Joker's Iron Maiden Mini-Tour Review

So, I did a Iron Maiden Mini-tour this year and it was freakin' awesome!!!! Got to meet new people, see old friends and had a GREAT time!!!!! The set list I saw was the following:

Wicker Man
Ghost Of The Navigator
Wrathchild
El Dorado
Dance Of Death (all shows except Pachendale was played instead in San Bernardino)
The Reincarnation Of Benjamin Breeg
These Colours Don't Run
Blood Brothers
Wildest Dreams
No More Lies
Brave New World
Fear Of The Dark
Iron Maiden

Encore:
The Number Of The Beast
Hallowed Be Thy Name
Running Free

To start the tour, my first stop was:

San Manuel Amphitheater
San Bernardino, CA
Sat Jun 19th, 2010

My first show of the tour! The trip started off great - originally, got a round trip flight for under $300 from Washington-Dulles to LAX on Virgin America (GREAT FREAKIN' AIRLINE!!!!!). It got even better as I was able to upgrade to first class for $130!!!!!!!! GREAT flight out (and back - upgraded on that one too!)

First hit Disneyland and Disney's California Adventure for some fun. The night before the show, hit the famous Rainbow on Sunset Strip for a night before fan club meet up. Great time!!!!

On Saturday, it was off to the pre show fan club meet and greet and then to the venue for Maiden - I had already seen the set list, so I knew what would be played. Dream Theater put on a GREAT show - the place was packed even for them! At the time Maiden was supposed to come on, Rod Smallwood (IM's manager) came on stage to say the band would be going on 30 minutes late because of the 5,000 people that hadn't been able to get into the venue yet!!!! Bruce said there was 25,000 + at the show. Capacity at the venue is something crazy like 65,000 (the place has a HUGE lawn). Maiden ripped through a GREAT set!!!! Show was awesome and I was very happy with the set list!!! The biggest difference between tha CA show and ones I have been to on the east coast was the shear amount of weed being smoked. I was getting sick of smelling it. But, was an AWESOME show!!!! I had seats for this one right next to the sound board and the mix was perfect!!!! - here a few pics:

Crowd shot:


The Venue - BEAUTIFUL location (and the site of the legendary US Festival)!!!!!


Next up was:

Sat July 3rd, 2010
Molson Amphitheater
Toronto, ON

Road trip for this one!!!!! Left on July 2nd with 2 friends (I drove) to first hit Niagara Falls (Canada side). I have never been there before, so was great to see! They also have a nice casino (Won 400 Canadian at Craps!!!!). Then, off to Toronto for the show!!!!! Got checked in and went over to the fan club meet up at a place called the Loose Moose. Then, off to the show!!!! Had to arrive early as I had won the Iron Maiden Fan Club First To The Barrier contest!!!! We ended up on the rail on Jannick's side. This show was even better than the CA show!!!!!!! The bonus, I caught one of Nicko's wrist bands (and my friends got a Nicko and a Steve wrist band!) Maiden was tight, the crowd was freakin awesome! This was another sold out show. The show had to end early, with Maiden done by 10PM because it was Canada week and there were fireworks at the location of the Amphitheater - what a great way to end a Maiden show but with fireworks!!! Here's the pics:

Niagara Falls:


Outside the meet up:


On the barrier with the road trip crew:


John Pertucci:


Jannick:


Bruce and Adrian:


Sold out crowd:


Dave playing a Les Paul (and posing for us on the rail taking pics!)


Eddie!!!!!


'Arry:


Wristbands:



Part two of the trip to follow soon........

Great review dude. Thx for sharing.

Excellent Pics!!!!!!!!!!!

manny wrote:

Excellent Pics!!!!!!!!!!!

Thx!!!!!! More to come!!!! Need to get The Warning review up first!!!!

Next on the Mini-Maiden tour was two days of Maiden in New Jersey and New York!!!!!!!

