Nicko McBrain Revisits Iron Maiden’s ‘Somewhere in Time’ Tour

By Elena Vasquez

Forty years ago this autumn, Iron Maiden released its sixth album, Somewhere in Time; Nicko McBrain’s new book Hello Boys and Girls! places it before the band’s 157-show Somewhere on Tour.

McBrain presents the album as an instant classic carried by “Wasted Years” and “Stranger in a Strange Land.” He says the World Slavery Tour had made the band metal superstars and ended about one year before the album project.

The book also covers McBrain’s life before he joined Maiden in 1982, his years with the group and his decision to stop touring in 2024 after the effects of a stroke a year earlier. Its title repeats his “Hello boys and girls” catchphrase. He calls bassist and bandleader Steve Harris “’Arry” and guitarist Adrian Smith “H,” while recounting stories about singer Bruce Dickinson and guitarist Dave Murray.

How did Somewhere in Time begin?

McBrain says the writing sessions started in Nassau, Bahamas. Bruce Dickinson arrived with acoustic songs and argued that the band needed a new direction, while Harris rejected them immediately.

Before McBrain could ask, “What do you boys think?” Harris had already called the shots. McBrain noticed that Dickinson was “a bit miffed,” but says the bassist and bandleader remained in control.

McBrain says he never heard the rejected songs. Harris described them as “quite Jethro Tull,” a comparison McBrain softens by noting that Maiden had covered “Cross-Eyed Mary.”

Smith, he says, then provided three tracks. Two became singles: “Wasted Years,” about homesickness, and “Stranger in a Strange Land,” about a sailor lost on an Arctic expedition and found in ice years later.

Harris drew on the British film The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner and ancient history for “Alexander the Great,” McBrain writes. Despite the album’s references to time, he says it was not conceived as a concept album. The never-ending World Slavery Tour may have shaped that motif subconsciously.

McBrain’s account makes the record a product of friction and compromise, not a fully planned concept.

How did synthesizers change the record?

McBrain traces the guitars and vocals to Wisseloord Studios in Holland after Nassau, then places the mixing at Electric Lady Studios in New York, where Smith and Murray first used guitar synthesizers on an album. Their effect begins with the opening note of “Caught Somewhere in Time.”

He compares the initial resistance with the response to Bob Dylan going electric. On an earlier Polish visit, McBrain recalls, a young fan told Dickinson, “I want to play heavy metal with synthesizers.” Dickinson replied, “You can’t play heavy metal with synthesizers.” The clip appears in the recent documentary Iron Maiden: Burning Ambition, now available to rent.

The excerpt says Somewhere in Time did even better business than Powerslave. “Wasted Years” became the first single.

On German television, the band prepared to perform live before a director told them to mime. As protest, Harris took the drums, Dickinson played bass and McBrain sang without knowing the words. The director, McBrain writes, “went spare at us.”

McBrain’s history shows that a disputed instrument became central to the album’s sound and its early public presentation.

How did 157 shows become an extreme spectacle?

Asked about the length of the World Slavery Tour, Rod told McBrain: “Going ’round the world twice was probably not the best idea I ever had. So Somewhere on Tour was only 157 shows.” McBrain’s response was: “Only 157!”

By the first Belgrade show, McBrain says, he was eager to begin because Sonor had made his first custom drum set with nine-ply maple shells, a gun-metal matte finish and proper black chrome rather than powder-coated chrome.

“Do you know how much that’s going to cost?” Sonor asked. McBrain replied, “You make it, I’ll pay for it,” then admits: “I never did.”

Dickinson called it the “great inflatable tour.” McBrain’s inventory includes:

• a spaceship that spat fire;
• his favorite Eddie, a ray gun-toting cyborg;
• a monocled Eddie that appeared beneath his elevated riser;
• two giant Eddie hands.

Harris and Dickinson stood in an Eddie palm and were lifted above the stage. A lamp burned a hole while Harris was aboard, deflating it. Roadies repaired it for the next show, then tied every finger except the middle, making Eddie appear to give the crowd “the bird.”

McBrain also recalls Dickinson getting stuck inside a Wicker Man Eddie with scantily clad women. He says the visuals became vital to Maiden’s identity, while fans expected each tour’s scenery to grow.

Scale, not only musicianship, defined the 157-show production, according to McBrain.

What did the stage cost?

The skeleton remained constant, McBrain writes, including a horseshoe-shaped walkway behind the drum set and two “ego ramps.” Dickinson ran up and down the ramps. McBrain asked, “Why do you spend so much time up there?” Dickinson answered, “To get away from the fuckin’ noise, Nick …”

Maiden used substantial pyrotechnics until health and safety rules required permission from the local fire chief, McBrain says, although that step cost more money and did not end the flames. The band kept them for “The Number of the Beast,” when open-air performances could leave McBrain cold before the fire illuminated him.

McBrain counted 25 permanent touring staff—backline, sound and lighting workers—plus local crew, producing as many as 60 people at a show. Everyone needed pay; permanent staff also needed flights, hotels and meal per diems. Giant inflatable hands added further expense, he writes. His conclusion: once a rock band goes big, it should not go smaller unless forced.

The tour’s scale carried a heavy financial and logistical cost, McBrain’s account makes clear.

Why did the tour blur into memory?

McBrain says he cannot confirm whether Somewhere on Tour was an in-joke, meaning “Where the hell are we today?” He sometimes forgot the day or city and could enter a familiar venue believing he had never played there, evidence of how a long run compresses memory into a blur.

He never heard Dickinson announce the wrong city, but others told him about an earlier “Hello, Cleveland!” error that made the band laugh. As the 40th anniversary approaches, McBrain’s book reduces the nostalgia to measurable facts: 157 shows, up to 60 workers and a stage built for maximum impact.