Iron Maiden Flight 666 - Documentary 2009 English
We shall go on to the end,
we shall fight in France,
we shall fight on the seas and oceans,
we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air,
we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be,
we shall fight on the beaches,
we shall fight on the landing grounds,
we shall fight in the fields and in the streets,
we shall fight in the hills, we shall never surrender.
It's January 28th 2008 and I'm at Stansted Airport in England.
I'm here because my favourite band, Iron Maiden, has invited us
to film the first leg of their Somewhere Back In Time world tour.
This tour is based on the classic World Slavery tour from 1985,
which is back when I first became a fan.
That's a thing of beauty.
Over the next six weeks, we'll travel 40,000 miles
on Iron Maiden's private 757, Ed Force One,
and watch them play 21 cities in 12 countries across 4 continents.
That's an average distance of 2,000 miles between each show.
And what's even more impressive
is that lead singer Bruce Dickinson is flying the plane.
The aeroplane idea started off as a crazy gleam in my eye.
I went, 'Wow, if you could get all your gear into an aeroplane,
"you could cut down hugely on the amount of dead space we have in touring."
So I said, 'What if you join up
"all the countries that accountants say, 'You can't go there, it costs too much'?"
And we just join them up. And we go...
Yes, we can, 'cause we've got our own magic carpet.
The idea of especially modifying a plane
to take the band, 70 crew, and over 12 tons of equipment,
has never been attempted before.
This could be the most ambitious tour in rock history
and everyone seems a little nervous to see if they can pull it off.
When you're going round the world and you're trying to combine
passenger and freight on the same plane,
on that level it's very hard.
We knew what we had to do, we had to get the engineers involved,
to make sure the plane could stand that stress,
of flying with that much freight in the back.
To get all of that together took a year.
Everything else was in place. We'd got the visas and the equipment.
The only thing we hadn't got was the authorization to fly the plane.
I was the nut in the nutcracker, as it were.
Because when it came to that morning,
and we still hadn't signed the papers we needed to get the aeroplane airborne,
I was in a stressful place.
Tire was a little bit flat this morning. Not dangerously so
but just as a precaution we put a new wheel on it.
It's not like Formula One.
Is that the young man who brought the wine?
Yeah.
Take your hands out of your pocket.
How come we shouldn't have our hands in our pockets?
'Cause it shows a slovenly attitude,
the type of attitude that is easily displayed by ex-colonialists like you lot.
Ian, what did you tell me to do
with the documentary people if they annoyed me?
He said I've got to be nice to you.
Iron Maiden's always been a band that's maintained their privacy over the years.
They've never had a camera crew come into their lives, who are outsiders.
And we don't really know what to expect.
Turn that off.
Good morning. Welcome to Stansted.
Who's he? Who are you?
As we drove into the airport
there was you guys with the cameras
and Rob was telling us to be nice to you.
"Get that camera out of my face!"
Right, come here!
I didn't sleep a lot the night before.
It's like going on holiday when you were a kid,
and getting anxious and don't want to go to bed, just want to go away.
Oh, yes, here we go! Ed Force One!
You all right'?
You fricking' beauty!
And you've got a whole case on there.
I must admit I was a bit sceptical about it all.
The idea of band and crew travelling on the same plane.
It's like a trip away in a coach, a few cans of beer in the back,
like a day trip, except that it lasted six weeks.
The only time we'd ever travelled with a crew was back in the late '70s,
where, basically, there was only one crew member.
There was the band and one guy.
I think it's something to look forward to.
All crews are maniacs, and ours have got their share of characters.
No interviews. Tax purposes.
You're not allowed in this section. I'm sorry. You haven't got a special pass.
They got the rubber stamp of approval.
Yeah, we're all strapped down
and palleted and fire-bagged and everything else.
- And we're good to go. - We're good to go.
Everything was just going swimmingly
and I was sat on the flight deck going,
"There are so many things that could go wrong.
"Just take a deep breath and wait till they close all the holds."
And then we can go. Four hours 45 is the flying time.
A bit windy when we get to Baku.
And then a stonking power wind will take us to Mumbai. Three hours 47 to Mumbai.
Plenty of time to drink Nicko's bottles of wine.
See you later, and we'll get ourselves under way. All right'? Bye for now.
And you know you are!
You're shit and you know you are!
Five star 666 to Sierra 1. Clear for take off.
Wind 290. Ten knots.
Clear for take off, Flight 666.
I've done plenty of take-offs in Boeing 757s,
but this particular one was rather special.
I was so glad to get the wheels up and get under way.
London five star 666 passing 2,800 feet.
Everybody was chuffed to bits on the aeroplane.
