Extremely tough between Piece of Mind (which has some underrated songs like Die With Your Boots On and Still Life) and Powerslave.

However, other than Losfer Words I can't think of any filler in Powerslave, and the title track is amazing. I really liked Somewhere In Time and Seventh Son and in many cases they had the best riffs but I can't put them up against Powerslave. Their weakest album of the 80's is Killers, the title track is fantastic, as are several songs, but it's overrated compared to all the other gold they made in the 80's imo.

Still Life is better. Flash of the Blade is cool and all but Still Life is...well, Still Life!

Looking at it in that light makes a lot more difficult. I haven't been dissuaded from Killers but damn, Powerslave. The song I mean. That's my favourite Maiden track of all time. I'd take Powerslave over any song from Killers. However, save Aces High, I don't care for much from that album. ...it might have been five years since I've listened to it, though, so I'm making a point to refresh my memory tomorrow. I have a strong feeling that I'll still find the bulk of the songs unmemorable and unremarkable.

And having said that, definitely Still Life. Flash of the Blade is okay, but Still Life is one of my favourites. The build and release up the chorus is amazing.

Voted for NotB, haters gonna hate.

It was the first Maiden album I bought, and when I got it I just listened to it over and over and over again.

Voted for the debut.

seventh son here. I have an odd relationship with maiden - number of the beast was the first album of theirs i got, and i played the fucking thing to death for about 2 years before i got any more of their albums. spent a lot of time listening to powerslave and somewhere in time over the years - probably would've voted for powerslave a few years back - but i stopped listening to maiden in about 2009 (not for any real reason, just kinda got over them) and these days the only album of theirs that i can still enjoy is seventh son.

I chose Powerslave because it has this epic grandeur about it. Also, the album art is prime.

My favorite Iron maiden album is powerslave, though my all time favorite maiden song is hallow by thy name, the first maiden song i heard which got me hooked to the band, (still hooked) is fear of the dark, at the time thought it was the coolest thing i ever heard. Good thing i stared from there because while fear of the dark is a good album, because their 80's and 2000+ stuff and are way coolier and seemed more awesome when listening to them. Up the Irons. *head bangs*

Iron Priest..... And Maidenpriestmanic..... Fuck, we got a case of long lost siblings here!

I agree about the artwork, though everyone I've ever known that's seen it has sniggered about the stairs leading into Eddie's dickhole.

Damn, Powerslave is really in the lead right now!

I'm surprised at this. It is a killer album though. Powerslave for me.

Powerslave is an Oreo with a delicious and awesome cookie outside and a shit double stuf filling.

Wow all the Powerslave fanboys jumped in as soon as SS and SIT had it in a dead heat.

Fixed that for you.

Mmm yes, unfinished instrumentals, fencing songs and overlong filler!

So many people seem to mention PowerSlave's "consistency" as though it's understood, notably compared to
Piece of Mind, but to me, it's clearly the opposite. PoM is much more consistent, and flows perfectly as an "album as a whole", at the very least where its first, oh, SIX tracks are concerned. I almost never feel like spinning PowerSlave, the album. Instead, I regularly find myself craving for one of its highlights.

PoM goes:
1/ awesome
2/ awesome
3/ insanely awesome
4/ awesome
5/ brutally awesome
6/ incredibly awesome
7/ fine
8/ fine
9/ astoundingly awesome

PS goes:
1/ magically awesome
2/ pretty cool
3/ fine
4/ awesome
5/ fine
6/ fine
7/ violently awesome
8/ disturbingly awesome

Repeating something to death doesn't make it true, guys. PowerSlave is NOT that consistent. Deal with it.

You know, Steve Harris once said that every Maiden fans favorite album is "the first album they heard from Maiden" and I agree my 2 favorite all time albums are Somewhere in Time and Seventh Son. No two albums have ever made me smile and give me goose bumps everytime I listen to them. I use to play in a semi tribute band (we also did Judas Priest covers) and every time we played "Caught Somewhere in Time"...my hairs would raise thou to the crowd reactions. Un real!!

The first album I heard was Fear Of The Dark, so no.

My first Maiden album was The Number of the Beast, so I'm witn Inhumanist on this one.

@LegendMaker; LIES! BLATANT LIES! YOU ARE A LIAR, AND YOU KNOW IT!!!



But yeah man, can't agree with you regarding Powerslave.

I pretty much fully agree with LegendMaker actually; with only a few minor tweaks that's basically how I see those albums. I really enjoy them both, but Powerslave's appeal is more in the 'big' feel of the music, rather than some kind of consistency like PoM or Seventh Son or even SiT. The thing with Powerslave for me is that it just feels so grandiose and big, and really shows that they were on top of the world, which others have stated.

