Quite a few times ive read some dude saying the production on this album sucks...i can see what they mean...but then again i know that a matter of life and death was recorded with all of the musicians playing at the same time... (almost like a live album)
i think thats so fucking badass for a HUGE band to do
keep it real! up the irons !

Wow.. how did this get an 8 overall?!

Written by Death To Posers on 24.03.2010 at 01:43

Wow.. how did this get an 8 overall?!

Which imho is still too high. I woudl say between a 6 and a 7 so a 6.5

Because it is too good to be rated high...

I think that 8 rating is a decent and fair one for this record. A solid album with some nice listenable songs...

It's Iron Maiden in a really different style. But I like it. Got an 8 from my side.

This is one of my favourite album covers.

This is a very strong album, there's only one song on it I don't like. And the long, epic songs generally work far better on this album than on "The Final Frontier".

From all maiden albums I've listened so far, this one is the worst.

EDIT: I forgot the Blaze-era albums This album is the worst in maiden discography featuring Bruce. I've not fully listened to Dance of Death or The Final Frontier. And seriously, Dance of Death CAN'T be bad as this album is.

Say "most different" and i will agree with you

This album is beautiful. It's my second favorite 2000s era Maiden album behind Brave New World. There are so many haunting moments on here and the brooding atmosphere is captivating. Out Of The Shadows is also one of Bruce Dickinson's best vocal performances I've ever heard, the music around it is heartwarming.

Pretty interesting and strong, maybe strongest ''new era'' , defenetly much better than next one aka last one (from nowdays point of wiew) if IM will relise so strng one next (ferom todays point of wiew) I will be so happy
Diferent Worlds, Brighter Than 1000 Suns, actualy all songs are good, some weeker, some stronger, but all are decent. one more album album not one bets song video album

It started off with a bit of strength, but despite the decent writing and great performance, it turned out to be really bland. Didn't really enjoy this one all that much. Even thought Dance of Death was slightly better.

Actually, i'm loving this album! It's so awesome, specially, The Reincarnation Of Benjamin Breeg...oh that voice at the end of the song...oh Bruce!

Their most mature album indeed. Great lyrics and nice idea to record all instruments along, gives sometimes the feeling of a live album but without the crowd (well, you understand me ).

Surely not as good as BNW or DOD but still great.

Great record. The only one from the 2000's that can top BNW IMO

This is such a brilliant record, they seemed to get right every fucking thing on this work. Every single song tells it's own story and even though the length of the songs (and the album overall) it never feel dragging or repetitive. The way The Longest Day paints the horrors of war or the excellent mysticism they faked about the Benjamin Breeg story is just two of the wonderful things with this album. I consider this one of their best albums and a true heavy metal classic!

A Matter Of Life And Death, huh? More like An Album That Bored Me To Death

Re listening, I remember I hated it back then, now its an epic kick ass album, basically best what Maiden wrote(don't worry I wont say same things about next one ) but its awesome and interesting, epic in some way, a perfect album for old farts what cant run and has no energy as young pals has

Written by majormalfunction on 04.06.2016 at 12:41

This is such a brilliant record, they seemed to get right every fucking thing on this work. Every single song tells it's own story and even though the length of the songs (and the album overall) it never feel dragging or repetitive. The way The Longest Day paints the horrors of war or the excellent mysticism they faked about the Benjamin Breeg story is just two of the wonderful things with this album. I consider this one of their best albums and a true heavy metal classic!

Finally! Someone who understood the mastery of this record. In my opinion, best Maiden album since the 80s and one of their best albums ever for sure.

Because my latest re-listen made me appreciate Dance of Death for what it is, I also decided to give this one a go. If the former was pretty much disliked by everyone I knew, this thing was loved and praised by the same people like crazy. While I honestly enjoy the more epic songs here, I feel like they had to put in also few more radio-friendly songs that really drag it down. Songs like "Different World" and "Benjamin Breeg" especially are just average and boring, in my opinion.

I’ve been re-listening to every Iron Maiden record and I feel like while the high points of this album don’t quite reach the heights of Paschendale and the title track off of Dance of Death, the baseline average of this album is better as a cohesive whole. I think this might be Bruce’s best vocal performance since he rejoined the band and he sounds particularly passionate here. He doesn’t use quite as many rasp noises as he did even on the past two albums so his melodies are even more clear and legible to the ear. The production is also a bit more crisp and doesn’t suffer quite as much from the “loudness wars” as Dance of Death did. Some of my highlights are The Pilgrim, Out of the Shadows, Benjamin Breeg, For the Greater Good of God and The Legacy. It’s probably their darkest album thematically/lyrically since The X Factor as it goes into the savagery of war and hypocrisy of religion and even the melodies are more downtrodden than on the previous record, you won’t find any songs like Wildest Dreams on here. Overall, a solid album that I’d rank in the middle of the pack since it at least gets the job done.

I used to really enjoy this album, but over the years the problems have become more and more apparent to me. Modern day Iron Maiden is just extremely lazy, examples:
-Cover artist sends a draft for artwork - approve it rather than wait for the finished art (Dance of Death)
-Why spend time, money and effort on producing albums, just record all instruments simultaneusly in the studio, and use the first take that doesn't go obviously wrong. Tell the fans, it is because you want to sound 'live' (except it doesn't, and why would anyone want that anyway, they don't sound good live anymore)
-Recycle riffs
-Use the same song structure for 70 % of the songs (2 min of slow acoustic generic intro, louder, but still slow core, slow acoustic outro)
-Just slap the different parts together, natural transitions are unnecessary
-Don't edit album or reject bad idea, all ideas are good enough
-Don't bother with music videos, just hire an animator
-Only release albums frequently enough to not go completely irrelevant

A Matter of Life and Death isn't as bad as some of the latter ones, but it suffers from most of the same problems. Yet it is somewhat salvaged by decent songwriting. There aren't really any all time great tracks here, but Different Worlds, These Colours Don't Run, Brighter Than a Thousand Sons, The Reincarnation of Benjamin Bregg (this is the best), For the Greater Good of God (although it has some dreadful parts) and Lord of Light. The remaining four are quite uninspired, but only The Longest Day stands out as completely generic. The albums main problem is the production though, which is the second worst the band has ever had.

I did went to see the band all the way to Helsinki in 2006 when they played the whole album live, and I think it was quite a borefest until they played some of the older material. Maybe I should've picked a concert in a different year, also basically nobody was there to see Trivium

Written by Vinther1991 on 02.05.2022 at 22:38

-Why spend time, money and effort on producing albums, just record all instruments simultaneusly in the studio, and use the first take that doesn't go obviously wrong. Tell the fans, it is because you want to sound 'live' (except it doesn't, and why would anyone want that anyway, they don't sound good live anymore)

Hahahaha. I don't really care much for Iron Maiden, but I found this rundown very entertaining.

I think I never really fully got into Maiden and nowadays I can't stand most of their stuff post-Powerslave (and also a lot of stuff pre-Powerslave). I used to like this album though, but that was... 14 years ago? I remember it was one of the first CDs I ever bought.

Anyways, as far as I'm concerned, you're right; almost everything you described can be applied to all Maiden albums since 2000, or maybe even earlier (I honestly don't know their catalogue that well and I have given up trying to like them).