The seats were all comfy and the road crew couldn't believe the leg room
and then the cabin crew started serving the drinks and the grub.
Everybody was like, "Yeah, great! This is the way to do it!"
Since getting here on Thursday,
the band's been mobbed by young rock fans keen to get a look at their heroes.
Although Iron Maiden struggle to get any radio airplay back home,
they still fill stadiums around the world.
This new plane means they can play more shows in more countries
than any other group can.
Despite being around for decades,
Iron Maiden are spearheading a new wave of hard rock in India.
Teenagers fed up with mass-market Bollywood music
are buying into heavy metal in a big way.
Sky News, Mumbai.
Are you happy?
It's not even funny, man!
Shit. Shit, man.
Maiden!
This tour for us
is a retrospective look at a classic period in the band's history.
We're playing songs we haven't played in 23 years.
But, most importantly, for an audience
which has never seen us perform these songs,
this is a real treat.
It's every guy's dream to be a rock star and you guys are living that dream.
So can you give us a little insight about what it's like backstage on tour,
the kind of stuff you wouldn't want us to know?
If we told you, then you'd know, wouldn't you?
Yeah, we could tell you but we'd have to kill you.
So how did you first discover Iron Maiden?
At my friend's uncle's place.
I saw this Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son cassette box over there.
And I just freaked out on the artwork, to be honest.
It was love at first listen. I just got hooked onto Maiden, just like that.
And I haven't looked behind ever since.
Maiden!
The first time we played in India was in Bangalore
and we were absolutely knocked sideways by the reaction.
It's a 20,000-seat outdoor venue, and there were 50,000 people wanting to get in.
It was reminiscent of 1984,
when we played behind the Iron Curtain for the first time
and we were besieged.
This is the first major metal band which has played in India.
The crowd are waiting here from six o'clock in the morning.
More and more kids get inspired by the metal scene.
They start getting into playing guitar, drums and forming bands,
and something will come out of it in years to come.
Bruce, you rock!
Best band in the world. Always will be. Up the Irons.
- Nice one, mate. - Painless sound check.
That worked nice, didn't it?
- It went really nice. - I can really hear you well now.
I'll keep it, though, cos it really is a fail-safe.
I'll turn it up if you like.
The first show was India. What were your feelings going into that?
To be totally honest with you, I was more frightened of getting up on that stage
than I was getting inside a 757 with a bunch of hooligans
and all our gear in the back.
We got to the venue and the stage was built from wood.
The stage was lashed-together bamboo.
We were going round testing it but it was really solid.
The backstage thing where everything's like red carpets and great big tents,
it's almost like being back in the Raj or something.
Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!
All right?
Can we switch the air conditioning off, please?
Let's go.
I'll tell you what amazed me. Madness went down a storm.
I know, I know. Which is unusual.
Beer!
Obviously got very good taste in music.
Five beers is not enough for an hour journey.
I said to the tour manager, "Five beers for five people for an hour journey isn't enough.
"It's pathetic."
- I'm sure we can afford it. - Note to self.
I can't talk very well 'cause my mouth's so dry.
So bear with me.
Look, boys and girls, this is what it's like after a gig in a van.
We postmortem the gig for ten seconds, make apologies to one another...
Then we argue.
And then we argue about ice cream vans and stuff!
It was a little jagged tonight. Got through it.
I thought I might collapse halfway through. I ran out of steam. I'm an old man.
Oh, dear. We've still got the police escort.
He's the only vehicle holding us up.
Oh, man.
Passengers travelling on Iron Maiden Flight AEU666
kindly board the aircraft at gate number four, thank you.
That's what I'm saying. I don't...
will be served in-flight. Please observe the fasten seat belt signs
and no smoking signs...
You're shit and you know you are!
I've got to slow down 'cause the arm's hanging off now.
It's like watching a rare wild animal.
Even in its sleep, it snarls and it growls,
unaware of the presence of the cameras.
Rod is the best rock and roll manager in the world,
who is not just about the money and the fame and the bullshit.
It's about integrity and, 'We did it our way."
He's such a bombastic guy, which is what you want as a manager.
Sometimes he's bombastic with us as well at times.
We all moan about him but we love him dearly,
and he's a very hard-edged person.
He's a Yorkshireman. "Don't bloody talk about that! Come here!"
Bloody Roderick Smallwood!
He's brilliant when he bursts into the room.
I thought that was him.
And it's awake. We've woken it up.
Fat chance of sleeping.
Saxon's radar, good afternoon...
Could you sign this?
- Maiden! Maiden! - All right?
So where are we?
We're at the Comer Hotel in Australia for the Iron Maiden Melbourne meet-up.