^ Fully agreed. Powerslave is fun because of the scope of the album. The songs themselves aren't the most stellar, particularly everyone's favorite Maiden finale track. That song is way too long and to me is mostly boring. SIT did everything better while creating an even bigger feel. No fillers, either.

But for me Emp, it's actually both; Powerslave is indeed a grandiose, epic album, but I think that it's also a very complete, well structured piece that can easily be listened to from start to finish, while Piece of Mind is the album that is more focused on individual highlights. I think we're all simply gonna have to agree to disagree regarding this particular point.

I think LegendMaker is pretty much correct song for song in his analysis there. Only disagreements I have are that 2 Minutes to Midnight is better than just pretty cool and Back in the Village comes short of being fine. It sucks. Otherwise, spot on. I went with Piece of Mind, though I might have just as well picked the s/t, Killers or Powerslave.

I'm not sure I quite understand the Losfer Woods dislikes. It isn't quite as epic as Ides of March, but those riffs are catchy as hell and the structure is a lot of fun.

@Xlxlx: My pants are on fire.
Seriously though, I agree to disagree with you on that point, dude. We clearly have opposite perspectives regarding those two albums, but hey! that's fine. They're both great.

@Necessitarian (and Empyreal): Thanks! There is a similar difference between the debut and Killers, I'd say, with the former having more of a "compilation" feel to it whereas the latter flows really, really well. Other albums are just as or maybe even a little more consistent than PoM, you're right, Emp. Seventh Son would be a perfectly complete and balanced masterpiece if it weren't for the track you know. Necessitarian, we seem to have the same four favorite Maiden albums, which is pretty rare (I think the Maiden/Killers/PoM/PS Über Alles Club now counts a total of three members, with us and Abominatrix!).



That's a good one, man. Most people even among the most dedicated SiT fans will fiercely disagree with you on that one, I think.


Not in my case either. The very first Maiden album I was exposed to was TNotB, and that's my second least favorite one among all their classic-era albums. Also, I think, no, I hope that this statement's wrongness must be reversely proportional to the age of the fan. There are more and more people out there whose very first taste of Maiden were singles from the 90s and beyond, you know.


Come on, man, you like it so much you unknowingly make fun of its title? It's a fine track, that's the best I can do it for, sorry.

To me it has potential, but feels unfinished. It just sort of ends. I think it could be a killer 4 minute (or so) song.

It seems funny to me that many consider the middle portion of Powerslave to be weaker than the rest of the album. To me, "Flash of the Blade" and "The Duellists" absolutely bitchslap anything on the rest of the record into submission, and I like every song on that album. When I revisit any Maiden album these days it's rarely for the full duration, but I always find myself coming back to those the most.

Also, "Sea of Madness" is easily my favorite on Sit and "Still Life" probably takes the crown on PoM. So yeah, I tend to love the somewhat overlooked Maiden tracks.

My favorite Maiden album is always changing... A year ago I thought that Seventh Son was a watered down pop metal album (albeit a very good watered down pop metal album) but at the moment its probably been my favorite. It does seem less complex than SIT, but no more so than any other 80's Maiden album. The songs manage to be both extremely catchy and fun to listen to while also having that unique mystical atmosphere to them.


Only The Good Die Young is the song that got me hooked on Maiden, so he's right int his case.

People keep using that word for 80's Maiden...



...I do not think it means what they think it means.

Hard choice, even though I haven't listened to much Maiden in recent years...
I ended up choosing POM, perhaps because I am partly biased towards it.

That was my first Maiden album, though, so it's hard for me to choose something else. Most of my "Maiden memories" are built around it.
Not every song on the album is my favorite, but then several of them are... and, to be honest, that's how most Maiden albums are for me: They usually have at least a few really, really good songs, and at least one or two I could take or leave entirely.



Haha! Yeah, it is! That is my least favorite song on the record, even though I chose POM.

PS: Oh, shit... thread's got me listening to Iron Maiden again, haha. It's a good thing.
Listening to NotB right now, and I remember now how much I love The Prisoner... it's def. not my favorite album as a whole, but it's still got plenty of great songs (yes, even Invayyyyduhhhhs). The Prisoner has got to be my favorite on the record though.

No way. Single tracks aside I started exploring Iron Maiden by getting Fear of the Dark, the title track being the best Maiden song I had heard. That boring, overly drawn out snoozefest turned me off from exploring more Iron Maiden for quite a while. I was expecting fun, fast, guns blazing kind of heavy metal, and I got that embarrassing drivel like "Afraid To Shoot Strangers". Nowadays I think "Be Quick or Be Dead" is pretty good, but back then I had gotten tired of hearing it in Carmageddon II.

Can it! That's a good song.

When I first heard it, I couldn't believe it was Iron Maiden.