PNC Bank Arts Center
Holmdel, NJ
Sunday July 11, 2010

Sunday morning - on the road early to head up to New Jersey. First stop - the Holiday Inn in Hazlet, NJ to check in. After waiting in line with the other Maiden fans checking in for the night, grabbed some food and headed off to Fat Freddy's old hang out, the PNC Arts Center which was the next exit up on the Garden State Expressway. First stop - the parking lot for the IMFC's version of "Heavy Metal Parking Lot" for the Fan Club meet up. Good times where had by all - food, drink and music!!! Plus, Eddie payed a surprise visit:



OK, so it wasn't Maiden's Eddie, it was a buddy dressed in Maiden cover band Sanctuary's Eddie costume. It was cool non the less - lots of other people stopped by to get pics with Eddie.

Then, it was on to the show! Caught most of DT's set. They were spot on, as always. For this show, had seats as there is no GA PIT at the PNC (What's up with that Fat Freddy?)

Thankfully, paying for the fan club membership yields good seats!!!!!! Maiden put on ANOTHER great show! Once again, spot on by the band!!! This was another sold out show!! My only complaint is the sound at PNC - it reverberates as bad as an arena and it's outdoors!!! Who in the world thought it was a good idea to put a CONCRETE dome on an amphitheater? Well, just a minor complaint! Anyway, here some pics from the show:

Sold out crowd:



Davey:


Older "Shed" and the stage area is not that wide - you can tell from this shot:


Brave New World:


Hallowed Be They Name:


After the show, it was back to the hotel room for some much need sleep and to get ready for the big show the next day at MSG!!!!! More on MSG to come!!!!!

Awesome pics Joker! Thanks for sharing.It always amazes me how great Maiden sound live.

Killer pix and report, man. Wish I could've taken you up on your most generous (but unfortunately far too last minute) offer of a ticket to this one, but I had family stuff goin' on that day... See what I give up for the sake of family unity? Arrrgh!

thejokeriv wrote:

there is no GA PIT at the PNC (What's up with that Fat Freddy?)

Beats me. The best guess I can make is that the Center was built in the early 80s, not so long after the stampede @ a Who concert in Cincinnatti that killed a couple of people...that sorta put the damper on "general admission" at rock concerts for quite a few years...

thejokeriv wrote:

My only complaint is the sound at PNC - it reverberates as bad as an arena and it's outdoors!!! Who in the world thought it was a good idea to put a CONCRETE dome on an amphitheater?

Sometimes the sound there *does* have the effect of being at the bottom of a very large bowl, I will admit. Though I've been to a couple of shows there where the sound was really great (i.e. Queensryche in '95)... I guess it depends on the band and their sound guys...

Fat Freddy wrote:

Killer pix and report, man. Wish I could've taken you up on your most generous (but unfortunately far too last minute) offer of a ticket to this one, but I had family stuff goin' on that day... See what I give up for the sake of family unity? Arrrgh!

thejokeriv wrote:

there is no GA PIT at the PNC (What's up with that Fat Freddy?)

Beats me. The best guess I can make is that the Center was built in the early 80s, not so long after the stampede @ a Who concert in Cincinnatti that killed a couple of people...that sorta put the damper on "general admission" at rock concerts for quite a few years...

thejokeriv wrote:

My only complaint is the sound at PNC - it reverberates as bad as an arena and it's outdoors!!! Who in the world thought it was a good idea to put a CONCRETE dome on an amphitheater?

Sometimes the sound there *does* have the effect of being at the bottom of a very large bowl, I will admit. Though I've been to a couple of shows there where the sound was really great (i.e. Queensryche in '95)... I guess it depends on the band and their sound guys...

Wish you could have made it! O well......

Maiden;s sound was better than DT;s

By the way, correction - according to our good friends @Wikipedia, the PNC (formerly known as the Garden State Arts Center) was built in 1968, not the early 80s as I'd assumed (wow, it's older than I thought it was!) and it featured mainly classical performances for the first few years of its existence. That right there would explain the lack of a general admission/mosh pit section, I guess.

Fat Freddy wrote:

By the way, correction - according to our good friends @Wikipedia, the PNC (formerly known as the Garden State Arts Center) was built in 1968, not the early 80s as I'd assumed (wow, it's older than I thought it was!) and it featured mainly classical performances for the first few years of its existence. That right there would explain the lack of a general admission/mosh pit section, I guess.

Yep! And also why the stage area is so small! Of course, the other amphiteathers built around that time - like MErriweather Post Pavilion - where built of wood and sound FREAKIN AWESOME!!!!!!!