So why do you have these pre-show events?
Just to get together, have fun, have some drinks and enjoy the atmosphere.
'Cause we're all pumped for Maiden.
This is David from Melbourne, mate, a real fucking Maiden fan.
It's not so much about identity or whatever social culture you think you fit into.
If you could see all these different types of people that come along to gigs
and worship upon the altar that is Iron Maiden,
they have this ability to really hit your heart
and either that or it makes you want to headbang and go fucking wild.
How long have you been Maiden fans?
Since I was fucking born, man!
Fucking day 666!
It's been 15 years since we played Australia.
Everywhere we go, the fans are so keen to have us back.
Some people never saw us, some people saw us on earlier tours.
But absolutely incredible everywhere.
We're bigger than ever.
Our heyday was the mid-'80s, which is what this tour is all about.
We're 24, 25 years older,
but we get up on stage and I look out and I see the kids and they haven't aged.
It's really weird.
I go, "Look. They're the same kids that were around in front of the stage 20 years ago."
Why is it that Maiden appeals to Morn and Dad and all the kids?
Because they're cool.
Because they're fucking awesome, man! Come on!
I believe Iron Maiden are playing here tonight. Giddy the fuck up!
Steve's probably flat out in bed.
He's also down still?
Steve's down big-time. Yeah. He's looking really ill.
We all picked up a little bug from India. Steve and I probably more so.
I mean, we didn't eat for four days.
By the time we'd arrived in Australia and we turned up at the sound check,
we'd start a song, someone would be off to the bathroom, come back and we'd start,
and people were just off everywhere.
We're all pretty jet-lagged still. That jet lag is a killer.
You've got to be ready for that concert because those kids want a good show.
We've had buckets for both ends on stage during some of the shows.
Ten out of ten to the band for putting up with that pressure and that illness,
and going out on stage with those conditions.
There's always a shithouse that you can sing in somewhere.
Scream for me, Melbourne!
I can't fucking hear you! Scream for me, Melbourne!
The ship is fucking sinking.
Yeah, it's a bit better. A bit better is better than worse.
None of the places you play are designed for music
so you always have sound problems.
You have to just be prepared for the worst,
and if it sounds great, all the better, but you can't let it throw you off.
People who've paid to see you don't give a shit if it doesn't sound good on stage.
They want to have a good time, and that's what you've got to try and put across.
Adrian has always been a stickler for getting the tones right that he wants.
He's meticulous. He's like that in his playing.
When you listen to his guitar solos, they're very precise.
Adrian's guitar playing is the stitching,
it's the texture, the fabric that covers all the structures.
Nothing Adrian does is aggressive, like...
Everything lopes. He picks notes out of the air like that.
And how he does it, no one knows, only Adrian. 'Cause nobody else can do it.
I'm trying to be all serious. I probably look...
Sorry.
I felt like shit before I went on, and then I got some adrenaline going and I enjoyed it.
Contrary to belief, boys and girls,
Harris don't smack the shit out of his bass guitar strings, he tickles 'em.
And I have it on good authority he's a good tickler.
You are talking a load of bollocks.
More shit comes out of your mouth than your arse, mate.
More shit?
Actually...
Are you coming for a drink, Steve?
Got some nice chilli.
Just about full.
You're fired. You can go home.
I thought you were gonna come with me and film me in the bloody bath.
I have my limits.
You ought to do, mate.
Go on, bugger off, you.
See you later.
- Can't beat them. - Bugger off.
I don't like being part of the group all the time.
You need to be out, be an individual. It keeps you fresh.
So when you've got the show the next day, you're not all hungover.
There he is.
Oh, my God.
How are you, mate?
I reckon I've known the guys for 25 years.
Their first tour here in Australia, Number Of The Beast, we played tennis with them.
We've been friends ever since, really.
This is not easy.
Again.
Adrian a worthy opponent there, Pat?
A much better tennis player than I am a guitarist.
We got a chance to play Pat Cash,
we had also Wayne Arthurs. He had the fastest serve record for a while.
I had the audacity to try and return one of his serves.
I was put firmly in my place.
That's in the movie.
Now, didn't you?
I'm gonna get your camera.
When you're on the road as much as we are,
you don't want to sit in your hotel room and mope or watch movies.
Everyone has their own activities that they do. I think it keeps you sane.
Get out of the bloody way! Get out of the bloody line!
A lot of bands go out there and put on this image of staying up all night partying.
You can't go out and go crazy every night,
because the performance for the next show would suffer.
Instead of spending six hours in the bar,
you can spend six hours on the golf course.
And then maybe an hour in the bar.
Not bad, Dave. A bit hanging on the right side.
