@ The Springhead 4 August 06

Having had both very good and very bad experiences of Tribute bands recently, I was a little in trepidation of going to see Ironon Maiden, although I had heard very good reports from some people who had been to see them last time at the Springhead..

Hailing From Leeds Iron On Maiden are:-

Matt Vocals (Bruce Dickinson)

Kev Bass (Steve Harris)

Simon Guitar (Dave Murray)

Pete Lead Guitar (Adrian Smith)

Dave Drums (Nicko McBrain)

Performing without a break for a full 2 and a quarter hours they totally rocked the Springhead playing a selection of songs from The original “Iron Maiden” Album, Killers, The number of the beast, Piece of mind, Powerslave, Somewhere in Time, Seventh son of a seventh son plus some others.

One of the highlights of the evening for me was the performance of Iron maidens newest song (not at this time yet released) the reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg which was really good, will be interesting to hear the “original” of it

Musically the band were very very good, the musicianship was spot on, with Simon and Pete sharing the honours of playing the lead parts equally, The backline of Kev on Bass and Dave on drums was also faultless but the frontman Matt has an amazing voice, not only sounding like Bruce Dickinson but with tremendous power and more than enough range for all of the songs.

Once again at the Springhead it was a bit of a disappointment that more people didn’t turn out to see an excellent band, seemingly the only rock tribute band to consistently sell out there are Livewire, when there are other tremendous tribute bands performing too.

However, Matt cajoled, teased and otherwise goaded the audience into joining in and singing along to

a lot of the songs, and I think that everyone there went away feeling very well entertained.

The band even brought along their own “Eddie”

(see pic left) at the end.

The major disappointment was not getting to hear them play The number of the beast and Run to the hills, due to time restraints, The band had planned on doing an encore of 3 songs with these greatest hits included, but as it had got to 11-30, Unfortunately they had to be missed off, The Springhead having to have the bands finished by this time.

Ironon Maiden are returning later in the year (3^rd of November) and have promised that those missing hits WILL be played.. those of you that missed the show this time, be sure not to miss them next time.. dodgy wigs and all!

Ironon Maidens website is www.iron-onmaiden.co.uk and can also be found on myspace

At www.myspace.com/irononmaidentribute