I just returned from the Iron Maiden concert here in Athens, soaked in sweat, most of which wasn’t even mine. I shall now recount to thee the details of my aforementioned journey to

THE IRON MAIDEN CONCERT


This is not a generic lighted stage.

First of all, I would like to tell you of the terms of the concert, which were written in the back of the ticket. They were these:

  • If you take any pictures or videos of the concert, they belong to Iron Maiden.
  • Pictures or videos of the concert are not allowed.
  • If Iron Maiden takes pictures or videos of you, they belong to Iron Maiden.
  • If you step in the concert area, or in a radius of 15 km thereof, or within earshot, you and your firstborn belong to Iron Maiden.

Consequently, the following pictures were not taken at the aforementioned concert. Which is sad, because the exquisite pictures range from “Random people standing at random places” to “Generic lighted stage picture #943”. I decided not to take my digital camera with me, because I paid like, a gazillion bucks for it, and like hell was I going to risk breaking it for you guys.


This is not a bunch of virgins.

Also, a few tips before you go to any rock concert:

  • Take as little with you as you can, but OMG DON’T OMIT CLOTHING. Unless you are a woman. But not ugly.
  • Always keep your t-shirt on. Unless you are a woman. But not with saggy boobs. Guys, WTF was up with removing your shirts, you are sweaty and smelly and filthy and you stink, fucking pigs. Also, when you touch other people without your shirt on, that shit sticks to the other person’s skin and I got half my skin flayed off me in this manner.
  • For god’s sake, wear your old shoes.
  • Men go in the front, hot women go with me.
  • Chicks with big boobs should bounce more.
  • That’s it.

So, we went there, and after a lot of waiting and “One two three, one two three, hey hey hey testing”, Dragonforce came on the scene and started singing. Sadly, they were not able to stir up a lot of enthusiasm among the crowd, but that was mostly because they weren’t who we went there to see. They did rock though. After a while, they finished their gig and it was IRON MAIDEN time.


These aren’t many people.

We had to wait a bit more for it to get dark, to MAXIMIZE THE EFFECT. They started with Remember Tomorrow or something like that, which I hadn’t heard of before. Apparently though, everyone else knew it, but they were all virgins anyway. Hell, I didn’t know half the songs, but they were from the first four albums they released and I doubt I had been born back then, so I am excused.

After a few more unknown songs, we started DEMANDING Alexander the Great, the greatest great historical song ever, and Bruce was like “Every time I come to Greece, you ask me to sing that song”. Well duh, genius. Didn’t you learn from the previous 12 times that we were probably going to ask for it again, and that you should probably have practiced it? Anyway, he made a deal with us, we were going to sing a couple of verses and next time they came they would play it themselves. We concurred, and he began singing a cappella:

Alexander the Great,
His name struck fear into hearts of men.
Alexander the Great,
Blar glar glar meeen.

This verifies the theory of the ingrate and the dimwit, who said that they don’t know the lyrics to that song. Damnit. Anyway, better luck with that next time. But seriously, he could have told me to go up on the stage and I would tell him the fucking lyrics, it’s not that hard, everyone knows them.


Not the stage with the Dragonforce flag.

They played a few more songs, including “The Number of the Beast”, “Hallowed Be Thy Name” and “Run to the Hills”. They told us from the beginning that they were going to play songs from their first four albums, but everyone knew this meant “our first four albums and Fear of the Dark”, so naturally we were waiting for it.

Alas, it never came. They played and played and played, but no “Fear of the Dark” in sight. After a while, and when Bruce had introduced the band members, we began chanting “FEAR! OF! THE! DARK!”, but our cries went unanswered. They said their goodbyes and left, and we were all like “OMFG WTF”!

Seriously, I know that you played all those other cool songs which you probably had never played before, since I have all your live albums and they are nowhere to be found, but going to an Iron Maiden concert and not hearing Fear of the Dark is like having sex and the phone ringing when you are about to come. Only instead of sex it’s a concert. And instead of coming it’s Fear of the Dark. And instead of a telephone it is your momma.

I can’t help but feel cheated. It was the first concert I went to, and damnit, I wanted to hear Fear of the Dark. Still though, it was worth every cent (Eurocent, which is like 1.3 dollar cents, so it was worth like 1.3 cents more than your American ones, muhaha). Overall, it was a great show, and we had lots of fun. BUT SERIOUSLY, YOU MADE LIKE $1M TODAY, WOULD IT FUCKING KILL YOU TO PLAY FEAR OF THE DARK? Jeez…

Also, as a side note, there was this hot chick next to me that had this boyfriend, who also looked like a chick, but not that hot. Wtf was up with that couple? I do have reason to hope though, because she spent the largest part of the concert behind me, and I was wearing my Poromenos t-shirt, so all she has to do now is google me and find this site, where she will promptly notice the email address she must use to email me. Hot chick, EMAIL ME HERE: HotChickFromIronMaidenConcert@poromenos.org.

Update: Alas, tonight I was unable to sleep. Bruce Dickinson’s treachery kept echoing in my mind and all I could hear in my head was a voice saying “Revenge! Revenge!”. I pondered long and hard, and I finally came with a foolproof plan that will lead to Iron Maiden’s undoing. It is a plan of utter magnificence and unspeakable horror, the likes of which only a criminal mastermind such as myself could spawn. I will exact my revenge upon Iron Maiden, starting now. You have undoubtedly heard that whenever someone downloads a song, that artist loses millions of dollars. I will, therefore, as of now, download all of Iron Maiden’s albums again and again, costing them trillions of dollars in lost revenues! This will perforce cause the band to disband, as they will be unable to pay all that money. Goodbye, Iron Maiden! Mwahahahahaha!