Bruce Dickinson Special Interview in Japan (from "Burrn!" Magazine, August 1997) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ T - Taka Okuno B - Bruce Dickinson T: Accident Of Birth got brilliant responses from fans who have supported you, Bruce, for a long time and also from Iron Maiden fans. B: Yeah, I know. But the idea of this album was different. I wanted to do some experimental things. A long time passed since the beginning of my solo career and I really didn't know if this heavy metal record will be good or not. The music we created in the early times of Iron Maiden was really great. So I tried everything to avoid making a metal record until releasing 2 or 3 albums. T: Probably that's the reason why there're some elements of Skunkworks in your Accident Of Birth album. I guess songs like "Freak" or "Starchildren" sound more modern and closer to the Skunkworks times. B: Yes, I agree. All the people who listened to this record told me that it sounds great and that they enjoyed it. But all of these responses were different. Some people said, "It's great because it sounds like Iron Maiden", a lot of them said, "The aura of the whole album reproduces the best years of Iron Maiden." It's very interesting for me to know what my fans think about the album. I think that doing it helped me to overcome myself. This album compiles everything I've done through the Maiden years and in my solo carrier. This is my best album so far. It would cause me a lot of problems when I will record the follow-up. (laughs) T: You composed two songs on this album together with Adrian Smith. For example, "Road To Hell" is in the vein of the fast Maiden tracks like "The Evil That Men Do", "2 Minutes To Midnight" or "Moonchild". B: Yeah, it was supposed to. T: But I feel that in some songs like "Welcome To The Pit" you and Adrian tried the opposite like bringing new modern elements of Skunkworks and Psycho Motel kind of stuff. B: Well, I've tried to make a new metal record and was surprised how interesting it was doing it. Me and Roy began writing and in a week we completed 5 tracks. I enjoed making demos very much and it turned out great. So I felt that it's time to make a metal record. That's why I phoned to Adrian saying, "You will not believe me but I'm doing a metal record right now". I sent him a demo-tape and asked to play guitar parts on the record if he was interested. 24 hours later Adrian phoned me and said, "It's awesome. I've got some riff ideas." (laughs) It was the right time for the two of us. You can wonder if we're going to continue together. The answer is yes. (laughs) We'll be doing the same stuff on the next album with Roy and Adrian. But it will be a step further. Also it's very important for us not to make absolutely the same record again. Maybe we'll use keyboards on the next album. I think it would be really cool using some classical elements with a Hammond organ like Deep Purple's one. T: Strings in "Man Of Sorrows" and "Arc Of Space" sound really effective. Whose idea was to use it? B: "Man Of Sorrows" is the oldest song on the whole album, it's been written 5 years ago. The original demo was recorded in a 24-track studio to be used in a soundtrack. But the movie wasn't even done. During the production of that soundtrack I gave a tape with the gothic version of that song to a guy responsible for the whole project. From the beginning I used sampling and included it in that demo. Finally, instead of using strings with an orchestra we used strings and mellatron together with cello and violin. The arrangements in "Arc Of Space" were created by me and Roy. Roy played mellatron and we asked an orchestra musician to play it for the record. T: Speaking about "mellatron", do you mean the mellatron which is used by Moody Blues and King Creamson? B: Yes, that's it. Me and Roy are long time fans of synthesizers. We wanted to use many instruments on this album and among them was the good old synthesizer. It was the same guy who played on The Dark Side Of The Moon. Plugging it into the soundboard, we used no keyboards. It was absolutely direct recording. It was a really great mechanizm. In the beginning, there were some industrial parts on this album like on the first version of "Accident Of Birth". It was a kind of "percussive industrial". The same thing was with "Starchildren". There're two more songs containing it but it's shown very good in those two tracks ("Starchildren" and "Accident Of Birth"). T: Two of your guitarists have different styles but their combination soudns really awesome. B: Yeah, you're right. Adrian played the way he likes to. I haven't seen him for a long time playing with such a pleasure. There was no pressure from the outside, so he just relaxed and played and it turned out great. The way Roy did his work was different from Adrian. Adrian played for too long but Roy recorded all his parts at one take. In "Magician" there were three different portions and Roy played his part holding the guitar behind his head. (laughs) He did it while sitting on the table. He's really crazy but great at the same time. T: Speaking of the lyrics they were very dark on Skunkworks... B: Oh, I was very upset. (laughs) T: With this album you turned to wide science fiction themes. So you decided to write dramatic lyrics to fit the songs, didn't you? B: Yes. When me and Roy began writing songs it was already decided to come back to heavy metal. That's why I turned again to all the ideas about stories in the songs and decided to write something like fairytales or science fiction stories. I wanted to do it for too long. Originally, I began playing music because I wanted to transfer stories into songs. On Skunkworks I was very attentive to everything. Quite the same thing was with Balls To Picasso. But in times of Skunkworks I was very angry and my anger and frustration were revealed in lyrics. But I'm not gonna be the same again. I did it on Skunkworks because I had to but now there's nothing left of that sadness. (laughs) That's why I returned to stories. But I was aware of it for more than 2 years. Nevertheless I did it brilliant and now my crazy stories appear one after another. T: Whose idea was to invite Derek Riggs (an artist who did most of Iron Maiden covers) for drawing the cover artwork? In the previous interview you told about a student of art school doing the cover for you and you