That kind of hurt.
Davey is the backbone of the band.
You can have a chat about things and he won't say anything
and then he comes out with these amazing words of wisdom.
Dave is the wise counsel.
He doesn't say much. Day-to-day problems?
Not bothered. Major crises?
Somebody will ask Dave what he thinks.
"I think this." And it's like 'Whoo!"
We should have got that out of him two hours ago, you know?
- It's good night from him. - And it's good night from him.
- And it's... - Adiés, amigos.
Toodle-oo. Bye-bye, boys and girls.
All aboard the Skylark.
How many you got to sign there?
This is the second box load
and there's another four box loads in the back that I ain't done yet.
A lot of musicians that tour the world won't bring their kids,
but you have them with you.
I was the first one to take my kids on the road
and I think that's been the hardest part of touring,
being away from your family.
They enjoy being on the road
and they still say, "Dad, when can we go back and go on the bus again?"
We used to have our own bus.
We were separate from all the mayhem when we were younger.
I used to like sleeping in the tour bus, rather than being in hotels.
How would you describe your dad to other people?
Quiet.
Shy.
He keeps himself to himself. He's quite private.
I think he's kept us really grounded.
'Cause we could have been a nightmare.
So is this the last tour you're gonna do?
Yes.
Are you sure?
Positive.
What do you plan to do with your time off?
Grow vegetables.
I'll miss two things. Abusing people, and the sense of humour on the road.
In the event we land in the water,
remove the jacket from the container, pull it over your head,
fold the tapes around your waist,
and tie them securely in a double knot on the left-hand side.
I thought it were a single knot.
No, it's a double.
Scream for me, Sydney!
Let me see those hands out there!
Sydney!
Oh. yeah!
Take a look at yourselves.
How you doing? All right, Sydney?
The flying thing was in my bones from when I was little.
Two members of my family were in the RAF
so I was brought up with aeroplanes.
It shocked me, the experience of getting in an aeroplane and actually flying.
You can never be the master of it.
You can control it to an extent, but you have to submit to some of its realities.
It's a very humbling experience.
Bruce is just full-on. I mean, the energy of the man.
I wish I had a serum, get some out of him, stick it into me.
He's able to juggle lots of things at once.
He has a perpetual flood of ideas.
His enthusiasm rubs off.
If he gets excited about something he really follows it through.
Like now, he's flying planes on days off.
We'd be doing a European tour and we'd fly home after the show
then he'd be flying to North Africa.
You think, "Christ, at his age, he should slow down a bit." But, no, not a bit of it.
Passed our second Equal Time Point.
So now we are absolutely committed to going to Narita.
This is in fact my first time flying into Japan.
I'd say it's a very wonderful experience so far.
Take me back to the first time you played in Japan.
I was excited to come to Japan
because it's somewhere I'd always wanted to visit.
I was intrigued with all the shogun stuff.
Notice. I got a Yakuza samurai. Look, see?
Back then you'd turn up in a hotel, they'd be there and they'd be giving you presents,
little stuffed toys, little cards,
and they'd make you feel really welcome.
It was the only place in the world
where we physically got mobbed by teenage girls.
Hello. My name is Maria.
Japanese Maiden girl number one!
Welcome to Japan, Iron Maiden, OK?
I would like to become Steve Harris' daughter.
We'll have to work on that.
Stay heavy.
Iron Maiden's having a massive resurgence. Is that what's happening in Japan?
So focused.
I've never seen anything like it.
I just blocked it out.
Get rid of that one. Pull this back. Pull everything back.
Twenty-six people to put a black drape in here.
Ninety-four people to lay a carpet. Got to love Japan.
Bring the gear on the stage.
Being with Iron Maiden, you work your ass off. There are no days off.
You are on 24/7.
On a good day I start at 7 and I finish at 2am.
The crew are the biggest partiers I know, but they always come in and do their gig.
When you're in the Iron Maiden family, you're in the Iron Maiden family.
You've got to screw up to get kicked out.
Is there any chance we could get a drink before we finish the set?
- No. You'll wait! - Just a couple of vodkas.
He's a slave-driver.
We need two Laurens and one support manager.
Wine and food, please.
I'll send the old man back here to come and get you.
The Old Man And The Sea.
His last term.
It is. It's his last go. How many times has he retired?
He'll be back. This is the fourth time.
At least twice.
Dick Bell and I go back way before I joined the band.
He's a phenomenal production manager and he's part of the family.
He used to come round and hit you on the arm, like "Come here!"
He's a bit of a bastard. He knows where to clump you.
And now he's retiring again after tomorrow.
Let's go.
