Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Artist: Iron Maiden
Label: EMI Records
Release: 1988
Length: 43:51
Rating: 5/5
In 1988 Iron Maiden were sitting at the artistic and commercial peak of their career, which came as no surprise to anyone who had followed them since the early eighties, when, after the arrival of vocal thunderer Bruce Dickinson, they quickly became one of the leading heavy metal bands of their day. 1988 was a huge year for the band: Iron Maiden headlined and ‘conquered’ the prestigious Monsters of Rock festival at Donington, and just before that they dropped the cult album »Seventh Son Of a Seventh Son«, to this day their only concept project and one of the most ambitious achievements of their entire career, one that took them (once again) beyond the confines of traditional heavy metal and (especially on the title masterpiece) had them flirting with some symphonic prog rock influences.
Bassist and band leader Steve Harris drew the inspiration for the esoteric concept running through the lyrics of »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son« from a book and the folk tale of the Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, an exceptional individual endowed with supernatural gifts, clairvoyance among them. The prophecy hanging over his birth held a burning riddle: once he reached adulthood, would this miracle child use his extraordinary talents for good or for evil, and with that choice ultimately seal the fate of humanity? True to the concept, Eddie in his new incarnation, shown on Derek Riggs’ excellent cover, has gone through a fantastic metamorphosis from the cyborg of the futuristic »Somewhere In Time« (1986) into the seventh son of a seventh son, who was reincarnated once more amid Antarctic glaciers and frozen images of his dark past.
Unlike the phenomenal but often criminally overlooked »Somewhere In Time«, which featured a brilliant use of guitar and bass synthesizers, Iron Maiden decided that on »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son« they would finally use real synthesizers, giving the symphonic arrangements a much more ‘organic’ sound, even though their earlier experiment with guitar synths had been the most successful one on the metal scene of the time (especially compared to Judas Priest and their »Turbo« (1986) album). Still, Harris’s hugely ambitious vision for the sound of »Seventh Son« demanded an even grander, more epic production with a whiff of mysticism if Iron Maiden were to pull off the concept of the miracle clairvoyant.
The legendary bassist has always been a big prog rock fan and once even said he ended up in metal only because he wasn’t technically good enough to play prog, so for years he’d been itching to steer Iron Maiden, at least for a while, into waters more complex in arrangement and rhythm, which was also their logical sonic evolution. The first hints of more complex arranging ventures could already be heard on some tracks from earlier albums, especially the masterpieces »Powerslave« (1984) and »Somewhere In Time«, but »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son« was the album with which Iron Maiden left the biggest mark on the emergence and development of progressive metal.
The rest of the band liked the idea of a new, conceptual direction too, which means that even singer Bruce Dickinson, who didn’t contribute a single songwriting credit on »Somewhere In Time«, was back and collaborating very successfully with Harris and guitarist Adrian Smith on some of the album’s catchiest numbers. »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son« isn’t a fully conceptual album, since not all the ideas link up properly, something some band members, led by esoterica buff Dickinson, still regret today, but amid all that prevailing mystical atmosphere it hardly matters.
Most of the lyrics touch on the usual Iron Maiden themes, namely the eternal conflict between good and evil, heaven and hell, with a pinch of esoterica thrown in. All the compositions on the album were built around the title track, which forms the epic peak, while the record also holds three hugely successful singles, headed by the big hit »Can I Play With Madness«, which have long since become part and parcel of the metal community’s folklore. In fact, most of the tracks on the album, including the opening anthem »Moonchild«, reportedly inspired by the novel of the same name by the infamous Aleister Crowley, rank among Iron Maiden’s long-standing classics.
The conceptual nature of the most melancholic and mystical album in Iron Maiden’s career so far is also underlined by the opening and closing verses, with an acoustic arrangement delivering a mysterious and dark prophecy. The energy catalyst »Infinite Dreams«, crowned with a philosophical-mystical lyric, grows more punchy from second to second after the opening guitar solo-fest. Because of its demanding vocal performance, compared to the other singles from the album, it never became a regular live staple, but it’s easily one of the best compositions here, with plenty of unexpected twists, tasteful guitar harmonies and a mighty chorus.
