In a revealing new interview with Kerrang! magazine, longtime Iron Maiden drummer Nicko McBrain reflected extensively on the band’s divisive five-year run with vocalist Blaze Bayley. Following the departure of iconic frontman Bruce Dickinson in 1993, Blaze Bayley stepped in to front the heavy metal legends from 1994 to 1999. During his tenure, the band released two studio albums, The X Factor and Virtual XI, which experienced a noticeable drop in commercial sales and charted lower in the UK than any of the group’s releases since 1981’s Killers.
Looking back on that transitional period, the drummer spoke candidly about the challenges the band faced, while emphasizing his personal affection for the former singer.
“For Blaze to replace Bruce was very difficult,” Nicko McBrain told the publication. “Bruce was more soprano than baritone, which is what I think Blaze was, so there was an issue with the fans accepting him and we were playing the small theatres, and played some clubs in Florida. But here’s the thing: it never diminished the spirit of the band. Certain shows Blaze had a struggle with and fans kind of went, ‘Oh, this isn’t really Maiden at their finest,’ but we were still Maiden, we were just a different Maiden. The essence of the band hadn’t changed in the slightest.
He elaborated on their close personal bond behind the scenes, as well as the eventual realization that the lineup was no longer sustainable.
“With Blaze, I loved that guy,” Nicko continued. “I was a father figure to him, I said, ‘I’ll take you under my wing when we go out.’ We spent a lot of time together, and I loved him. At the end, I did have my trepidation, if you like, about some of the performances as we were going down the line into the ‘Virtual XI‘ tour, which is documented in the movie. But we never lost the essence of what Iron Maiden was, especially with Steve [Harris, Maiden bassist and founder] at the helm. Steve never wavered and was 125,000,000 percent supportive of Blaze, as we all were. But then cracks started to appear. It was looking like, ‘We’ve got to either change this or we aren’t going to survive.’ And then Bruce, obviously [returned] and we know the story of what happened.”
When Bruce Dickinson finally returned to the fold, Nicko McBrain admitted he still harbored anger over the singer’s initial exit. He confronted the returning frontman directly during their first reunion meeting.
“I knew I had to say something to him, because it’s how I felt,” Nicko confessed. “I felt betrayed by him, halfway through the ‘Fear Of The Dark‘ tour, announcing that he was leaving. I thought, ‘I’m gonna have to put this to bed with him.’ You know there were doubts as to his motives of coming back. But then, after that first meeting in Brighton, it was done. We were in the pub and I put my arm around him and said, ‘Look, mate, it’s great, I’m glad you’re back, but listen, I can’t change the way I feel and what I said about that. I love you, but that’s how I feel.’ He just turned around and said, ‘I wouldn’t have it any other way, Nicko, I love you too.’ And that’s the last we ever — to this day — spoke about it.”
The drummer, who converted to Christianity in 1999 following an experience he described as “a calling,” ultimately views the entire timeline of the band as part of a higher design.
“Well, it tells me the sincerity and the truth inside his heart. As I said, I needed to say that to Bruce because I wanted him to know everything wasn’t going to be, ‘Oh, yeah, you know what I said? Bollocks to that.’ It was something that was on my mind. I think it was all God’s plan — not Rod‘s [Smallwood, longtime Maiden manager] plan, bless him — because who could have planned it other than God saying, ‘Right, you’re going to get a new singer, then you’re going to get the old one back, and he’s going to bring Adrian [Smith, Iron Maiden guitarist] with him, and then you will make those records.’ We came out with Brave New World, which was the beginning of us going back into the mega stadium touring that put us back on the map. Bruce and Adrian coming back completed the band.”
While he was out of the band pursuing his solo career, Bruce Dickinson largely disconnected from the Iron Maiden camp. Speaking on the “Talk Is Jericho” podcast last October with Fozzy frontman Chris Jericho, the vocalist explained his mindset during the mid-1990s.
“No. [It’s not that] I didn’t have any interest in listening [to Maiden‘s Blaze-era albums]. I was just too busy doing my own stuff. So, it was kind of peripheral awareness, but in a way I was just, like, ‘This is none of my business. I’m not in the band anymore.’ And I wished Blaze well, ’cause when he joined the band, I thought, ‘Wow.’ ‘Cause his voice is very different to mine. I loved what he was doing in Wolfsbane. And I thought, ‘Well, this is… I hope it works out the right way.’ And sadly it didn’t. But I love Blaze. I think he’s a great character. There’s not a malicious bone in his body. He’s a great guy,” he said at the time.