Not even dressed yet.
OK, Dickie, we're looking at ten minutes. Are you good?
OK, always good.
We're on.
I know!
That was brilliant. That is so good.
Less of the "young".
See you somewhere in Spain.
Everything's done.
It is a big bastard, isn't it'?
Carry on.
If you are carrying a mobile telephone or any other electronic equipment
these should be switched off, as these items may interfere with the air force...
air pressure...
You're shit and you know you are!
By the time this tour is over, Iron Maiden will have played in 21 cities,
travelled over 50,000 miles in 45 days,
something considered nearly impossible by rock tour standards
until this band figured out a way to pull it off and created Ed Force One.
Laura Ingle, Fox News.
- We made it to sunny LA. - Yeah, but it is sunny. I mean...
We flew from Japan after a couple of days there
up through Anchorage to LA.
When we got to LA, Steve got straight off the plane.
To Steve the music comes first.
Off the plane. Straight down the studio with Kevin.
You might want to leave it up a bit.
Just on that bit. I'd like to try Jan's guitar, leaving it up.
I don't think Maiden ever cares about being relevant,
and that's one of the things that makes them relevant.
We like eight-minute songs.
Slow intros and outros. The gallop in the middle.
So we've got ten songs like that. We don't give a fuck.
Steve is obviously the anchor of the band. He writes a lot of the songs.
If he doesn't write the songs, he has a say in the way they get arranged.
You know, it's Steve's band.
We have this sixth sense with one another.
He doesn't have to say something. I can tell what he wants. And likewise.
There are a handful of bass players that play our sort of music that are that good.
And I'm playing with one I think is the best in the world.
Steve is the musical basis of Maiden
and it's something I can say, all the band would agree with that,
that everything gets Steve-ized.
The spirit of Maiden comes from his musical focus on what he thinks is right,
and he's completely incorruptible.
Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!
This way.
My pass sucks.
Your pass is golden.
How did that happen?
He's a big fan.
- All right. - Thank you, man.
I wore out Piece Of Mind. I wore that out. I listened to it all day.
At night-time I put the headphones on and listened to it some more.
Did Smith and Murray influence your guitar playing?
I was always a fan of the twin axe attack
but, myself, I never wanted to share.
When Steve Harris's foot goes up on the monitor, and he starts singing along,
I'm gonna be very excited tonight.
I remember one thing that made quite an impact on me
was on the Number Of The Beast Tour at Long Beach Arena
we always looked to Iron Maiden for inspiration.
They always had the cooler records, the cooler album covers,
the cooler stage shows.
They just were cooler than everybody else.
Is Nicko an influence on you?
Yeah, absolutely. He's got such a great vibe.
One day he's gonna realize that if he got some smaller drums
you could actually see what he was doing.
It was like "Nicko, man, come on, I want to see what the fuck you're doing!"
I have an audience here.
Hiya.
I'm trying to learn something.
Let him who hath understanding reckon the number of the beast,
for it is a human number.
Its number is six hundred and sixty six.
Twenty to eight, so just under six hours.
Still don't quite understand howl managed to get it all in
but it fits, just about.
Going all the way round the time zones,
halfway round the world, up to Japan,
from summer to winter,
not just across a date line, backwards a day,
but going back a whole season.
That was a huge chunk of jet lag, just non-stop.
But when we left LA there was certainly a slightly sombre mood
because there was a feeling that, "Guys, the holiday bit is over."
The adventure was really about to begin because when we hit Latin America,
you get this idea that you're on the edge of something exploding.
Climb to 5300 and clear direct to tango tango mike. Five star 666.
- Six six six, the number of the beast. - You got it.
Welcome home, Monterrey!
It's great to be in Mexico.
It is.
And you know what?
Every time we go south of the border, the hotter it fucking gets.
Iron Maiden used to tour in the toughest areas of Manchester, Liverpool.
We're all working-class guys
and we have this kind of a credibility with the fans, a connection.
Music meant a lot to people.
It was a way out. It was a release.
It's the same in Mexico. It's like playing to a soccer crowd.
They're singing, they're chanting all the words, and it's a real tribal thing.
Latin American audiences, you know they're gonna be great.
The anxiety is, "Are we gonna be as good as the audience?"
We're just gonna give 150 per cent.
We've really got to deliver a passionate performance
that justifies our existence in front of this audience.
Five quid. That's ten dollars.
All right, eight.
Beautiful.
350 dollars.
- You're joking. - Look at the work.
It's very nice. I've seen work like that before for a fiver.
That is beautiful. Thank you so much. That's lovely.
Look at that, boys and girls.
This is gonna look great on my mantelpiece at home next to the one I got here last time.
