Ex-IRON MAIDEN Singer BLAZE BAYLEY To Perform 'Run To The Hills' Live For First Time On 'Trinity' Tour

Former IRON MAIDEN singer Blaze Bayley has revealed that he will perform the band's classic song "Run To The Hills" live for the first time on the upcoming "Trinity" tour.

"Run To The Hills" was released as the first single from MAIDEN's third studio album, "The Number Of The Beast", in 1982. It was credited solely to the band's bassist, Steve Harris, although significant contributions were made by lead vocalist Bruce Dickinson, whom Bayley replaced more than twenty years ago.

Asked why he never performed "Run To The Hills" live with MAIDEN during his time with the band, Blaze told Jimmy Kay of Canada's The Metal Voice (see video below): "Well, I thought… What I thought was this really is Bruce's hallmark song, so on the first tour, I didn't think it would be a good idea — on the first tour — for me to do that song. [It had] nothing to do with the register [in which the original song was sung] or anything; just because people would have a direct comparison and go, 'That's Bruce's song and Blaze shouldn't be singing it.' So that's what I thought on the first tour. But then on the second tour, it just never came up. And I really like that song. I sang it a couple of times and I really enjoyed doing it, and it feels like a lost opportunity to me. So on the 'Trinity' tour, what I'll be doing is I'll be doing my own version of 'Run To The Hills', so I'm really excited about that and really, really looking forward to it. And it'll be the first time I've done it on a tour. I've sung it one or two times — literally just once or twice — before in public, but I'm really looking forward to doing it on the 'Trinity' tour every night. It was one of my favorite MAIDEN songs — one of the songs that got me into MAIDEN in those early years."

The 53-year-old Bayley, who was born in Birmingham, was the original frontman in WOLFSBANE, but left in 1994 to join MAIDEN, with whom he recorded two studio albums — 1995's "The X Factor" and 1998's "Virtual XI" — before Dickinson returned to the group.

Bayley told Canadian journalist Mitch Lafon that it feels rewarding to see fans finally acknowledging the quality of the material on "The X Factor" and "Virtual XI" albums. "Yeah, it is a really nice feeling when people come up and they weren't around… some of them weren't around at the time when those albums came out, and I have great comments," he said. And some people who are really honest and say, 'Well, I didn't like it at the time, and I've had no choice but to go back and listen to them, 'cause I had listened to everything else to death, and when I've gone back and listened to them without that kind of emotional attachment of 'my favorite singer has left my favorite band,' then it's been something that I've started to understand. I think those records, those CDs will stand the test of time, and I think they'll always have that deeper meaning. And I'm really happy about that. It's very nice to meet fans who come up and say, 'Well, it's still one of my favorite albums.'"

The "Trinity" tour will see Blaze sharing the stage every night with former QUEENSRŸCHE frontman Geoff Tate and ex-JUDAS PRIEST singer Tim "Ripper" Owens.

Bayley released his eighth solo album, "Infinite Entanglement", on March 1.