Iron Maiden and the new wave of British Heavy Metal

Sexy Intellectual
2008

This documentary introduces the roots and origins in metal and then tells the story of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal from it’s start around the mid-1970’s up until around 1981. They rely largely on interviews with journalists, various insiders and musicians including former Iron Maiden members Paul Di’anno and Dennis Stratton, Brian Tatler of Diamdhead, Rob Weir of Tygers of Pan Tang and others from the scene. As the title indicates Iron Maiden get more focus than the other bands so you get a great deal of early history on the band plus various opinions on why the band was able to succeed. There is also a decent amount of time spent talking about other scene leaders Def Leppard and Saxon as well as second tier bands Tygers of Pan Tang, Samson, Diamond Head, Girlschool and Praying Mantis. There are a number of parts of live clips and stills shown in the film as well. What I liked about the film was that they allowed the participants to tell their stories and give their views no matter what instead of using clips to give one particular view. I like how they tied in the punk rock scene early on and some of the people interviewed expressed the theory that the punk rock scene may have delayed the NWOBHM scene but that it also empowered those bands because they saw the punk rock bands using a DIY style of promotion and followed that example. I also felt that most of the people here were honest and it was refreshing to hear views that it was a movement like any others in that there were good bands and there were second rate acts as well. Now it still didn’t help me to understand why people in the UK didn’t accept High –N- Dry or Pyromania, but they embraced Hysteria, but I guess that’s a question for another day. However being that I am from the states I enjoyed the views of this scene from people who lived in the area at the time. I have long realized the importance of this scene, but not having lived there I never thought of the community aspect of the movement at least during the early years. They didn’t cover some bands I love such as Raven and Venom, but perhaps it helped the film to be more concise by just focusing on a few bands. The only real downside is that is clocks in at two hours and thirty seven minutes which is fairly long for a music film with just a very limited amount of music. If you love the topic then you may easily sit through the whole thing, but others might have to take it over the course of a little at a time.