We've lost Janick.
As you may have gathered from what you've seen so far,
Janick's a little bit of a lone soldier.
He runs off and disappears and does his own thing.
Normally you find him in an Irish bar somewhere.
As there's no Irish bar here, he's decided to go off on his own anyway.
Last time we saw him, he was heading over there.
There he is.
Where?
In front of us.
He's come back. I was just telling him you went off on your own.
Yes, there he is. He's back, boys and girls.
Couldn't find the Irish pub so he came back.
Janick is the jester. He's so funny. He's a party animal as well.
Out he goes strutting around and he enjoys his life very much.
Jan is someone I can bounce a lot of stuff off
and we can talk for hours about the band, about music.
He won't tell you this, he's got a degree in sociology.
He's a very educated guy.
There's two sides to Janick. Janick can be quite outgoing.
He loves going to Irish bars and mixing with people
and other times he'll go out strutting,
like now he'll probably be out strutting on his own somewhere.
He's a free spirit. He plays guitar like a free spirit.
He never plays the same thing twice.
Sometimes the other guys in the band are looking over going, 'What are you doing?"
Shall we leave this downstairs?
Wow. Fantastic. Careful, Janick.
We've got to mind our heads here.
We've got to go through a very low passageway, boys and girls.
Shit.
We are under the Sun Pyramid
and we're probably about 50 feet, 60 feet into the Pyramid so far.
- So it's... - I wondered why it was so dark.
We know that the medicine tradition, healers,
decide this day for you to deliver the holy fire
to share it with your brothers on the holy road,
take all the love to the people that that's the way how you want to heal the people.
Any message you want to deliver and share with them?
I share this medicine of the spirits with my friends,
and wish them health, happiness, love, friendship,
cherish the spirit and the bond we have here today.
That was fucking insane.
You came in the wrong door. You've got to go back.
I have never seen anything like that.
When the promoter suggested Costa Rica, I thought, like, 7,000 capacity hall.
He said, "No, we're doing football stadium." I said, "You sure?"
It ended up being the biggest gig ever in Central America.
It was sold out way upfront, 27,000
and anybody else they could cram in.
It was the biggest show they'd had in Costa Rica,
and we'd never been there before.
So it was new territory for us to go in and Maidenize.
It was like finding some weird tribe in the middle of the jungle
and they all come out and go, "Fear Of The Dark, favourite album!"
"What?"
Children Of The Damned!
When I was 14 or 15, I heard Iron Maiden for the first time.
"This is amazing. Iron Maiden. Can you imagine to see them live?
"No. Shame we live in the ass of the world."
A lot of people have come here. People from El Salvador. Honduras.
Nicaragua. From South America like Ecuador.
This is once in a lifetime.
I have a friend who quit his job to be here today.
This is the thing, you know. This is the thing.
Maiden! Maiden!
Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!
We decided to go and play golf in Costa Rica.
So we get out on the first tee, tee off and get down to the first green.
A fucking golf ball hit me on my wrist.
Within two minutes it had swollen up, black and blue.
My main concern was, "I'm not gonna be able to play tonight."
I'm a wounded soldier in battle.
Yeah, it's gonna swell up a bit more.
The doc's saying it'll be a couple of days it'll go up your arm.
See, boys and girls? That's what a golf ball can do for you.
Max-Fly number three. Low compression, though.
- It was a shit ball, thank goodness. - Dangerous game, isn't it'?
- No, not at all. - You're banned. Are you all right?
Thank the Lord that it wasn't an inch lower.
Because we would have been going home.
It's ironic that with all the planning and the huge setup and the massive logistics,
the half-an-inch trajectory of a golf ball...
And it would be Nicko, of course.
It could have brought the whole thing to an end.
Your face. "You'd better be able to play."
You'd better be able to play.
It'll be fine.
Scream for me, Costa Rica!
If it's like this at Immigration, what's it going to be like in the rest of the country?
Good afternoon, everybody. How are you?
The show last night, phenomenal. Absolutely phenomenal.
As Bruce said when we were in Mexico,
the further south we come down into South America, the hotter it gets.
And it became pretty hot last night.
The show was really good and the audience were phenomenal.
So the Columbian audience tomorrow night, you have something to live up to.
Nicko's a larger-than-life character.
You send him into a room or a party,
he batters his way through and goes schmoozing in there.
Then I just walk in behind him and pick up the pieces.
Nicko is the social side of Maiden because he's so gregarious and fun.
We will go in the room, and sometimes you've got to say hello to people.
But he's a totally genuine, full-on...
and, again, a great part of the team.
They broke the mould when they made Nicko.