The aforementioned »Can I Play With Madness«, the album’s best-known track and a big hit, comes with a cheerful chorus that lodges itself in your ears in no time, so it’s no surprise it did so well. Also because, from an arranging standpoint, it offers a fairly simple and direct listening experience compared to most of the other »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son« cuts. And of course, let’s not forget the unforgettable video starring the late Monty Python comedian Graham Chapman. »The Evil That Men Do«, draped in melancholic guitar passages and dealing with the age-old fact of human wickedness, was one of the better »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son« tracks at the time of release, but over the years, thanks to being played live far too often, it has lost a hefty chunk of its original atmospheric charm.
The best and most ambitious piece on »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son« is the epic title-track masterpiece, with its distinctly melancholic-dramatic mood, where, amid varied use of keyboards, heaping gallons of dramatic guitar harmonies and unusual time changes that bring various dark, folkloric images to life, it makes a short excursion into symphonic progressive rock, powered by metal, of course. Dickinson’s vocal performance is a chapter in itself, conjuring up an esoteric ambience in his typical thunderous way, and there’s even a short narrative passage just before the climax of this mighty epic. Iron Maiden later repeated the successful recipe of epic synth use on »No Prayer For the Dying« (1990) with the gem »Mother Russia«, which has a similar melodramatic atmosphere thanks to the synths and gloomy visions of mystical figures in the middle of the Siberian tundra. On the somewhat overlooked melancholic treat »The Prophecy«, which boasts a triumphant chorus and an excellent Celtic-troubadour ending, guitarist Dave Murray left his songwriting mark alongside Harris.
Another famous single, »The Clairvoyant«, is, alongside »Moonchild« and the title track, a central conceptual piece of »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son«, reportedly inspired by the death of an (alleged) clairvoyant, and then fitting perfectly with the concept of the clairvoyant seventh son of a seventh son. The opening bass solo is followed by a mighty shift into an epic section, with Dickinson at the peak of his vocal powers, guitar harmonies in thirds and merciless drum fills courtesy of ‘good old’ Nicko McBrain. The often overlooked anthem »Only the Good Die Young« delivers an epic closer to the album in the best Iron Maiden tradition, with Dickinson in phenomenal form while both guitarists once again go properly ‘gunslinger’ on each other. It also contains one of the best lyrics of their entire career, applauding the sad but all too often true fact that decent folks mostly die young, while scoundrels often live to a ripe old age, unless they happen to kill themselves, of course.
The prog-leaning masterpiece »Seventh Son of a Seventh Son« was the grand finale of the epic trilogy of Iron Maiden albums kicked off by »Powerslave« and »Somewhere in Time«, a successor every bit as good as its two triumphant predecessors, with keyboards giving individual songs a whole new dimension. The Iron Maiden lineup between 1983 and 1988 is still rightly considered their most beloved, and at the end of the eighties they were truly at the top of their game. Keeping up the level of quality Iron Maiden delivered through the eighties was, of course, brutally hard, and after Smith’s departure in 1989, a logical consequence of the rest of the band not wanting to continue the ambitious sonic evolution of the time, things slowly started sliding downhill artistically for a while. Even so, in the ‘difficult’ nineties, when their popularity melted away fast in favor of the ‘brutal-depressive’ metal/rock wave from America, they never made a truly bad album (»The X Factor« from 1995 is even one of their most overlooked achievements).
Lineup
Bruce Dickinson – vocals
Steve Harris – bass guitar, bass synthesizer
Dave Murray – guitar
Adrian Smith – guitar, synthesizer
Nicko McBrain – drums, percussion
Production
Martin Birch
Track list
1. Moonchild (5:38)
2. Infinite Dreams (6:08)
3. Can I Play With Madness (3:30)
4. The Evil That Men Do (4:33)
5. Seventh Son of a Seventh Son (9:52)
6. The Prophecy (5:04)
7. The Clairvoyant (4:26)
8. Only the Good Die Young (4:40)
