Listen with Nicko! Part X

Ah Ha! Ha! Ha! Haaaa! Maybe I can get out of here now! Oh, this is Nicko's "not a lot of people know that, number ten". When I finish this I can go home! Ahahaha! Ah oh, why do I want to go home? Oh I don't know, I've been in here so long, oh I'm stuck to the chair and all that kind of good stuff... And I've had so much fun mumbling on to you guys and telling you jokes and all that stuff, and this is the last one! Well at least I can go and have a bath. Hmmmmm, it's about that time of the year anyway. Hahahaha!

Well! You despicable heathenistic civilictic God knows what else... mumbling jumbling oooh big single buying public have got in your greasy sweaty horrible... oooh! How is your stereo still spinning around and that little needle bouncing up and down in all that grime? You have got 'The Clairvoyant', 'Prisoner', 'Heaven Can Wait', released the 7th of November 1988 chart position number six! Yes! And on the other side you've got 'Infinite Dreams', 'Killers', 'Still Life' – Harris and Murray wrote that song, debuted number twelve, got to number six again! My goodness! And that was released the 6th of November 1989! Oh, here, have you just noticed something... something a bit weird about that? Yeah, I don't know whether that Eddie's got anything to do with that Seventh Son business, but those were both released... those singles, within one year of each other to the day almost. Released 7th of November '88, Infinite Dreams released 6th of November '89. A bit strange and all that...

Well look at that! Let's go on, I don't really... I started getting tingles up the back, I don't like that. Dave? Oh, get out of here. Anyway, no. Hahaha! Gee, four top ten singles in a year to two years actually. By the time you lot are listening to this, which is February, I mean as we know Can I Play With Madness was released the 2nd of March '88 and we're at the sort of end of February. That's close to two years, innit? That's bloody good I think, considering we had a year off. I mean, God bless you lot out there, I mean, you know, to not actually have done anything in a year and we pulled out like a single, you know, Infinite Dreams... And by the way that was off the new Maiden England video which we shall talk about in a minute... you know, after a year you pushed it up to number six for us, and God bless you all, because that's nice to know that you ain't forgotten us. You know.

Anyway! 'The Clairvoyant', 'Prisoner'... all live renditions, my goodness, of the most severe kind! I should know, I was there, wasn't I? Sooty was there too, did you notice? Anyway, enough of him, stupid soddy bear, he doesn't know even how to talk or anything else, stupid git! Anyway! 'The Clairvoyant', 'Prisoner', and 'Heaven Can Wait' were recorded in front of you lot as I said I believe earlier on. If I didn't, as I said again on previous "not a lot of people knows that" f'kin' too f'kin' bad! A hundred and seven thousand of ya! Wooah! At Donington on August the 20th 1988, you f'kin' lucky people, you have not only got the live renditions, you were there, probably! And there was Kiss, David Lee Roth, all kinds of people. My goodness, what a great day. Anyway, those as I say were recorded and were a special little single release for you from us lot celebrating the 20th of August for us, because that was... I told you this, we got on stage 20 minutes early for that gig. We got a guy called Dicky Bell, my goodness the... Das Fuhrer Bell we called him because he's like Hitler – right arsehole! Anyway hah! He comes in the dressing room and he goes, "right you horrible lot, you musician slime, you scumbags, you sleazeballs, get on that stage now, it's time to do your show, you lazy bastards!" All that sort of stuff, right? "Oh good afternoon Dick, or good evening Dick..." you know, yes you are on the other side of me head... off we go. We were convinced that he'd actually come in the dressing room at Donington that evening and told us to get on stage. But he actually didn't. And we got on stage and he goes, "Oi! What the f'kin' hell are you lot doing up here? Piss off my stage, get up there when I tell ya!" We said, "Look! Rumour has it we're supposed to be doing a gig. Anyway you stupid prat, you told us to get up here." "No I f'kin' didn't!" he said. We said, "You f'kin' did!" He said "I f'kin' didn't!" Boof! Stuck us in the eyeballs! Take that for openers! "Look here Dick, why the hell we up here for if somebody didn't come around..." He said, "You fucking show him off to me, I'll have a word with him... tell my band to come up here when I ain't ready!" So, we get on stage, as I said. There we are, ten minutes early and we had ten minutes before we had to get, you know, actual showtime. So! 'Cause we get up there and get warmed up the various bits, twiddly old exercises, Steve checks his bass, all the boys and that out... and Bruce goes round the back and does the various gobbing in the old facial mask thing and all that, and ah ha! Oh we all do the bits, you know.

