The Book of Souls (2015)1.
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After a historically long five-year gap between albums, Iron Maiden returned to the studio last year and came out with
The Book of Souls. This release was an absolute behemoth, spanning two CDs and over 90 minutes of runtime, and featuring the band's longest song—the sprawling 18-minute epic Empire of the Clouds.
Stylistically, Maiden's 16th studio album does not deviate too far from its immediate predecessors for most of its runtime. The Iron Maiden on this record is very much the prog-tinted Iron Maiden that reunion-era listeners have come to expect—sprawling epics and steady rockers and all. Regardless, the album has been well-received by fans of the band's recent output, and is generally considered to be a worthy output for a band in its 40th year of existence.
Much of the positive reception seems to have focused on Empire of the Clouds, which, in addition to being the band's longest epic, is one of the most experimental songs in their catalog. Combining a more orchestrated songwriting approach with Maiden's proggy metal style, and featuring singer and songwriter Bruce Dickinson playing piano most of the way through, Empire serves as a powerful narrative song telling the story of the disaster of the R101, a British airship that went down in France, killing everyone on board.
Despite the band's age and the fact that Bruce Dickinson was diagnosed with throat cancer during the recording of the album (fortunately, he has since recovered), Iron Maiden produced a quality record in their 40th year, with no obvious signs of stopping soon. Hopefully,
The Book of Souls will not be the last Iron Maiden album, but if it ends up being their swan song, they could have a worse finale.
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I still don't know quite how I feel about this one in ranking with the rest of the discography. My thing is that Iron Maiden was the first band I got really into, which happened in around 2011, so I have heard their first 15 albums a ton and know them all by heart, which is certainly not the case with
The Book of Souls. My current estimation is that I like the album, but not as well as the two before it. I like all the songs, but something feels missing. I don't know what that is, or if it's just the magic I felt listening to those first 15 for the first time that I will never be able to recapture with TBoS. Regardless, I do think it is a good album and like it quite a bit, though it's not among my favorites.
I need to listen one more time before I can vote. I do think my first vote is likely to go for Tears of a Clown or When the River Runs Deep. But I'm not certain.
Poll
Topic: Iron Maiden Survivor 2016 - The Book of Souls - Round 1 (Read 829 times)