However, he previously told the “Do You Know Jack?” radio show that he initially found the casting choice confusing given their vastly different vocal styles.
“I was delighted for Blaze, but there was a whole bunch of other really good singers out there,” he admitted. “I thought ‘Wow, they could have picked somebody with a voice that could do what my voice did.’ But they picked Blaze. Obviously, they picked somebody different, but that came with its own set of challenges. I just wondered whether anybody in the management was really giving anybody any serious words of truth on how hard this could be.”
Despite the differences in register, Bruce Dickinson willingly incorporated Blaze Bayley-era tracks into the live set upon his return. During a 2018 appearance on “Rock Talk With Mitch Lafon“, he explained his reasoning.
“Well, you know, life’s too short to go around chucking your ego around like that — it’s childish, it’s stupid. And, actually, some of those songs kind of worked [with my voice], some of them didn’t, but you know what? They were all songs which a lot of Iron Maiden fans bought, and some of them, in particular ‘The Clansman‘ and ‘Sign Of The Cross‘, I think we really nailed those songs and I thought it was great material. Blaze‘s voice, obviously, was quite different than mine — it was a slightly lower register — and, actually, I wasn’t complaining, ’cause I could use this kind of lower baritone tone and get quite kind of robust on it all. And I really enjoyed singing those songs.”
He added: “I had the utmost respect for Blaze, because he stepped into a situation that was extremely difficult for him. Because, manifestly, his voice was so different to mine and yet he had to try and sing some of those [older Iron Maiden] songs. He was in a difficult place. And he was a very, very nice guy, and still is a very nice guy, and I have a huge amount of respect for him.”
Founding bassist Steve Harris has continually defended the 1990s albums. Speaking to SiriusXM‘s “Trunk Nation With Eddie Trunk” in August 2019, he explained why keeping songs like “The Clansman” and “Sign Of The Cross” in the setlist remains important to him.
“We’re doing ‘The Clansman‘, which is from [1998’s] Virtual XI [album], and we’re doing ‘Sign Of The Cross‘, which is from [1995’s] The X Factor. We’ve done ’em before, anyway, with Bruce; he really likes those songs, so he was really happy to do ’em. And I’m not gonna complain, ’cause I’m happy with doing ’em songs. But I think it just mixes the set up a bit. I know that those albums are not as well known as some of the other albums, especially over here [in the U.S.], but they’re really good songs, and live, I think, they come into their own. So, yeah, it makes for an interesting set,” he explained.
Harris also noted that public perception of the records has slowly shifted over the decades.
“Oh, definitely. I said at the time that I thought a lot of people would, in the future, get into those albums a lot more and maybe understand ’em a bit more and give ’em more of a chance. And that’s what’s happening — loads of people are really enjoying those albums more now. I think there’s some really, really good songs on both those albums, and they stand out to me as most of our other albums. But it’s like anything — I think you need to hear the stuff a few times, and I think a lot of people couldn’t get past the fact that we had a different singer, and it was one of those things. But it was well received more in the rest of the world, really; the U.S. was a little bit more awkward. But I think a lot more people are finding that they’re giving it a second chance, if you like, and actually really enjoying ’em.”
Blaze Bayley shares a similar outlook. In an interview with Tony Webster on “The Metal Command“, the singer acknowledged that the dense production style of his debut with the band made it a challenging listen for some fans initially.
“Yeah, I think you’re right, Tony. I’m hearing this a lot. People look back and they go… Some fans go, ‘Of course I’ve got every Iron Maiden album, but the ones I haven’t listened to are [Blaze-era albums] The X Factor and Virtual XI. And now that’s all I can listen to that I haven’t listened to a hundred times. I have to listen to those. And it’s exactly what you say to me,” Bayley observed at the time.
“The X Factor‘s got some incredible music on it, but the sound of it is so dark, and the way it was produced, it’s not accessible like some of the other Maiden albums,” he continued. “You’ve gotta live with that for quite a few spins until you’re tuned into what things are doing. Then you can get to the music. I think that was maybe a problem with it at the time. It’s so dark and the sounds of things were quite different to what came before. People who did live with it, managed to find it. And it’s different cultures as well, different countries. In Sweden and Spain, those albums, people loved them as much as every other [Maiden] album. But in other places, people didn’t. It’s a different thing.”
