I may have intimated at various points over our past thirty year journey that I was a big metal fan in my early teens. Lest any ambiguity remain at this point, let me clarify - I WAS A BIG METAL FAN IN MY EARLY TEENS. And why not - the early eighties were a golden era for the genre; the 'New Wave Of British Heavy Metal' was in full swing and, apart from giving voice to a new breed, it provided a medium for a crew of disparate, older guitar acts to tap into for a well deserved late day pay day. Whitesnake, Saxon, AC/DC, Rainbow, Black Sabbath, Judas Priest, Kiss, Scorpions, Motorhead, Venom - all were united under a single banner woven from denim and leather.Yet despite its popularity, us metaller's were still looked on as outsiders, a vaguely troubling subgroup that stood a breed apart from the more media friendly new romantics and their kin. Media? HA! The media didn't have much truck with metal - Tommy Vance's Friday radio show, the odd Top Of The Pops appearance and that was your lot. In fact, one of the highlights of those years was a 1980 episode of TOTP that had Saxon miming to 'Wheels Of Steel' and Judas Priest miming to 'Living After Midnight'. And all in the space of twenty minutes. Such events did not come round too often.
To the above list of bands you can add Iron Maiden. The archetypical NWOBHM act, Maiden's first two albums were a permanent fixture on my stereo. Still are really; loud and raw, they mixed the aggression of punk with the live free, us against the world ethos of metal with an added political edge all to rare in this field (Margaret Thatcher appeared on the sleeve of two of their singles, and don't forget who Eddie was meant to be burying that axe into on the 'Killers' cover'). Yes they were ridiculous, but there was enough danger about their songs about murderers and rapists and the tough nut frontman who sang them that suggested you'd best not say it to their faces. Golden years indeed, but they didn't last. 1982's 'The Number Of The Beast' might have taken the band global, but it walked a fine line with me and by the time of its 1983 follow up 'Piece Of Mind', Metallica and Anthrax had arrived and I lost interest completely in their 'new found niche of casting 'Boy's Own' tales in workaday prog metal.
And yet that did not mean I didn't glean tremendous satisfaction from seeing 'Bring Your Daughter....To The Slaughter' take the first number one spot of 1991. Rock songs in pole position are rarity enough lord only knows, but this was the first time a bona fide metal track had stormed the barricades. That it wasn't one of Maiden's better singles (in fact, it's one their weakest) mattered not a jot - like seeing a dog walking on two legs, first comments shouldn't be that it's not doing it very well, but to marvel that it's able to do it at all. Seeing Bruce and the boys delivering the country's most bought song was a blow against the vague, undefined 'them' that my younger self was never able to strike, and it gave voice to a million teenage dirtbags still playing air guitar in their bedrooms.
But after all that, I suppose I should say a few words about the actual song itself. Well it's Maiden by numbers, a 'humorous' title of schlock dragged out to song length. The drums pound, the bass gallops and the guitars squeal while Bruce Dickinson's vibrato goes into overdrive on the chorus like an aural fist attacking a speedball. All usual elements in fact, all present and correct to shake the bones until they crack on a ketchup for blood, Ghost Train ride of pantomime horror. And yet for all that 'Bring Your Daughter' is unremarkable and rather dull.
"So get down on your knees honey, assume an attitude. You just pray that I'll be waiting, cos you know I'm coming soon" - lazy Spinal Tap references wait in the wings and I'd like to think I have more class than to stoop to them, but there isn't much more than casual cliché about it all; 'Bring Your Daughter' is construction manual metal, written by checklist and played by rote. Sure it's loud, but it's uninspiring and it's unengaging and it gives rather too much ammunition to those who sneer that metal is dumb as a stump music played by poor white trash for poor white trash. As pantomime rock 'Bring Your Daughter' is fine, but I know from experience that Maiden as a band and metal as a genre could do so much better. But still, number one eh?
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