John Mitchell

The past two weeks have certainly been busy for the music world, with the release of new albums by two of the most popular artists of our time. Kanye West released Donda, as Aja Romano of Vox discussed, and Drake released Certified Lover Boy, as Marianne Garvey of CNN reports. But what many people may have missed amidst all the uproar over the two rap/hip-hop moguls was that on the same day that Drake released his new album, British heavy metal band Iron Maiden unleashed their seventeenth studio album, as their official website reports. Titled Senjutsu (roughly translated from Japanese as “tactics and strategy”), the album is the band’s first studio album in nearly six years, the longest gap ever between two Iron Maiden studio albums. But after a whopping 46 years and seventeen studio albums, how does this new material hold up? Can any band manage to sustain both their commercial appeal and their creative energy for more than four decades? Let’s find out!

From the very beginning, the best two words to describe the album are somber and epic. That said, while the songs on this album may not be quite as instantly catchy and invigorating as the band’s early work, they’re nothing to sneeze at either. The band has matured over the decades, no doubt, but while their music may be a little different, it would still make an epic soundtrack to a motorcycle ride. The lyrics and the melodies may both be more complex  (the album boasts no fewer than three guitarists), but the fist-pumping energy of their shorter songs (“Stratego,” “The Writing on the Wall”) is still there. Who says old people have to be boring?

The album continues the band’s turn-of-the-century trend of focusing on epic ballads over catchy riffs. Some of the longer, more complex songs on the album almost have notes of  progressive metal in them. Almost, but not quite. Iron Maiden may be good, but Tool they are not, nor do they try to be. The album’s tone is fairly dark and even a little gloomy, with the exception of the somewhat lighter “The Writing on the Wall,” which almost feels like a Western power ballad at times. Despite the epic energy present, the somber tone is consistent, though it never gets to the point of being overly dreary and depressing. Iron Maiden walks a careful balancing act, and  mostly pulls it off.

As is the usual with Iron Maiden, the songs’ subject matter ranges from the historical to the biblical, with various songs covering: Churchill during World War II (“Darkest Hour”), various Bible stories, including Belshazzar’s feast (“The Writing on the Wall”), and various other cheery subjects, such as the apocalypse (“Senjutsu,” “Days of Future Past”).

One other thing worthy noting about the album is the length of it. Spanning over eighty minutes long despite only having ten songs on it, it is Iron Maiden’s second double album, spanning two CDs/vinyl records. The last three songs alone (“Death of the Celts,” “The Parchment,” “Hell on Earth”) are each over ten minutes long, in an era where many tracks clock in at under three minutes. Iron Maiden seems more and more willing to break from modern convention with each new album.

So for those looking for something different, even wildly different, from the endless stream of modern rap and hip-hop, Senjutsu proves an excellent, if slightly gloomy, choice. Proving that with age comes wisdom, Iron Maiden have managed to make their seventeenth studio album feel both familiar and refreshing, and have proved yet again just why they remain such titans in the world of heavy metal.