Iron Maiden stormed the sold-out Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia on November 1st. Team DHA’s Nick Polis was there to witness and photograph one of the greatest metal acts of all time to tell you all about it. Here’s how the night went:
Kicking the night off was the Mongolian folk metal band The Hu. Every time I have seen Iron Maiden, they carefully pick an opening band that fits just right, and this time was no different. The Hu put on a performance that had the entire Wells Fargo Center rocking. Despite most of the lyrics being entirely in Mongolian, the crowd loved every second of the show, with most attendees already in their seats rather than buying merch, wandering about, or tailgating.
The Hu brought their signature blend of traditional Mongolian instruments and metal styles and came out hard. The band played selections from their two albums, The Gereg (2019) and Rumble of Thunder (2022), as well as two newer singles. They seem to know exactly what they need to do to get the crowd on their side, and that is usually to blast some epic folk metal the likes of which have yet to be replicated.
Next up was the one and only Iron Maiden. Before anything happening, the other photographers and I were given a briefing by a member of the band’s team that included opportunities for certain shots and assurance when Pyro would go off. While this may be a little bit of inside baseball, I must commend Iron Maiden and their team, as in the last 8 years that I have been doing this, nobody has taken the time to do that for the photographers. It showed that the band wants to make sure everyone can have an amazing experience, both fans and professionals.
And boy, did this professional fan have an experience. The place was filled with loud conversation, that is, until UFO’s “Doctor Doctor” started. As Iron Maiden’s signature pre-show song ended and the end title music from Blade Runner (1982) began, you could feel the energy in the room spike, almost like a change in air pressure. Out came Nicko to his drum set, out came Steve, Dave, Adrian, and Janick, and finally outsprinted Bruce to kick off the show with “Caught Somewhere in Time”.
The energy on display in the arena during “Caught Somewhere in Time” was astounding. Between Bruce running everywhere, the crowd going absolutely insane, and Janick being, well, Janick, the band showed early on that they were bringing some real power with them. This was further shown when the “Stranger in a Strange Land” Eddie came out for his song, just the second of the night. If Eddie was coming out only two songs in, then Maiden was going to be pulling out all of the stops.
As the night progressed, you could have told me every member of Iron Maiden was no older than 40 and I would have believed you. The only real indication they were older was their hair color, and even that doesn’t mean much in the grand scheme of things. The energy the band exhibited running around the massive stage would have put me in the hospital with a collapsed lung and shin splints.
One of the best parts of this tour is Iron Maiden’s focus on Somewhere in Time (1986) and Senjutsu (2021), as it allowed them to play both older, deeper cuts that rarely get played when all of the other hits need a slot, as well as newer songs that showed where the band is now. Every single time the band jumped back to a Somewhere in Time song, the crowd erupted as most of the album, especially the selections of the night, hadn’t been touched since the album’s release if at all. Despite many fans calling the older tracks their favorites, that didn’t mean the Senjutsu tracks didn’t also react, as the crowd was almost just as loud for each of them too.
Something that surprised me as well as several others in the crowd was the choice to, rather than include more hits in the set, opt for even more deep cuts to fill some of the other space on the set. A prime example was opting to include “The Prisoner” rather than the title track from The Number of the Beast (1982). There is not a soul who claims to enjoy music who hasn’t at least heard of “The Number of the Beast”. Yet the band took the risk of adding “The Prisoner” to the set, and let me tell you the Wells Fargo Center went ballistic when they heard the clip from the 1967 series The Prisoner say, “I am not a number, I am a free man.”
About halfway through the night, Bruce addressed the crowd, bringing with him a message of strength in keeping your culture and faith no matter the hardships. He talked about how “people are a******s and want to wipe other people out because they don’t like what color they are,” and countered the point with “The good thing about that is that it never works.” The last thing he gave the crowd was “if you have a language, a culture, a family, loyalty, you can’t wipe that out. They’ll be around forever my friends.” before launching into “Death of the Celts”.