He's one of these people, the first time you meet him, you love him for life.
What can you say about Nick? It's best left unsaid.
Yeah, that'll do, won't it?
We'd never been to Columbia before
and we were playing this massive park
and all the way along there were tents, three miles of it.
They'd been out for a week, ten days, so they could get nearer the stage.
I've never seen that before, ever.
Seeing that, your pulse rate goes up and you get a huge adrenaline rush.
Columbia was one of the places
that I was slightly apprehensive about going to, I guess,
because of the idea that if some kind of event kicked off offstage,
that it could get nasty.
Even though everybody was very happy,
you got the impression that they lived with the military presence
and tolerated it on a day-to-day basis.
We've been here the whole week but we don't have any food right now.
They just take away everything, food, cameras, all that stuff.
- So it's pretty heavy security. - It's heavy security.
The atmosphere was charged. It was all brewing up.
It was only going to take a small thing for things to get out of control.
There is no fucking use to it.
They are fucking assholes.
They don't like metal, man. They are mistreating the metal in here.
The world knows that Columbia has a very serious social problem.
But here the metal music is alive.
This is the main dream for every rocker here in Columbia.
I think that I'm going to cry here.
I may sound very emotional but I think that I'm going to cry there
because I grew up listening to Iron Maiden.
Tell you what, the old altitude is...
You feeling it?
Big difference. I woke up this morning in bed,
which is a good place to wake up.
But I was out of breath.
You're just in bed. It was shallow breathing and stuff. Bizarre.
Oxygen stage right, and oxygen by the drummer.
I've got one on my jacket.
No, no, no!
Bruce, when you need oxygen, it's over stage right.
I could have done with oxygen last night. I've got a shocking hangover.
Come on!
Have a nice bottle of white, mate.
Look at that. Loads of that funny cheese in there, I bet.
It's not bad.
I don't like the sweaty-feet cheese or the strong cheese.
But this ain't bad. Anyone fancy a chunk of pizza?
No, but nine o'clock is early to leave.
Is that the time we're leaving?
That's a 7:30 wake-up.
Eight o'clock, mate, pack up.
You've got to do the three S's. I can do them in 15 minutes and be downstairs.
I have the shave first, then the shower.
Then the shit. I can't even say it.
Does it confuse you if anything's out of sequence?
It does sometimes.
Like you wipe your bum with your razor or something like that?
Please take a seat. We are cleared for landing.
Brazil, for us, is where Latin America started, when we did Rock In Rio.
We went down there just for one show, and the experience was unbelievable.
Life-changing.
Run To The Hills!
The Rock In Rio in '85 was fantastic.
We flew in especially for one show, about 300,000 people,
and it was being televised live throughout South America.
The whole of South America suddenly went Maiden.
We came from up-state New York. It was freezing cold.
Went down to Rio. I'd never been to a hot country before.
Certainly not South America. So it was all wide-eyed.
It was all a bit of a shock.
Excitable, passionate fans, and people jumping up and down chanting "Maiden!"
Being British, we're not used to that. You don't get that excited.
But the amazing thing is that it goes on undiminished every time we go back.
You got both signed. Are you happy?
Very happy, man. Heavy metal. The Irons, man.
Iron Maiden is my religion.
In Brazil, similar to Scandinavia, it's got the Maiden religion,
because it means so much to so many people in those areas.
But in some instances it can get very exaggerated.
There's a priest an hour and a half out of Séo Paulo
who does sermons sometimes around the morality of Maiden lyrics.
Could you describe for us some of your tattoos?
They are crazy.
With the success of the band in South America,
you do get the corollary, the price of fame,
which is that you're really just stuck inside the hotel.
You can't just go and amble out and take a stroll.
Argentina was just a bit less subtle.
It was just 24/7.
The fans do get a bit much sometimes,
when you've been travelling and people expect you to stop and sign
and have photos and look all cheerful.
Once you're in a hotel, that's my home away from home.
Outside the hotel, we're fair game.
Argentina!
Santiago, where the local time is five to one in the afternoon.
Maiden! Maiden! Maiden!
This was the most out-of-control reception that we've had in Chile.
It's ironic that we're in that situation now
because we were banned initially.
The once all-powerful Catholic church took exception to our "Satanic" lyrics
and, unbelievably, they stopped us coming to Chile.
Maiden!
All they wanted to do was see the band. That was it. End of story.
They didn't want to start a revolution.
They just wanted to go and see a heavy metal band.
Scream for me, Santiago!
Santiago, Chile!
I want you.
And I want you!
And you!
And you down here, my friends.
Iron Maiden's gonna get you!
Iron Maiden's gonna get all of you!
