IRON MAIDEN Tour Poster Banned In Lithuania For Being Too Scary For Kids

According to Newsweek, a poster advertising IRON MAIDEN's upcoming concert in Lithuania has been banned by the Baltic country's authorities because the band's Eddie mascot may frighten little kids.

A Lithuanian spokesman for concert promotion agency Live Nation told local news site Delfi that authorities had expressed concern at the effect the poster — which features Eddie with glowing red eyes, wearing white tribal paint and holding a heart in one hand and a bloodied knife in the other — might have on children and ordered all posters be taken down immediately.

Vytautas Paukštė told Delfi: "Right now, we have to decide how to carry on forward, but we must also immediately take down the posters."

IRON MAIDEN is scheduled to perform at Kaunas's 18,000-capacity Žalgiris Arena on June 23.

This is not the first time an image used in the marketing campaign for MAIDEN's current tour and album, "The Book Of Souls", has been deemed unsuitable for children.

Germany's Stern reported last September that a billboard promoting "The Book Of Souls" in the Kreuzberg district of Berlin was covered by a mob of concerned parents who apparently claimed the image had no business being there due to the school and kindergarten near its location.

The artwork for "The Book Of Souls" album and tour was created by Mark Wilkinson, whose previous works for IRON MAIDEN include "Live At Donington" (1998 remastered version) and "Best Of The 'B' Sides" (2002 compilation). According to MAIDEN bassist Steve Harris, the album cover art ties in with the title track, as the depiction of the band's mascot, Eddie, is based on the Maya civilization, who "believe that souls live on [after death]".

To check the accuracy of the artwork, the band hired Mayanist scholar Simon Martin, who also translated the song titles into hieroglyphs. According to Martin, although the civilization had no Book Of Souls, "the Mayans are very big on souls ... So as a title, it's appropriate to Mayan culture, but it's very much IRON MAIDEN's own thing."

Released globally last September through Parlophone Records (Sanctuary Copyrights/BMG in the U.S.),"The Book Of Souls" was recorded in Paris, France with producer Kevin "Caveman" Shirley in late 2014, with the finishing touches added last year.