IRON MAIDEN Singer Discusses New Solo Album, Upcoming Solo DVD

Australia's The Metal Forge recently conducted an in-depth interview with IRON MAIDEN frontman Bruce Dickinson. Several excerpts from the interview follow:

On his new solo album, "Tyranny of Souls":

"I've actually been thinking of doing another solo release since the success of 'The Chemical Wedding' [1998]. I had quite a thriving solo career with about six albums behind me, so the intention was always to make another one, but it was just a question of getting it together in terms of time. Roy Z, my songwriting partner, producer and guitarist was busy doing the JUDAS PRIEST record ('Angel Of Retribution'),and before that he was doing Rob Halford's last solo album (2002's 'Crucible'). So he was only available when I was touring with IRON MAIDEN. I guess you could say that we were biding our time. I was getting up the necessary creative juices so I could commit myself to doing an album."

On whether the pressure to follow up the critically acclaimed "The Chemical Wedding" album contributed to the delay in releasing the new CD:

"There was definitely some pressure, for sure. For the first two to three years after 'The Chemical Wedding', I was quite happy to sit on the sidelines and say, 'Yeah, wasn't that a great album?' (Laughs) I did record a couple of new tracks for 2001's best-of compilation ('Broken' and 'Silver Wings' appeared on 'The Best of Bruce Dickinson'),and the intention at that time was that as soon as that was released, we would go in and record another solo album. But things conspired one with the other in terms of other commitments such as IRON MAIDEN and all kinds of other things, and it soon became obvious that it simply wasn't going to happen. We started thinking about doing a compilation DVD, and while we were putting that together, I suddenly saw this window of opportunity. So Roy Z and I wrote a bunch of songs, and immediately thought, 'Wow!' So we decided to grab the next two or three weeks we had together and made this album. Suddenly, everything changed. I then decided to put out this new album rather than put out any more stuff that had to do with the past, purely because I think it's going to severely influence the way people look at things from this point on."

On putting together a comprehensive double DVD package documenting his entire solo career:

"That's very much an ongoing project. Absolutely. I guess by the end of the year, or whenever the time is appropriate, we'll put out the DVD. The main reason why we chose to release 'Tyranny of Souls' before the DVD is because if you're given a choice to put something out that is new studio album-wise, you always go with that. That's what it's all about. Keeping things alive is by releasing new material. But the DVD itself is looking really cool, actually. It's very entertaining. In fact, I've just shot a video for 'Abduction', and there will be a few bloopers for that in the making of section. We'll be adding some more material to it before we put it out. It's going to be a complete works of all the concert footage, lots of bootleg footage, all the promotional video clips I had ever done, a documentary and the whole shooting match. I've got so much video stuff that I've done, and it's never been out. A lot of the promotional video clips weren't shown on MTV. I was busy beavering away at all kinds of mad things, most of which people have never seen. It's a really good thing to do, but it'll happen when all the fuss about the new album has died down and people are standing around asking, 'What's next?' Then we'll hit them with this! (Laughs)"

On the possibility of a solo tour:

“In about six weeks time I'm back on tour with IRON MAIDEN. That'll run through May, June, July, and right up until the end of August. We'll then have a bit of a break, and then start with the writing of a new IRON MAIDEN album. I guess it will depend on the reaction to the album, and the demand, but I won't rule out doing some gigs. I think the idea of touring to support the album will be long gone by the time I find the time. The album will have done everything that it was going to do by then. But, of course I did some shows a couple of years ago at some festivals in Europe, and we had a blast. We just went out and played a load of cool material. We just had a lot of fun! (Laughs)"

Read Bruce Dickinson's entire interview with The Metal Forge at this location.