Where Eagles Dare ( Harris )
Revelations
( Bruce Dickinson )
Flight Of Icarus ( Smith - Dickinson
)
Die With Your Boots On
( Smith - Dickinson - Harris )
The Trooper
( Harris )
Still Life
( Murray - Harris )
Quest For Fire
( Harris )
Sun And Steel
( Dickinson - Smith )
To Tame A Land
( Harris )
Total Songs: 9
Total Time: 46:04
Produced and Mixed by Martin Birch
Recorded @ Compass Point, Nassau, Bahamas
Mixed @ Electric Lady Sound Studios, NY
Managed by Rod Smallwood and Andy Taylor
Sleeve Illustration by Derek Riggs
Interesting Facts:
* "Where Eagles Dare", underlying theme: Whatever is going on wrong in
the world, Clint
Eastwood will fix it (quote by Bruce Dickinson, Hannover,
Germany, 4/15/93). Also
taken from the movie of the same name, with Clint Eastwood
and Richard Burton.
The book is by Alistair MacLean. There's also a part
in here that supposed to sound like
a machine gun (an instrumental section), but it's not very
loud in the mix. This song was
done in only 2 takes. For the Piece Of Mind tour, this
used to be the opening song, putting
a good bit of pressure on Nicko, since he was still new to
the band.
* "Still Life" is about a guy who's drawn like a magnet to a pool of water,
sees his face in the
lake, has nightmares about it, and in the end jumps in and
takes his unfortunate girlfriend
with him. Might be inspired by Ramsey Campbell's "The
Inhabitant of The Lake."
* "Quest For Fire", inspired by the movie of the same name, is a little less
convincing than some of the other epics, although the vision it conjures
up
of dinosaurs and Racquel Welch wobbling about is pretty agreeable.
* "Sun And Steel" is a song about Miyamoto Musashi, a legendary Japanese Swordsman.
The lyrics make many references to Musashi's book "A Book Of
Five Rings." Musashi's first fight was at the age of 13, where
he
(untrained) supposedly beat his opponent, a samurai warrior, to death
with a stick. At the age of 16 he had his second fight, and he
killed
that guy, too. The line "Through Earth and Water, Fire and Wind,
you
came at last, Nothing was the end" is a reference to "A Book Of Five
Rings." Musashi also wrote his book in five sections (books):
Earth,
Water, Fire, Wind, and Void. "You make your cut by Fire and Stones,
take
you and your blade, break you both in two". The Fire and Stones
cut is a
movement that Musashi decribes in the aforementioned book. Also,
according
to the book "Kenjutsu: The Japanese Art of Swordsmanship" by Charles
Daniel, Musashi died of natural causes at the age of 61.
* "To Tame A Land" is based on the novel "Dune" by Frank Herbert. The
song was actually
originally titled "Dune," and Steve wanted to use a spoken
quotation from the book as the
intro. Out of courtesy they applied to Herbert's agent
for permission, and back the word
came from Herbert: "No. Because Frank Herbert doesn't
like rock bands, particularly
heavy rock bands, and especially rock bands like IRON MAIDEN."
Pretty narrow-minded
attitude if you ask me. Even though the band thought
it would be a good advertisement for
the book "Dune" and everything, Frank Herbert still said
no, and that *if* IRON MAIDEN
went through with it, then he'd sue them into next week,
etc. Fucken Slimy Bastard! :)