Imagine for just a moment that Iron Maiden would pull a Helloween. Helloween decided to keep on both of their lead singers when they reunited for their Pumpkins United World Tour. It would be a tour that surely would piss off the worst of Iron Maiden fans. It’s long been known that I don’t respect people that disregard the Blaze Bayley era of Iron Maiden.
The two albums that he performed on were not the same Iron Maiden that we’re all used to. They laid the groundwork for the current era of Iron Maiden that we have today. Most importantly, he guided the ship for Iron Maiden through one of the worst periods for heavy metal. We’re in a resurgence of sorts right now, but in the mid to late 90’s, it was dire straights for some bands. CD sales were down across the board.
So if you’re one of those people who disregards this era of the band completely, I’ll kindly ask you to stop reading, go look at the setlist for the Legacy of the Beast tour, bend your head backwards, and shove it up your ass. If Iron Maiden wasn’t appreciative of the era of Iron Maiden that Blaze Bayley was involved in, they wouldn’t include two songs from that era on a tour celebrating all that is great about Maiden.
The tour would be called the When Two Worlds Collide Tour celebrating the legacy of Iron Maiden and the work of Blaze Bayley for the band.
How To Work With Two Singers
Helloween worked because Andi Deris and Michael Kiske are two drastically different singers. They complement each other. Kiske cannot sing like he used to, and that comes with age. Singers have to change their vocal stylings as they get older, and not everyone is Glenn Hughes. With Blaze Bayley and Bruce Dickinson, you’d get the high ranging power of his voice with the lower, darker, deeper, style of Bayley.
Bruce Dickinson would never do this obviously, but that’s why this is a dream setlist. As for the actual set, Iron Maiden plays between 16-20 songs normally, and we don’t have any restrictions besides getting at least eight Blaze Bayley songs in here for him to sing. Since we’re going to include both singers, we might as well make this a sort of best-of for both Bruce and Blaze. As for anything else, we could include some Bruce or Blaze solo songs, but with Iron Maiden playing behind them, I’ll just keep it to Iron Maiden songs.
On To The Dual Dream Setlist For Iron Maiden’s When Two Worlds Collide Tour
Tape: Doctor Doctor
Tape: Dance of the Knights (Prokofiev)
- Futureal (Both singing)
- 2 Minutes To Midnight (Both singing)
- The Prisoner (Bruce singing)
- The Trooper (Bruce singing)
- Sign of the Cross (Blaze singing)
- Lord of the Flies (Blaze singing)
- Heaven Can Wait (Both singing)
- Revelations (Bruce singing)
- Lightning Strikes Twice (Both singing, one does the “Maybe Lightning” the other does the “Strikes Twice”)
- Powerslave (Bruce singing)
- Number Of The Beast (Bruce singing)
- The Clansman (Both singing)
- When Two Worlds Collide (Both singing)
- Blood On The World’s Hands (Blaze singing)
- Fear Of The Dark (Bruce singing)
- Afraid To Shoot Strangers (Both singing)
- Iron Maiden (Both singing)
Encore - Man On The Edge (Blaze singing)
- Virus (Blaze singing)
- The Clairvoyant (Bruce singing)
- Como Estais Amigos (Both singing)
- Running Free (Both singing)
Explaining The Dream Iron Maiden Setlist
If you look at this one, it’s a lot already. You not only get a celebration of the 90’s era of Maiden with a full 12 songs from that era. But you also get some classics and songs that haven’t been performed live by the band before. The performance of “Como Estais Amigos” would be worth the price of admission alone for me.
I based the setlist’s flow, and songs mainly off what Iron Maiden played during Blaze’s tenure in the band, and some fan-favorite Bruce tracks. It obviously doesn’t contain some of the more classic songs that seem to be played at every Maiden concert like “Hallowed Be Thy Name” or “Run To The Hills”. I was also disappointed that I couldn’t fit in any songs from the modern era, but that’s a dream setlist for another time!
Overall, I think this one captures the essence of that era without containing too many of the dark and dreary songs of The X-Factor or the longer more dense songs of Virtual XI. You can read about all of my comprehensive, in-depth reviews of Iron Maiden’s albums with Iron Maiden-A-Thon.
What do you think of this dream setlist? Let us know in the comments! What would you have done differently with this set?
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Once again, I’m in full support of Maiden doing a show like this, especially as a way for Blaze Bailey to get the respect from fans he more than deserves. Everyone judges his vocal abilities based on how well he could emulate Bruce and while it was expected during his tenure, it really isn’t fair to him. Watching whatever live footage there is of him with the band, you can tell he was giving it his all.