So we actually had an extra ten minutes on stage looking at you lot standing out there waiting for us lot to come up and do it, and so... ... "You nervous?" "No." "What was that? Loose floorboard?" "Somebody step on a duck?" "I dunno!" Cor! The air turned blue! We had all these film crews around there trying to film us, and they soon left, hahaha! They got out of there quick, they knew how to get out while the going was good, you know what I mean.

So what can I say man, what a fantastic experience! Something that will live with me for the rest of my life, no doubt about that. And, I mean we played like a cat on a tin roof, and we all thought it was a blazing gig. But we later found out and we thought the tape was running slow when we recorded it but nevertheless... enough said about that! Hahaha!

Mooooving on to 'Infinite Dreams', 'Killers', and 'Still Life'! Ohh God it's tormenting me! I'm sitting here, I'm strapping myself into this chair with the lead and cable from these headphones trying to restrain myself! My goodness! It was only a year ago that I played these songs for you with the band and all! I miss it so much! Oh gosh, it debuted at twelve and it got to number six, didn't it, not so many weeks ago! Released the 6th of November 1989, my gosh, one year to the day of The Clairvoyant's release. A bit uncanny, as I say.

Nevertheless! These three songs were taken from the band's gig at the NEC in Birmingham, which was recorded around I think November the 28th, 1988... and er... 27th I think it was... and the 28th, we did two gigs! Hah ha ho! So! What can I say? We listened... now actually Steve... let me say this, Steve directed and edited this here Maiden England video, and he set up all the camera angles and told the guys what he wanted, and it took six months to edit this piece of work, 90 minutes worth of music. And I've got to say this, he done the most stunning job I think I've ever seen, and I'm saying that... I'm saying that because... I didn't have to crawl to him because I did that last week, I've got a brown tongue and warm kneepads! Hahahah! No, serious piece of work! No, as you will agree with me, it is, isn't it? I mean, I haven't seen a music video that's so clear, so good, and well put together. It's really... I'm proud to have been on that, because it's f'kin' great. And we decided actually, when we heard the soundtrack we were really so tempted to release it as a live album again, cause it was really good and Martin recorded the band so well in that room, it was really nice. But we settled for taking a single off of it, because we thought, you know, it wasn't the right time to do another set, you know, a second live album. But you know, it means it's well... I guess for the fans without access to the video will have a souvenir of the '88 tour won't you? Because you can stick this lot on your f'kin' stereo, as long as it ain't screwed up with all the sticky horrible debauched singles you stuck on prior to this, as long as your stylus still bounces over the grooves and does all that good stuff it'll be alright won't it?

Hey, by the time you've got this lot in your hands, by the way, we shall have been in the studio working on a brand new album! Yes! Oooh, it's gonna be out later this year. And we may, or we may not, you never know, have another four top ten singles, thanks to you lot. And I'm going to work it out and say to them... say to you lot, it's about that time to wind this up. I mean, I've had such a great time speaking to you.... you... you lot! F'kin' hell! Oh dear, we'll have to do this again sometime, I'd like to. But I've got to say a few farewells to people. That's it! No, and... basically, say... thanking you lot... you greasy slugs! You... you grubby lucky little people! No I'm kidding, hahaha! Thanks for ten great fantastic Maidenesque years of boogalooing through the, you know, the lunchaloms of this business... getting up there and giving it all the good old heavy metal welly, which we need more of! Lots of big heavy metal wellies everywhere, squashing all that grief stuff, all that rap shit and all that good crap that's out there that that Bleedin Bojack Company play all the time and that fucking Mighty Tight Veg 'cause they haven't got a clue anymore have they? Anyway! Toodle-do to you lot! Thanks a lot to the guv'nor, 'Arry Harris, and Dave Murray, Adrian Smith and Bruce Dickinson, and the guv'nor Rod Smallwood, Andy Taylor, and all the boys... Tony Wiggins, Dick Bell, and everybody else who's involved, my drum tech especially, Gadsy! And EMI, for whom without them I wouldn't be here talking to you lot, mumbling and jumbling, and you wouldn't have had f'kin' half a dozen, seven or eight, f'kin' albums of the band, all that good stuff, to be mumbling jumbling and listening to. So, as I said... oh yeah, is it, no... I was going to tell you a joke, but I've decided I've run out of them, and they ain't very funny anyway, so bollocks! That's all I can say to that! And as I say, and as 'Arry Harris says, as he says it very well, "there's only one 'um, and that's fuck'um!" So, God bless ya, and I'll see ya... if I don't see you in the spring, as I said on one of the other "not alot of people know that", I'll see you in the mattress!