Throughout the night, Iron Maiden decimated the Wells Fargo Center, and a key part was their stage design. They kept the general design that they had been working with since at least their Legacy of the Beast tours, with the two-layered stage with a mix of changing backdrops as well as inflatables. One thing I noticed that was different and exciting (at least for a production nerd like me) was the fact that for nearly every song they had a new backdrop, allowing each song to transport the fans into its theme. Another cool thing was the addition of small screens on the sides of the backdrops, allowing them to both hide the retracted ones, as well as make them come to life.
One cannot talk about Iron Maiden without bringing up Eddie. On top of making an early appearance, he came out for a laser fight with Bruce during “Heaven Can Wait” adding some pyrotechnics to the otherwise tame show effects-wise. Senjutsu Eddie also came out towards the end, getting into a spat this time with Janick for a change rather than targeting Bruce like he usually would.
As I was told earlier in the night by the band’s team member, there are more and more “young chaps” every year they come to the US, and throughout the night that was shown whenever there was a crowd shot on the screens. Just because they were younger didn’t mean they weren’t into the classics like the older heads were, because when the set began to wind down with “Fear of the Dark”, every single person in the arena went nuts. After a night full of deep cuts and newer tracks, getting the first real “hit” of the night was like seeing an old friend, and the crowd reacted as you’d expect, by expanding the single mosh pit in the middle into two separate ones on either side of the crowd.
The re-energized crowd didn’t even have a second to catch their breath, as the band’s eponymous track, and title track of their debut album, “Iron Maiden” picked up right after “Fear of the Dark”. The two pits grew, Bruce was running around in a leather jacket, and not a soul was sitting down. It was almost the highlight of the night for everyone. That would go to the encore, as after the fire-filled “Hell on Earth” came the one-two punch that made my night. I’m talking about “The Trooper” going into “Wasted Years”.
“The Trooper” gave Iron Maiden one final explosive pop from the crowd, as much like “The Number of the Beast” I doubt there are many out there who haven’t heard at least the riff for “The Trooper”. Ending the night with “Wasted Years”, the band had the crowd singing along one more time, as pictures of posters, passes, and art from the band’s history flashed on their screens. As the last few notes rang out, Bruce addressed us once more, telling us they’d be back, and ending the night with “you’re our buddies, the only ones we’ve got, we need ya. Good night.”
After the show, I took to the parking lots to make sure I wasn’t the only one who just experienced metal gold. First, I came upon the group of Guy, Ace, Zach, and Matt. When asked what their favorite part of the night was, they answered with “’ The Trooper’ for sure, man, because we’re old school…Trooper and hearing ‘Wasted Years’, that was f****n’ awesome!” Next, I ran into Kyle who had seen them six times and said they “sounded really good, especially for their age.” This sentiment was a common theme with everyone I talked to, the last of which was brothers Kevin and Chaz. Kevin, who had just seen them for the very first time told me “Absolutely. It was like I put a CD in the car. His voice was, he was like, dead on key. It was awesome, I loved it.” Chaz, who had traveled up from Florida to see his second Maiden show, agreed, going on to add that “His voice, in concert, is better than anybody else’s. Y’know, Axel Rose, Vince Neil, but this guy is just unbelievable.”
Iron Maiden rocked the Wells Fargo Center and has shown no sign of stopping, already having announced the EU and UK legs of their 50th anniversary Run For Your Lives world tour, celebrating the music from Iron Maiden (1980) to Fear of the Dark (1992).
Iron Maiden played a 15-song set that consisted of:
- Caught Somewhere in Time
- Stranger in a Strange Land
- The Writing on the Wall
- Days of Future Past
- The Time Machine
- The Prisoner
- Death of the Celts
- Can I Play With Madness
- Heaven Can Wait
- Alexander the Great
- Fear of the Dark
- Iron Maiden
- Hell on Earth
- The Trooper
- Wasted Years
Tour dates and more information about Iron Maiden can be found at ironmaiden.com.
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