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Paul DiAnno: Live Review
By Aniruddh "Andrew" Bansal

February 17th 2010, Brixton South Bay, Redondo Beach CA: The doors opened at around 7.30 for the fans that had turned up for the show, only a handful at this time. It seemed to take forever to get the first band Ninth Circle on stage at close to 9 o' clock. They are a local melodic metal band who play this venue quite a lot, opening for some pretty well known bands. Their music was good and enjoyable to an extent, but I felt that people were getting a little bored with what they were seeing, every song sounding a lot similar to the next, and one guy next to me even said, 'if you caught them playing one song and missed the other seven, you didn't miss a thing'. I am not sure if I would completely agree with that, but considering the fact that everyone was here really to see only Paul DiAnno, a 40-odd minute set by this band wasn't all that well appreciated, which probably wasn't fair to them as they seemed to be capable musicians with some good music. But what really killed it was the drum solo, which was an 'Are you serious??' moment. Anyway, 'Living On The Sun' was their best song in my opinion.

    Here's their complete set list:
  1. World Burns Away
  2. Where No One Lives
  3. Living On The Sun
  4. The Power Of One
  5. Drum Solo
  6. The Quickening
  7. Frontman
  8. All Or Nothing

The next band took another half an hour to get started. But there were a few more people standing near the stage when Icarus Witch played their short set. They were pretty good I thought, having much more variety in the music as compared to the opening act. They have been regarded as one of the carriers of the New Wave Of Traditional Heavy Metal, and I can see why. They gave a good account of themselves by playing a few songs from their just released album 'Draw Down The Moon' and mixing those with some of the earlier stuff. The guitarist Quinn Lukas and bassist Jason Myers were specially impressive with their overall performance. Even though they got mixed reactions from this crowd, there is no wondering why this band got the gig touring as Paul DiAnno's backing band on this U.S tour.

    Here's their complete set list:
  1. Intro
  2. Nature Of The Beast
  3. Queen Of Lies
  4. Black Candles
  5. Serpent In The Garden
  6. The Ghost of Xavior Holmes
  7. Draw Down The Moon
  8. The Sky Is Falling
  9. Winds

It took another eternity after the end of Icarus Witch's set. I just didn't understand it this time, because the backing band was the same anyway and they didn't even have to do anything extra to set up the stage and equipment. Being on a Wednesday night as this was, everyone was getting annoyed by the unwanted break. But when we saw Paul DiAnno hitting the stage at around 11.30, everything was completely forgotten and forgiven by one and all. The fans went into a frenzy as they opened with the classic that never gets old, 'Wrathchild'! I've seen this song being played by Iron Maiden a couple of times, but to see it being performed by the original singer who recorded it, its just something that can only be experienced and can't be aptly described. From one classic to the next they went, belting out 'Prowler' next. I just couldn't believe it. I was rocking out one foot away from Paul DiAnno as he sang Iron Maiden songs.

But, playing Iron Maiden songs wasn't the only aim of their set. I actually enjoyed the next song 'Marshal Lokjaw' as much as the Maiden stuff. It was fast, heavy and DiAnno gave us his typical style of vocals on it. Next up was the rare gem 'Murders In The Rue Morgue'. I wouldn't expect Iron Maiden's current line-up to dust off this song on tour, so I was overly glad that I got to see it here tonight. They took a brief pause as Paul addressed the small, but appreciative crowd for the first time. He said, 'if you're here only for the Iron Maiden stuff, you should go home. This ain't a Maiden tribute show'. But in the end it pretty much turned out to be a tribute show. Not that anyone was complaining about it. Some of his non-Maiden songs consisted of the middle part of the set, songs like 'The Beast Arises', 'Children Of Madness' and 'Faith Healer'.

Things were about to get wild soon. 'Ides of March' served as a short intro before all the madness began. The next half an hour was legendary in the true sense. Personally it was a very emotional time for me. I was definitely overwhelmed when the song 'Killers' started. The otherwise peaceful and dare I say dull fans were gaining energy as this song went on, while I was getting drained out of it, head banging like I've done seldom before. I almost passed out, but the effect of music you really love and worship is often magical, as was the case with the following song 'Phantom Of The Opera', the most ultimate DiAnno era Maiden song which had me back up and singing along again.

I didn't like the fact that they quickened up the latter parts of that song. Another fun song 'Running Free' was next. The band went in and came back with the best encore any Iron Maiden fan could ever hope for, 'Transylvania' and 'Iron Maiden'. I don't know exactly why Paul took as long as 17 years to return to the U.S, or why he didn't have a more successful career after those two Iron Maiden albums, but I was sure happy to see him perform for the first time. This was a chance for hardcore Maiden fans to experience a throwback to the 'Jurassic' Iron Maiden period as Bruce Dickinson would call it. I also felt sad that even though its most likely his own fault, Paul is playing these ridiculously small shows while Iron Maiden are packing arenas and amphitheatres. As for the venue, I really hate the fact that they impose a '21+' restriction on a show like this, preventing younger kids from listening to some real music and resulting in quite a dull atmosphere, with the only energy coming from overly drunk middle aged people. Why can't they have it like the House Of Blues where the only time you need to be 21+ is if you buy an alcoholic drink?

Most people would argue that Paul is a shadow of this early 80s self in terms of his vocals and stage presence, but the die-hard Maiden fans, specially those who've never gotten to see him perform, would happily disagree. If ever there was an occasion to judge whether a person is a real Iron Maiden fan or not, this was it.

    Here's their complete set list:
  1. Wrathchild
  2. Prowler
  3. Marshal Lokjaw
  4. Murders In The Rue Morgue
  5. The Beast Arises
  6. Children of Madness
  7. Faith Healer
  8. A Song For You
  9. Ides Of March
  10. Killers
  11. Phantom Of The Opera
  12. Running Free
  13. Transylvania
  14. Iron Maiden
Check out the bands here:
Paul DiAnno
Icarus Witch
Ninth Circle

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