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''Iron Maiden'' is the debut studio album by the English heavy metal band Iron Maiden, released in April 1980. It was issued by EMI in the UK, and a few months later in North America, originally on Harvest/Capitol Records and subsequently Sanctuary Records/Columbia Records in the US. The North American version also included the song "Sanctuary", previously released in the UK as a non-album single. In 1998, along with the rest of the band's pre-1995 releases, ''Iron Maiden'' was remastered with "Sanctuary" added in all territories. It is the band's only album to feature guitarist Dennis Stratton. Although Iron Maiden have since criticised the quality of the album's production, the release was met with critical and commercial acclaim, debuting at No. 4 in the UK Albums Chart as well as achieving prominence for the band in mainland Europe. ==History== This was the band's only album produced by Will Malone, who Iron Maiden have since claimed lacked interest in the project and effectively left them to produce most of the album themselves, which, according to bassist Steve Harris, was completed in just 13 days. Recording took place at Kingsway Studios, west London in January 1980, with the band taking time out from the 1980 Metal for Muthas Tour to complete the final mixes at Morgan Studios, northwest London in February. Prior to the sessions with Malone, the band made two attempts in December 1979 with two different producers while still a four-piece. Guy Edwards, the first, was dismissed as the band were unhappy with the "muddy" quality in his production, while Andy Scott was sacked after insisting that Harris use a pick rather than his fingers. After these efforts, the band decided not to sack Malone as Steve Harris describes that they could "bypass him and () to the engineer." The group criticised the quality of the production, although many fans still prefer the raw quality of the sound recording.〔 Although AllMusic states that this style was "clearly drawing from elements of punk rock," Harris later stated that the band despised everything about punk. This was also the only studio album with guitarist Dennis Stratton, who, having been brought in as a last-minute placement, was sacked due to "musical differences" after the band's European tour in support of Kiss. Suspicions were first raised during ''Iron Maidens recording, when Stratton added Wishbone Ash-esque harmony guitars and backing vocals reminiscent of Queen to "Phantom of the Opera", of which the rest of the band immediately disapproved and had removed. Although Stratton states that he was not "trying to push the band in a new direction," Harris comments that it "really pointed up the difference between Den and us," after which he began to notice that "Dennis was so much more into playing stuff like "Strange World" than he was "Iron Maiden" or "Prowler", because it was more slow, melodic... when he was soloing on one of the heavier songs, it wasn't with quite the same passion." The 1998 remastered album differs from the original with the addition of the song "Sanctuary", which had then only been released as a single in the UK in May 1980, although it did also appear in the later US version of ''Iron Maiden'', which was issued in August 1980. The track originally appeared on the ''Metal for Muthas'' compilation, but was re-recorded during the ''Iron Maiden'' sessions. The re-release also features a different cover; a digital recreation by original artist Derek Riggs, with a portion of the original artwork instead being used on the disc itself. The band undertook the Iron Maiden Tour in support of the album, during which they played their first ever concerts in mainland Europe, where they were surprised to discover how successful ''Iron Maiden'' had been outside the UK, with Steve Harris commenting, "The prestige of doing so well in the UK had turned into a sort of word-of-mouth thing, and we'd turn up in places like Leiden, in Holland, places we'd never even heard of, and they'd have these massive banners waiting for us with "Iron Maiden Go Over The Top" written on them and all this. It was unreal." 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Iron Maiden (album)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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