I disagree, self titled thru the number of the beast are scaling the mountain before arriving at the golden era of Maiden, Piece of Mind thru Seventh Son are the true Golden Era line-up for Maiden (Murray, Smith, Dickinson, Harris, McBrain)
**i actually prefer the rhythm section of the first 3 albums tho, i think Clive Burr + Steve Harris had such great chemistry, the first 3 albums are more lively and energetic
but Seventh Son is definately their creative peak, Fillerslave may have the best guitar sound out of any Maiden album (no disputing that really), but it also has a pointless instrumental, and weaker songs Flash of the Blade and The Duellists, while they are not as bad as Quest for Fire, they are still definately filler on an otherwise great album, Powerslave is basically filler book-ended by 2 great songs on each side, SSoaSS is golden besides the throw away track Can I Play with Madness
Somewhere in Time is underrated, title track, wasted years, stranger in a strange land, deja vu, and alexander the great are all awesome, even the loneliness of the long distance runner is pretty good, the only poor tracks on there in my opinion are sea of madness and heaven can wait
Solo said:
Bruce's voice was still 100% there, and Dave and Adrian were on absolute fire the whole tour.
Solo man, go listen to Beast over the Hammersmith from Eddie's Archives if you want to hear 100% prime bruce sing, his vocals are completely godly in that performance, Live After Death was recorded at the very end of that tour, and bruce even admits that his voice was pretty shot by the end of the tour, i don't think its his best vocal performance by any means, he sounds better on rock in rio lol