‘There may be no better place to hear how both punk and prog rock informed the New Wave of British Heavy Metal than Iron Maiden’s self-titled debut’ Billboard
‘This debut stands as a virtual heavy-metal textbook for anyone eager to learn’ iTunes
From day one, bassist/founder Steve Harris has been the driving force behind Iron Maiden. According to Kerrang! Harris’s edict heading into the band’s first album was to make a plan and stick to it. ‘That’s the key to success. It’s a credo that [he] has followed since he started the band on Christmas Day, 1975.’ Former lead singer Paul Mario Day – who fronted the band in 1975–76 – later told Maidenfans.com that, even in the early days, ‘Steve generally came up with the ideas. I pushed to do more covers but Steve always wanted to stick to his guns and write original stuff. He was amazing like that really and he deserves all the success that he’s got.’
In describing some of the band’s earliest recordings, Steve Harris told Maidenfans.com years later, ‘I’ve got audio tapes that go right back from 1976, not right from the first gigs, but from the days when we used to play places like the Bridge House. They’re a bit dodgy. There’s a version of “Purgatory”, which was then called “Floating”, and it had an arrangement that was a bit different. I’ve also got a tape of my very first band, Gypsy’s Kiss, of us at the Cart and Horses. It might have been the first gig we did. There’s a song called “Endless Pit”, which later became “Innocent Exile”. The tapes exist but I never play ’em to anyone!’
As Rolling Stone noted, ‘the first incarnation of the band was inspired by the do-it-yourself punk ethos.’ But by 1977, according to the LA Times, ‘while most wannabe London rockers were embracing punk’s stripped-down sound and fashionista aesthetic, [Harris was] defiantly creating … a hairy, denim-clad band that proudly performed heroic, escapist heavy metal.’
In 1979, following numerous line-up changes, the group released an EP, The Soundhouse Tapes, on its own label, Rock Hard Records. As guitarist Dave Murray recalled years later to Metal Hammer, ‘The first Iron Maiden thing we did where I can remember that we were all travelling together was when we went out of London to record what became The Soundhouse Tapes, at the Spaceward Studios in Cambridge on New Year’s Eve, 1978. There must’ve been three feet of snow everywhere and we were freezing our balls off, all cramped together in the back of a van.’
Their dedication would pay off. The band recorded the original version of ‘Prowler’, which, as Harris recalled to journalist John Stix, was a ‘very special’ song for them. ‘When we made The Soundhouse Tapes, we took the actual tape to Neal Kay, who was a DJ in north London. He used to have a heavy-metal chart, which was compiled from record requests and printed in the music magazine Sounds. “Prowler” got to be No. 1 just from the requests for the demo tape. That’s why we had the tape made into a record because so many kids were asking us how they could get hold of the demo tapes … It was brilliant because that got us work elsewhere as well.’
The bassist added his memory of feeling that there was a certain amount of irony in the fact that The Soundhouse Tapes was the very first thing that Iron Maiden had recorded. ‘[The song] was just a demo … It really wasn’t great quality.’
Still, the quality was good enough for it to sell 5,000 copies within a month of release and land the band a spot on the compilation LP Metal for Muthas. This featured early versions of ‘Sanctuary’ and ‘Wrathchild’, eventually earning the band a record deal with EMI in late 1979. As the decade turned into 1980, the band made plans to record that spring with producer Will Malone, who had previously worked with Black Sabbath and Meat Loaf, and whose CV would go on to include Peter Gabriel, Simple Minds, Depeche Mode, Seal, The Verve, Dido, Jewel, Oasis and Jeff Beck.
But before Maiden could head into the studio they had to deal with yet another change in their perpetually evolving line-up, following the departure of lead guitarist Paul Cairns.
Years later his replacement, Dennis Stratton of Remus Down Boulevard, recalled to Praying Mantis webzine the circumstances that led to him being hired. ‘My wife at the time noticed an advert in the Melody Maker – “Iron Maiden, EMI recording artists seek guitarist/backing vocalist” – and we were debating whether to write off or phone up for it. I was doing a painting job at Stratford and I got on a bus at Stratford Broadway to go to Canning Town where I was living. A girl came up to me on the bus and said, “You’re Dennis Stratton?” I went, “Yeah,” and she said, “Oh hello, my name’s Lorraine. I’m Steve Harris’s girlfriend.” And I said, “Yeah?” rather blankly. And she went, “I take it you haven’t been home yet?” and I said, “No.” “Oh well, when you get home there is a telegram waiting for you to ring Rod Smallwood because they’re interested in you joining Iron Maiden.”
‘I said, “Well, how did they know about me?” She said Steve used to come down every night and watch the band play. I didn’t know Steve at the time. He apparently loved it. Iron Maiden weren’t allowed to play in the Bridge House club because they were too heavy. So they were over the Cart and Horses. On the nights they weren’t playing and when he knew RDB were going to play the Bridge House, he would come down. Again one night I remember him in there because he had a West Ham scarf on and I was taking the mickey out of him.
‘When I got home my wife said, “There’s a telegram here for you,” and I said, “I know what it is.” And I picked up the telegram and it just said, “Dear Dennis, please ring Rod Smallwood at the above number re Iron Maiden.” The following day I was down at Wardour Street, in the Ship pub near the Marquee, and I met up with Steve, Dave Murray and Rod. From there Rod said, “Steve wants you in the band. I don’t think you will have any trouble learning the material.”’
As excited as he was about the opportunity, Stratton also admitted that, heading into the gig, he was nervous because ‘I was a bit ignorant about Iron Maiden’s material at the time because I had been so involved with RDB and the tour with Quo. I had, therefore, never really got to listening to the really heavy metal stuff. And he said they had a really big following and they had done The Soundhouse Tapes but “we are due to go into the studio and record the first album” on EMI.
‘He told me about this big following at the Soundhouse [club] and Neal Kay, [and that] they had signed this big deal with EMI. What they were looking for was not only a guitarist that could do backing vocals and whatever but someone who also had a bit of experience in the recording studios and touring because you have got to remember they were still very young. Although they had done lots of gigs in clubs and travelled around a lot in the old Green Goddess – they’d done one-night gigs up in Wigan and places – they had never actually done a full tour.
So I said, “Yeah, no problem.” There was a little bit of an argument about money because I was married and had a little daughter, and I needed a bit more money than the rest of them because they were all living with their parents and whatever. So we got all that out of the way and they gave me a tape of some songs. I went home and I think the first one I played was “Phantom of the Opera”, and it had all these harmonies and I thought, “Yeah, this is all right.” They were rehearsing over at Hollywood Studios, Clapham, just round the corner from where Dave was living with his mum.