SEPT. 1 (Reuters) — After a five year hiatus and kicking cancer, Iron Maiden’s Bruce Dickinson said the band is back with an album that is full of drama.
The British band spent four months recording “The Book of Souls” in Paris, which is being called their most collaborative with almost every member earning writing credits.
“Nobody gets to hear the music until we are finished it. So, the manager doesn’t get to come down to the studio, he’s banded. The record company don’t get to come to the studio. Nobody gets to hear it until we finished it and then if they don’t like it then, you know, Houston we have a problem. But even if they don’t like it we’re still not going to change it,” said Dickinson, who is the band’s lead singer.
The 11-track album is the bands first ever double disc and also features an 18 minute song penned by Dickinson.
“I’m thinking, I’ve never done anything like this before. And I certainly never played piano on a record before. I mean my piano skills are strictly like one-fingered. And so, but we had to do it because the song is driven by the piano melody so somebody had to play it, so it ended up being me. I never attempted anything like this before and I realized about half-way through the writing process, I went, ‘this has got structure, this has got an overture to it.’ I went, ‘wow, that’s really grown up.'”
Iron Maiden finished recording in 2014 but was put on hold as Dickinson successfully battled cancer.
The 57-year-old said his diagnosis was toughest on his family.
“Everybody else has to stand around and watch, like my immediate family and people like that. And I just get to shuffle around the house going, oh, you know, and make horrible noises and do all the stuff that you have to do. But I’m doing that, so I have a full time job, which is getting rid of it, that’s the way I looked at it.”
Now in remission, Dickinson has a new appreciation for family.
“When I got through it I said, ‘what was that like?’ And they went, ‘Dad, we’ve never seen you be sick. We see you get grumpy, if you get a cold or stuff like that. We’ve never seen you like, just zoned out, like sitting on the couch, just exhausted and sick.’ And they go, ‘it scared the pants off out of us.’ And I went, ‘wow,’ you know, that’s hard. Hard for them to deal with. It sort of puts it home to you how much faith and how much you mean to people.”
After nearly 40 years in the industry Dickinson has seen technology both help and hurt musicians. While he admits the band has benefited from it, he sees it hurting up and coming artists.
“It’s as if their creativity is massively undervalued by the internet but notoriety is massively overvalued. So you can be famous for being famous and be absolutely, have no talent, unable to sing and a complete ass. And this is somehow really laudable in this day and age.”
When the band sets out for their tour in 2016, they plan to hit roughly 35 countries, six continents and visit China and El Salvador for the first time.
Dickinson, who worked as a commercial airline pilot for ten years and currently co-owns an airline, will pilot the 747-400 jumbo jet that will take the band and crew to all their stops.
“I phoned up my manager I said, ‘you know that it seems like I’m getting better?’ He said, ‘yeah.’ I said, ‘do you fancy going around the world now in the airplane?’ He goes, ‘oh my God,’ he said, ‘it doesn’t get any better than that.’ He said, ‘we come out with the amazing album and you’re better and you’re flying the Queen of the Skies, oh my God.’ I said, ‘ok, calm down, calm down.'”
“The Book of Souls” will be released on September 4.
