Iron Maiden - Dance Of Death World Tour 2003,
Glasgow SECC, Scotland, 8/12/03,
With Funeral For A Friend.

The anticipation at a Maiden concert is like no other's, and so Funeral For A Friend are brave to step out tonight in front of this sold-out arena populated by Maiden fans, young and old. It's just a pity they're an extremely boring, emo waste of time. 'Hits' roll by, including 'Bullet Theory' and 'She Drove Me To Daytime Television', but are often met by coins and chants of "MAIDEN, MAIDEN!", which, in the knowledge that the British heavy metal legends are in the building, is understandable.

Eventually, the lights dim and the crowd goes wild. No sooner had the opening bars of new single 'Wildest Dreams' filled the darkness than Dave, Janick, Adrian, Steve and Nicko ran on-stage, followed closely by vocalist Bruce Dickinson, who jumps a good six feet through the air as the others headbang, thrash their guitars about and bounce off the monitors. All within the first line.

However, it wasn't long before Bruce actually stopped the show to alert the audience that some people had fallen in the crowd, and ordered them to move to let them up.
"We want people to be going out of here happy. Not in body bags."

Once everyone was back on their feet and confirmed living, Maiden hit their stride again, blasting through an invincible set including 'Can I Play With Madness?', 'Fear Of The Dark', 'Rainmaker', 'Brave New World' and 'The Trooper', in which Bruce sported a Union Jack. Perhaps not the best idea in Glasgow.

One of the highlights of the show was when a huge puppet of Maiden's mascot Eddie emerged from the back of the stage, grinning evily and pointing as Bruce announced "Iron Maiden's gonna get you!" during the band's title song. It wasn't long before a smaller Eddie was back, marching around the stage and being attacked by the band members during the arguably definitive Maiden track, 'The Number Of The Beast'.

And so eventually the night comes to an end, and as the drum intro to timeless metal classic 'Run To The Hills' soars over the crowd, anarchy erupts one more time as Bruce leads everyone in a singalong, before thanking the audience and leading Maiden off-stage, living to fight another day.

Pure metal magic.