said that his pictures were scary. B: Yeah, they were really scary. (laughs) I had a person called "Eddison" on my mind and I explained this idea to my manager for 30 seconds on the phone. It took me 2 years to create him. The album was already completed and I took a week off while the mastering was being done. Right then my manager rang me and asked, "What cover do you want?" I said I hadn't thought about it. Then I don't know how I thought of a crazy person and named him Eddison. But I had no lamps and at the end of November went to England. When coming back I made a photo of a puppet somewhere. At first I wanted to place the photo on the cover but then rejected the idea because of the photo itself. A girl called Gilroy (my art director) advised me to call Derek Riggs and I did it. He agreed immediately and drew some pictures you can see on the Accident Of Birth album and on the Man Of Sorrows single. Eddison became a base for design. I liked the production very much, Derek grows all the time in different directions which he always keeps to himself. T: Is it going to become your trademark like it was in Iron Maiden with Eddie? B: Definitely yes. But I'd like him to be more friendly than the Iron Maiden's one. There're a lot of plans now. I think of making him an image of a real person. (laughs) He'll be thrilling and interesting. (laughs) T: By the way, you said that your new album could be compared to The Number Of The Beast. Can you explain it a little more definitely? B: OK. At first I felt it when listening. My thoughts were like, "It's a classic album." Of course, I like all of my solo albums but here we have something special. It's much better than other records. There's no doubt that the rest of my albums have some cool songs on it. For example, "Tears Of The Dragon" is really awesome. But this album is an absolutely completed album in its sound, performance of the band, tracks and even in the artwork. Honestly speaking, I could not even think that it'd turn out to be so great. I feel great about it and I am really satisfied with the result. T: The rest of the Iron Maiden members also say quite often when they are satisfied with a record that they tried to follow The Number Of The Best. Seems like that's an outstanding album for them too. B: There's nothing strange about it. The Number Of The Beast is a real Iron Maiden masterpiece. Our opinions are quite the same when we compare such brilliant albums as The Number Of The Beast and Piece Of Mind to the rest. Although The Number Of The Beast could be one position higher than Piece Of Mind. During the recording sessions we did something new and Iron Maiden created this sound for the first time. Also I established my own vocal style with that album. I think that's the most charming Iron Maiden album. In my opinion the situation with this Iron Maiden album is the same as it was with Deep Purple's "In Rock". T: Can I ask some mean questions? B: OK, no problem. (laughs) T: Was there really any need to leave Iron Maiden to create a heavy metal album again? B: There wasn't. Nevertheless I left the band. (laughs) T: Will you ever return to Iron Maiden and do you really want it? B: It'll be terrible to come back there. My style of composing albums... I mean heavy metal albums, it quite different from Iron Maiden's one. There's a usual process that Iron Maiden always follows. I don't think that our reunion right now could be profitable. Besides that I don't want to return to the past. For example, playing some songs live together could be a great idea, no problems with it. But making an album with them is very difficult for me. And I really don't think that my solo albums sound worse that Iron Maiden. So don't want any cooperation right now. But I'll play some Iron Maiden songs live. We'll come back to Japan in July and 3 or 4 Iron Maiden songs are planned to be added to the show. Of course, we'll play songs of Adrian Smith and Brian Dickinson times like "2 Minutes To Midnight". We'll be playing together with Tribe Of Gypsies. T: You mean it will be your opening act? B: Yes. We'll visit Osaka, Nagoya and Tokyo. T: It would be nice. B: I absolutely agree with you. The first will be Tribe Of Gypsies and then my band. Some of the members will play with both bands. (laughs) I think it would be a great tour. T: What are your plans besides the Japanese tour? B: I'll return to England, call my band mates and we'll begin rehearsals again. On June 28 we'll play at Nothingham. The gig at the Nothingham Rock City will be the first for Roy and Adrian together. After that we'll play at some festivals. We'll tour Spain for a week and then go to Greece and Austria also for some festivals. After that we'll visit Japan and a big European tour will follow. Probably we'll come to America. In August, I am plannning to go promote the album in the States. Accident Of Birth will be released there on June 6 but we are already recieving brilliant responses from there. So they possibility of touring there is very high. T: You said you'll play some Iron Maiden songs but I guess the main thing for you now is Accident Of Birth. Can you tell us what songs you will play? B: Well, during the rehearsals we've played all the songs. We can play the whole album from the very beginning till the very end. It's hard to choose. We'll certainly play "Freak", "Starchildren", "Darkside Of Aquarius", "Road To Hell"... definitely "Taking The Queen". Maybe... "Magician" and of course "Accident Of Birth". T: What I want to hear is "Man Of Sorrows". B: So I'll have to play it. (laughs) But we probably won't play "Arc Of Space". We plan playing "Tears Of The Dragon" but I don't want to include too many acoustic songs in our metal show. As I've told before, we'll play 3 or 4 Iron Maiden songs and something like "Tattooed Millionaire" or "Shoot All The Clowns". There'll be a lot of interesting songs. T: Your bassist Eddie Casillias played several years in an Iron Maiden-style band and in an Iron Maiden-cover band. His name is also in the credits of "Darkside Of Aquarius". B: You're right. He knows the whole old Iron Maiden stuff and plays it great. He also can play "Phantom Of The Opera". He's a very talanted bassist. In fact, I'm a long-time member of the Iron Maiden-cover band. (laughs) Nevermind, it's a joke. (laughs) ------------------------------------------------------------------------