(Rated this album with 8 out of 10) Reviewed by
Peter J Marcroft
from England
This album is unlike many other Maiden albums (with the exception of Brave New world) due to the fact that the band got heavily experimental and for the first time tried to use synthesisers. Was that a bad idea? Well I say no if you can produce an album as good as this! What is interesting is the way that the songs have a sci-fi feel to them. The opening song "Caught somewhere in time" sounds at the start like it has laser rifles firing all around! What I like about this album is the time concept and how not being able to die can drive you mad. For instance the song "Deja Vu" talks of how Eddie the time traveller has seen so many things so often he can no longer tell the difference between reality and fantasy. Another thing that makes me admire this album is the song length, like Powerslave before it this album stretches out to fifty minutes in total, even though there are only 8 songs on it! However these songs are seldom boring as they vary so much, "Alexander the great" can be fast enough to do some serious headbanging too and later be very calm and pick up again! The only song on here that I am not really keen on is "The loneliness of the long distance runner", while it is a long ambitious song I feel that it suffers from repitition. However seven out of eight songs means that roughly 94% of the album can be listened to over and over again. Can bands like Papa Roach, Linkin park and Limp Bizkit say that on their albums? No they can't! Reason enough to buy it, not Maiden's best but certainly worth the price as this is another cd that will stay in your collection for many years to come.
