June 11, 2008

Iron Maiden at the Allstate Arena.  This is going to be a several parter since I have an assload of pics to post.

Ok, so back in March I find out Maiden is coming out here on June 11.  As luck would have it (really, really good luck) I had my son that week for vacation.  Being that it was on a Wednesday none of my buddies could make it (something about needing to be up for work at 4am...pussies  ) so it was going to be just me and the kid.

Now, the kid has wanted to see Maiden live ever since he understood the concept of concerts.  Last time I saw Maiden was in 03 with Motorhead and Dio opening and he really wanted to go with but I wouldn't let him.  He was all of 9 then.  But now he's 14 and more than up for it, so I got us tickets and started counting off the days.  I think I was more excited about him going than he was, and he was pretty jacked for it.  I found the setlist on the internet (Maiden rarely changes their setlist during a tour) and emailed it to him so he could make sure to have the lyrics memorized.  Very important to sing at a Maiden show, it is.  :)

So about the tour...Maiden put out a dvd version of Live After Death earlier this year, and this tour was more or less in support of that dvd and the bonus "History of Iron Maiden pt2" feature that came with it.  It was a "greatest hits" type of set, with all but one song played being from the 80s.  So essentially what you had was a setlist that would make any metal fan drool.  The evidence:

Aces High (w/Churchill speech)

2 Minutes to Midnight

Revelations

The Trooper

Wasted Years

Number of the Beast

Can I Play With Madness

Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Powerslave

Heaven Can Wait

Run to the Hills

Fear of the Dark

Iron Maiden

Moonchild

The Clairvoyant

Hallowed Be Thy Name

Yes, Rime of the Ancient Mariner was played once again...and it was spectacular, all 13 minutes of it.  The stage was a reconstruction of the ancient Egypt theme from the World Slavery Tour back from 84-85.  They even had the giant mummy Eddie behind the drum riser when the band played the song Iron Maiden, and the cyborg Eddie from Somewhere in Time came out during Clairvoyant.

So now keep in mind this is not only my kid's first Maiden concert, but the first big-name concert he's ever been to.  He is almost as big a Maiden fan as I am, and as I mentioned he was pumped for this.  So I called the Allstate and found out disposable and small digital cameras were allowed.  Nice!  My son had a nice digital, so we brought that along.  We got there a bit early and hung out in the car til the doors opened.  Meantime the lot filled and some guys pulled in next to us and they were blasting Maiden on their car stereo so we got to enjoy that for a bit, and I have to admit I had a good time just watching my son soak in the atmosphere.  Nothing hanky or illegal going on, just people hanging out jamming music before the show.  So when it came time to head in a lot of the older (well, my age heh) people saw my son and were asking if it was his first time seeing Maiden.  When he said yes, everyone was high-fiving him and telling him what a great time he was in for.

So we get in line, and got inside.  Quick trip to the bathrooms, then we got a quick drink (water for him, $9 Heineken for me...ouch) and then to the t-shirt stands.  Maiden had been producing city/region specific shirts for some of their bigger stops on the tour so I figured there'd be a badass shirt for the Chicago show.  I ask the retard working the stand if they had a Chicago shirt and she tells me no.  So I explained EXACTLY what I meant, and she still tells me no.  So we got a generic tour shirt for the kid to start off with, and I told him to keep an eye out for others he wanted and I'd pick him up more on the way out.

So we get to our seats...and we had pretty good seats...and just check out the whole scene.  The floor area was only about 1/5 of the way full, but someone from the group must've poked their head out from backstage because suddenly there was this deafening roar from that small group of people (and I mean really, really loud...unreal) and a "MAIDEN! MAIDEN! MAIDEN!" chant broke out for a good minute or so.  Right at that point I knew the crowd was going to be outstanding...if just the glimpse of someone got that kind of response from just those people, the show itself was going to be insane.  And it was, but more on that later.

So we're sitting there and suddenly we notice people walking around wearing Chicago event shirts.  WTF?  So I asked the one guy, he said the one stand by the entrance we came in still had some so we headed back out there.  By the time we fought the crowd and got up there though, they were all gone.  Dammit.  They were completely badass shirts:

Front:

Back:

Ok, so now I'm bummed we didn't get one of those but screw it.  They had plenty of other badass shirts (which we got) so we go back to our seats and eventually the opening act comes out.  Lauren Harris.  Daughter of Maiden bassist Steve Harris.  She sings for a pop/metal band.  She has a good voice and works a crowd pretty well, but her band sucked.  And her music, while not offensive, is not my cup of tea.  But she had a killer body and was wearing these tight leather pants and a halter top (which she filled out quite well), and to quote my kid "At least she was good to look at".  The biggest response she got from us that night was when she announced she was playing her last song...then a huge roar came from the crowd.  Ouch.

So not long after that, the lights go out and Doctor Doctor begins to play on the PA.  Anyone who's seen Maiden knows thats the last song on the PA before they come out, and of course everyone was singing along with it.  So that song finishes, and the videoscreens on either side of the stage come to life with images of the band and their fans from earlier legs in the tour.  They were playing Transylvania with the video, which is a cool instrumental from Maiden's first album.  Then that stopped, and the sound of WW2 fighter/bombers echoed around the arena.  Amidst the roar of the engines and WW2 newsreel footage now playing on the screens, Winston Churchill began to defiantly state "We shall go on to the end...".  As he finished his speech with "We shall never surrender!" the band began the intro to Aces High, a song about the Battle of Britain.  Keep in mind the arena is still dark at this point, and the crowd is going apeshit.

As the intro ends and the song kicks up the tempo, pyro detonates and the band come racing on to the stage.  Good stuff.  And of course we're going nuts, and I'm split between trying to take pictures, enjoying the show, and enjoying watching my son going nuts.  Here's a video from youtube someone took at this particular concert of the moments leading up to what I just described.  Somewhere in that screaming, if you listen closely, you can hear me and my son.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgruOgIM-q4[/youtube]

There is plenty more to come on this, but this blog is long enough as it is.  I can hear MJ bitching already.