This time around, you're playing essentially a classic Iron Maiden set.
It's like saying to the fans, at least the fans in America,
'We're gonna revisit the catalogue."
No.
- Not at all? - No. Not at all.
We're not some old fossil dragging the bones of old songs around.
What you'll see tonight is not just a celebration of old songs.
It's the celebration of a lot of young new fans,
who have never seen us play these songs.
Any time you go out and you play songs that you've played before,
there's going to be an element of people going, "I've heard these songs before."
But the purpose of this tour was really very different,
because our entire audience for the last eight years
has been getting steadily younger.
So, as a big thank you,
large Christmas present wrapped up in a box with a big bow on top,
here, have a classic World Slavery Tour.
And that's why I get bent out of shape
any time anybody tries to play "Pin the tail on the donkey"
and the tail they're trying to pin on us
is that this is some kind of revival antique show.
And it's not that.
Is there a song or two that you most look forward to doing again?
Tonight?
In general.
Tonight or as part of this current Somewhere Back In Time tour.
Ancient Mariner.
- Is it really? - Mariner. Yeah, by far.
Once that plane landed in Toronto,
we knew the show would go ahead, we'd done it, and that was a great feeling.
And if you look back over six and a half weeks,
we played 21 cities, 23 shows.
It's the equivalent of playing a major concert every alternate day,
except those concerts are 3,000 kilometres apart.
And we pulled it off.
There was a sense of elation that, "Wow, here we are."
And then I just thought, "Christ, it's bloody cold."
Maiden!
Maiden! Maiden!
Definitely in the great white north now.
You see the kids outside queuing up and they're not wearing much more than I am.
In the snow.
They're tough up here, man.
Looking forward to going home?
Yes, I am, I must say.
Just having my little bit of space.
One less documentary crew to contend with.
I think you guys have been pretty cool, really.
I was dreading it, actually.
- So another successful tour? - Yes.
Quite gruelling.
It's been amazing. It's been gruelling. It's been one of the hardest.
Yeah.
In terms of audience...
it's been one of the best.
Yeah.
- How are you, Steve? - I'm all right.
- Final show. - Yeah.
We made it.
Finally we made it, yeah.
Feels like we've been out about six months, doesn't it?
Dear boy, you must be happy to be home on terra firma.
Indeed I am, thank you.
One more flight tomorrow. I'll be home in sunny Florida.
And I shall be getting my sticks out and going to get some lessons.
Have fun!
Thank you!
Fight on the beaches,
we shall fight on the landing grounds,
we shall fight in the fields and in the streets,
we shall fight in the hills, we shall never surrender.
I think the essence of us hasn't changed that much as people.
We do the music 'cause we love doing the music.
It's not about money. It's nice to make money but...
You can see we mean it and we enjoy it.
It's all about the music and I think people know that.
We've done it our way. We do it without radio, without any media.
We haven't become celebrities. We still go and have a drink in the pub with our mates.
Nobody has to bow down to us. We're just musicians.
We play music, we enjoy it, and if you like our music, God bless you.
And if you don't like it, you know what? God bless you too.
It's a beautiful thing that we're still here in 2008,
doing the biggest tour we've ever done.
This is bigger than the '80s.
I'm doing something that I love doing,
being able to play music, travel round the world, and have a great life,
and that sort of thing you never take for granted, and enjoy every moment.
We've got a bunch of your fellow countrymen out with us,
making a documentary
on the madness that follows us around the world.
So I'm putting them on fair warning now.
They've been well behaved so far.
They've said all the right things. They've been nice.
We've even bought them drinks.
But you know where they fucking live. Right?
That's all I'm saying.
It's fitting that we should end up
with the last bit of the tour that's been done round the world
in this crazy schedule
in a place that we love,
in a place that embraced Iron Maiden before America ever knew we existed.
Having gone through the gamut of so many countries,
and generating so much hope in people,
it's starting to occur to me now that we are actually...
What's that expression? Being thrust onto the tip of the spear
in terms of putting some kind of message out there.
All people need is something to hang onto that's real.
Somewhere there's something that you can rely on and they won't let you down.
And if Maiden fulfil that for people, I think that would be a remarkable thing.
We might all end up retiring at some point in the future,
having actually achieved something.
Wow.
Scream for me, Toronto!
Thank you, Toronto!
Thank you, Canada! We'll see you later, my friends!
See you in the summer!
Give us a kiss!
You just missed the best piece out of the whole fucking tour.
We need to get Rod Smallwood in a barrel over there.
It's bloody nothing, this! I've done worse!
Wankers.
One, two, three.
Tell me to fuck off!
Why don't you lot just fuck off and go home?