Fascinating to me how different opinions are. I consider myself a fairly hard core Maiden fan; been on the train since Number of the Beast, they were the first rock concert I ever went to, and I've seen them through the years (now they are a go-to regardless of what album they are promoting).
So I have issue with:
- Another Life is not a "come and go" song: it's one of the three best from Killers, which is itself a top Maiden album;
I'll take this one, since it was my comment
I'll say Another Life is the best of that three-song group I mentioned. By the way, truly, none of the songs is less than "good". I just listened to it again and Killers is such a cool album. Brilliant. The band sounds so...hungry. A mood that is so perfectly encapsulated by the cover art.
By the way, out of curiosity - what are the other two songs in your Killers top 3?
- Brave New World is easily the least of the reunion era. I tend to like the reunion stuff, and maybe even better than the original period, but BNW is not the best, and neither is AMOLAD.
As you can see from my ranking, I certainly don't disagree on AMOLAD. I do rank BNW much higher than you do, though. Again, I don't doubt there was a lot of hype that played into how the album was received then and (perhaps) how it's looked at now. But, minus some of the obvious quibbles I mentioned before, I still listen to it with great pleasure.
We certainly do agree on the fact that Maiden have released quality music over the last 20+ years. I still take 80s Maiden over Reunion Maiden, but there is SO much to enjoy in the latter.