Iron Maidenin Adrian Smith: ”Biisinteosta on tullut demokraattisempaa”
Iron Maidenin kitaristi Adrian Smithiltä kysyttiin taannoisessa Total Guitarin haastattelussa, onko kompromissien tekeminen musiikkia tehdessä vaikeaa, kun yhtyeessä on viisi jäsentä, jotka osallistuvat siihen. Hän vastasi, että hänen mielestään musiikin tekemisestä on tullut demokraattisempaa, vaikkakin yhtyeen kanssa kyseessä on aina kompromissi. 80-luvulla basisti Steve Harris saattoi usein tuoda näytille 4-5 täysin valmista kappaletta, mutta nykyisin häntä kiinnostaa enemmän tuottaminen, järjestely, sanoitukset ja melodiat. Hän kyselee Smithiltä, mitä ideoita hänellä on ja pyytää soittamaan niitä. Smithin soittaessa sävellyksiään Harris keksii siihen melodian saman tien. Uudelle ”The Book of Souls” -albumille Smith teki pari biisiä myös laulaja Bruce Dickinsonin kanssa.
”I think it’s got a little more democratic. Having said that, a band is always a compromise, but sometimes it can be good. Back in the ’80s, Steve would bring in four or five top-to-bottom finished songs, but now he’s more interested in producing, arranging, lyrics and melodies. He’ll ask me what ideas I’ve got and I’ll usually have pretty well-formed ideas. He gets me to play my ideas to him and he’ll come out with a melody straight away. He’ll sing the melody over the top and he’ll record it. Then, down the line, he’ll sort through it. But he’ll say the first thing that occurs to him is usually the best, and he’s got a lot of ideas for lyrics, so we’ve done that quite a bit over the years. Well, I say over the years, in my second stint in the band — in the last 10 or 15 years, that’s the way it works.”
”[On Iron Maiden’s latest album, ”The Book Of Souls”], I did a couple of things with Bruce, too. I thought I’d try writing shorter songs, like ’2 Minutes To Midnight’ and ’Can I Play With Madness’, with just Bruce and me. We haven’t done that since I’ve been back in the band. Maybe with ’Wicker Man’, we did it. So that was different. He came over before we started recording and we wrote ’Speed Of Light’ and ’Death Or Glory’.”
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”Steve constantly surprises me. I think the first time was when we did a song called ’Wasted Years’. I was messing around with a little four-track and I’d just put that riff down for ’Wasted Years’. I was playing Steve some other stuff and I played it to him by accident and he said, ’What’s that?’ I said, ’You probably won’t like this as it’s so commercial,’ but he really liked it and insisted we do it. So something you’d think he wouldn’t want to do, he does. But I do like to sit down and visualize us doing different things. Obviously, we can’t do anything too drastic, but whatever works, really.”