could rotate and get the bands off,

and the audience would just turn around, you know.

One minute you were at the very front and the next at the very back.

That was quite amazing cos we were all in the hotel,

the Scorpions, Def Leppard, all these bands,

we were all partying, we had a great time, you know.

That's all I remember about that gig.

There was the night that Ozzy came up,

and we were hatching a plot to steal a taxi

and drive it across fields.

When you headline with all these other great bands before you,

you've really gotta be on top-notch form.

And the gig just went fantastic.

I remember, we played really, really well.

We just played so well under pressure.

It was... it was scary, really.

Come on!

- (cheering) - Thank you! Good night!

I wanted to start with drums, to be honest with you,

but I just didn't have room for a drum kit.

I just thought, "There's no way I can sort all that out."

The next best thing was to play along with the drums

as part of the rhythm section, so I chose the bass.

Within ten months of starting to play,

I did me first ever gig

at the Cart & Horses in Maryland Point, Stratford,

a stone's throw from where I lived.

We used to go there all the time and see other bands.

So it was a big thing ' for us to play there.

It wasn't a baptism of fire,

but you were playing in a place you saw other bands,

so it was quite a big thing.

It was so nerve-racking.

I remember starting to play the intro to one of the songs, the bass intro,

and I messed it up so much, the singer thought I was tuning up,

so he didn't come in on time.

And then the rest of the band came in and he sort of realised.

It was unbelievable.

We got away with it cos nobody knew the song.

It was our own material.

We had another song which was written by the guitarist

called Heat Crazed Vole.

I thought that was an absolutely fantastic title.

In our first band, Gypsy's Kiss, we did only five gigs,

three at the Cart & Horses ' and two at the Bridge House.

Then we split up ' through musical differences.

I went for an audition with a band called Smiler.

It was all very professional, they had all the gear set up.

That's when I first met Steve,

he was the bass player for this band called Smiler.

It was more or less like a traditional boogie band.

I was writing, getting all these ideas,

and I was getting excited about the ideas I was coming up with.

I don't know where they were coming from. It was crazy.

I'd walk home from the Bridge House

and Transylvania just came out.

I thought, "I've gotta get home and put it on tape."

We played a song called Innocent In Exile,

which was one of Steve's.

I think it was the only one that Mick and Tony would do

because the rest of 'em they found a little complicated.

They liked some of my stuff, but it was a lot of time changes,

I was trying to get my progressive influences in there,

and they were more into, you know, straight R&B stuff.

It started to cause a bit of a problem.

I thought the only way I'd really be able to carry on writing...

I was writing more and more.

I thought I'd have to leave and form my own band.

He went off to form Iron Maiden and I went and got a job.

Yeah, the very first line-up for Maiden was Paul Day on vocals,

Dave Sullivan on guitar, Terry Rance on guitar,

Ron "Rebel" Matthews, we used to call him Ron Rebel, and myself.

Steve and I, we were of the same mind,

we both had a burning ambition to really want to do it.

Not for fame or money, just as a lifestyle.

That's what we wanted to do as our job.

I'd never met anybody like that before. .

Because we were in Steve's man's house,

I used to plug into an old Revox reel to reel.

If you turn them up enough,

they distort and give you a really heavy sound.

Steve used to have his bass which wasn't plugged in

and that's how we got it together.

Right from day one, Steve had this influence and vision

of what type of music he would like it to go.

What we wanted was a Wishbone Ash

We didn't have name to start with.

We didn't bother when rehearsing until we found a good name.

It was like, "That's the one."

We were playing at the Cart & Horses

and the pot man in the picture come over and said,

"You've got a phone call."

It was some other band saying they had a name.

So we just told 'em to piss off. '

But we was worried. We went out and registered the name.

The first gig, there was eight people.

On the second gig, there was 28. On the third gig, there was 48.

It went on from there.

This place was packed. There were people queuing down the road.

We did put ads in the papers quite often.

We put more ads once we started getting more established.

We was able to spend the money on putting an ad in,

but early on it was just word of mouth.

After several months, there'd be 50 people

looking out of the back door actually trying to get in.

They were playing floor-level.

It was like right on top of the band. It was intense.

We walked into the show and it was really loud

because unlike a lot of bands they'd brought their own PA.

We bought a mixing desk off a Cockney Rebel.

We did a gig in the Queen Elizabeth in North Chingford.

It's a restaurant now.

We turned up with the gear.

The manager said, "That lot will blow the roof off."

These days we sound commercial compared with other bands,

but at the time we were very heavy.

We was doing Innocent Exiles, Wrathchild, Iron Maiden,

they were sort of the early songs which we worked together on.

We put on a bit of a show to try and impress people.

I made a bubble machine and a smoke machine out of this old kettle,

a dry-ice machine and all this.

We got 15 quid, the dry ice used to come to a tenner.

There was no money in it.

Within two or three weeks

of playing a couple of gigs here and there, ,

we started getting a hardcore following.

The regular followers were just waiting for them to come back

so they could have another night watching Maiden.

Then they'd bring their mates and more mates.

We also did a talent competition

we went into in a theatre in Hornchurch.

I think there was six or seven acts.

We done two numbers, we came second,

it was given to a little boy who played the acoustic guitar.

I think he got the sympathy vote.

Our first singer, Paul Day, he was a really nice bloke,

he had a good voice, but he didn't have the stage presence.

Unfortunately, in the end we had to sack him, '

which I found very sad. I'd never done that before.

I thought it was absolutely awful.

We got another singer called Denny Wilcock,

who didn't have a great voice,

but he had a really, really good stage presence.

He used to do this little trick

with blood capsules and a sword and all the blood would gush out.

Denny used to do this thing with the sword

and this girl fainted.

It was like, "Blimey!" It had that much effect.

There was one gig when Dennis Wilcock didn't turn up

and we still carried on anyway.

If the truth be known, it wasn't quite what I was looking for

so I tended to steer away

and drifted apart rather than closer to the band.

I think there was consensus of opinion

that we needed to change the sound,

which was when Dave Murray came into the situation.

I went for an audition with Dennis Wilcock

and I left him my telephone number.

And he gave me a call and said he'd just joined Iron Maiden

and they were looking for a guitar player.

Dave watched some of our gigs

and it was suggested that he join us and we become a six-piece,

which is what they are at the moment.

So maybe it's actually turned out now

how it was planned to in the first place.

We was only a pub band. It was '76, punk had exploded.

You know, rock was still wanted, but it was going down, basically.

Steve, that wouldn't have bothered him,

he wanted to push the band.

Dave and Terry were asked to push it full time.

And at that time, having a new wife and a mortgage each

and only playing pubs, they declined.

So... Steve's often said to me, "Why did you leave?"

And I said, "Dave and Terry went and I thought that was the end."

He says to this day, "You could have stayed,

you could have still been with us."

But I get to see a lot of gigs and I love every minute of it.

I think Steve is still exactly the same guy he was in '75.

He's a very straight guy,

he'll always tell you if you're doing something not right.

Years ago there were a few people who didn't like that very much.

He's still a very straight bloke.

He was from day one focused.

I just really knew I wanted to be focused and dedicated

and just do everything that you possibly can to make it happen.

We sort of feel almost part of the family of Iron Maiden now,

which is a lovely feeling, actually.

We still go back to the gigs now and we're still all great friends.

We have a good time and...

The music's as powerful now as it was in the early days,