Fear of the Dark overall was a disappointment to me, but The Fugitive, Judas Be My Guide and Childhoods End save it from being very mediocre.

No arguing that, it's certainly a rather singular song in their discography. But not a bad one to me. Not necessarily a great one either, but, you know, a good one.

After a long hiatus I managed to remember my password right on time to contribute to this great thread!

Maiden had a fantastic and probably unparalleled run in the 80s, by continuously releasing timeless classic albums, a masterwork doubled by their relentless touring around the globe.

Although I somehow equally value Piece of Mind, Powerslave, Somewhere in Time and Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, for the purpose of this thread I’d go with the latter, both from a nostalgic and musical point of view.

Seventh Son of a Seventh Son not only marks the end of Maiden’s golden era, but in my book represents also their peak in terms of the ability to conjure the feeling of power, fantasy and emotion through a grandiose display of musical sheer brilliancy. It seems like the other six albums lead up to this masterpiece of gargantuan proportions, beautifully layered and exquisitely executed, summing up all the reasons for which this band has been loved: deeply, thought provoking lyrics, abrupt, stop on a dime transition between riffs, time changes and interludes, gorgeous melodic leads and harmonized melodies and the ability to transport the listener to other dimensions through music. For a diehard fan like me, it feels like it was indeed conceived to be their swan song in terms of classic material, a thought which always gave me a sense of sadness.

Thus being said, I feel the urge to address some keys points with respect to this poll.
1. Production value aside, although I view it musically as a more cohesive material than the debut, Killers doesn’t have the former’s classy highlights (Remember Tomorrow or Phantom of the Opera, to name a few) is, after all, a (great) collection of leftovers of the s/t. I have certainly never understood why it gets so much praise amongst the metal community.

2. The Number of the Beast is a bit overrated, especially in the Maiden catalogue, but calling it “poppy” is embarrassingly ridiculous. Apart from the immortal Hallowed Be Thy Name, The Prisoner (what a gorgeous melody in the bridge and such a fantastic fast melodic solo from Smith), Children of the Damned and 22, Acacia Avenue are all long forgotten gems that should have been played live a lot more often than the ridiculously overplayed and overrated title track and Run to the Hills.

3. I am surprised that Piece of Mind got so fewer votes, as all of the nine tracks are splendid, powerful melodic metal, the album abounding in pieces featuring intricate arrangements.

4. Powerslave is at least as consistent as its antecessor, with the four tracks in the middle being the bare bones of the album around which the gems are constructed. Losfer Words is an extremely catchy instrumental with progressive touches, Flash of the Blade, apart from its crushing simple intro, it has a beautifully bridge full of melodic galore whereas multiple guitars and the bass play sweet different melodies harmonizing near the end, The Duelists (probably my favourite track of the album) has a jaw dropping instrumental section (again, there’s more than 2 guitars on this part), with Smith’s solo leading into one of the most amazing and ear pleasing harmonized melody I have ever heard and Back in the Village features a very energetic and speedy main riff combined with subtle tasteful melodies popping up in the bridge.

5. Somewhere in Time was ahead of its time and it’s definitely an inspiration for later Euro power metal. The musicianship is superb, plenty of themes that come and go especially in the long titles (Caught Somewhere in Time, The Loneliness of the Long Distance and Alexander the Great), fantastic solos and melodies throughout. I thus invite the haters to check Autothrall’s review of the record on this very web site .

Last but not least, I truly believe that, with every album that followed the self titled debut, Maiden managed to surpass its predecessor(s).

Bring on the flamming!

P.S. LegendMaker, great to see you alive and kicking, as always! 

Thanks. Nice having you back. A Maiden poll, and voilà; no mystery there.

Re: Killers, Maiden had more than two albums worth of material when they got signed, the vast majority of which was awesome. It's not like Steve rush-composed a ton of material of varying quality overnight to populate their debut with, and later reluctantly resorted to using the embarrassing rejects from that session for the second album because he was fresh out of inspiration by then (that would be closer to the TNotB situation, me thinks). I think for the debut they (not just the band but also the producer and label) tried to select the most instantly gratifying songs, those that were the most popular in their live set then, or what they then thought were the best ones. Two solid thirds of the album is gold, that's for sure. But 'Killers', besides working greatly as a whole, is also jam-packed with incredibly awesome, personal-sounding, often complex songs. True, the monster that is the title track eclipses all the others, but tracks like "Ghengis Kahn", "Another Life", "Innocent Exile"... hell, every song but "Prodigal Son" is brilliant (and that one is not bad, just... a ballad, too long, and out of sync with the rest of the album). What I don't get how is how it's not getting more praise.

I'm beginning to wonder if there's a significant amount of voters who haven't even heard the debut.

Seriously, last place? MA has disappointed me greatly.