BRUCE DICKINSON On IRON MAIDEN's European Tour: 'It's Completely Sold Out Everywhere'

British heavy metal legends IRON MAIDEN have shared a video update from the 2022 European leg of the "Legacy Of The Beast" tour. The four-minute clip, which can be seen below, features footage from the first half of the trek, along with interviews with all six bandmembers in which they discuss their return to the live stage for the first time in more than two years.

Bassist Steve Harris said: "Midway through the European leg — actually, it's more than midway; we've done more gigs than we've got left — it's been brilliant everywhere. Absolutely fantastic."

Added singer Bruce Dickinson: "Honestly, I've never seen so many people watching [laughs] six gentlemen on stage as I have on this tour. It's amazing. We're just in the middle of doing Germany at the moment, and it's completely sold out everywhere. It's unbelievable."

Prior to the "Legacy Of The Beast" kick-off concert on May 22 in Zagreb, Croatia, IRON MAIDEN hadn't performed live in two and a half years — since the completion of its South American tour in October 2019.

IRON MAIDEN's latest album, "Senjutsu" came out in September. It marked MAIDEN's second consecutive double album behind 2015's "The Book Of Souls" which is the longest MAIDEN album, with a running time of 92 minutes.

IRON MAIDEN's first album in six years, "Senjutsu" was recorded in 2019 in Paris with longstanding producer Kevin Shirley and co-produced by Harris. It features three tracks whose running time exceeds 10 minutes each.

For "Senjutsu" — loosely translated as "tactics and strategy" — the band once again enlisted the services of Mark Wilkinson to create the spectacular Samurai-themed cover artwork, based on an idea by Harris.

"Senjutsu" bowed at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 chart, charting higher than even the band's early classics like "Powerslave" and "The Number Of The Beast". Nearly 90 percent of the LP's 64,000 equivalent album units earned came from pure album sales. The critically acclaimed double album debuted one place higher than 2015's "The Book Of Souls" and 2010's "The Final Frontier", which both peaked at No. 4.

"Senjutsu" was MAIDEN's 13th album to top in the Top 40 in the U.S.

According to Billboard, "Senjutsu" logged the second-largest week of 2021 for a hard rock album in both equivalent album units earned and in traditional album sales.

"Senjutsu" topped the charts in several European countries upon its release, including in Belgium, Finland, Germany, Italy, Sweden and Switzerland.