As with most people my age into metal, Iron Maiden was one of the very first bands I started listening to. However, this was in the mid-90’s, and their most recent album then was X Factor, so my introduction to the UK NWOBHM legends wasn’t with Bruce Dickinson, it was with much slated and underrated Blaze Bayley.

But, of course, pretty soon I delved deeper into the band’s back catalogue, initially via the Best Of The Beast compilation and then the albums themselves, and Bruce Dickinson rose to become my number one Iron Maiden vocalist. Even so, it took me an awfully long time to get into his solo material.

I remember getting this double CD limited edition compilation in late summer 2002 in a trade, and it being my introduction to Dickinson’s solo stuff. The reason I remember the date with such precision is… well, because I just remember stuff like that. I also remember I would travel several hours every Friday by train to spend the weekend with my girlfriend, who lived half across the country, and I would spend copious of hours on the train listening to this on my Discman. Good times.

Bruce Dickinson released his first solo album, Tattooed Millionaire, way back in 1990. I suppose that at the time it was a sort of pastime outlet for him, allowing him to do slightly different stuff from his main band. The early albums definitely have a marked difference to Iron Maiden, going for either a lighter sound or more somber feel. It might not be so surprising that at the time, these albums were not smash hits although Tattooed Millionaire did net four charting singles in the UK. And by the time he reached album number three, Skunkworks, pretty much nobody cared about what Dickinson, now out of Iron Maiden, was doing – as he himself admits in the liner notes of this compilation.

And it’s true that these early albums are hit-and-miss. There are good tracks in there, but there are also tracks that just don’t go anywhere. This uneven nature results in albums that are hard to consider essential. And that’s why this compilation is so good.

Because, you see, this 2001 compilation is assembled with great taste. It picks the absolute highlights of the early albums, padded with the best cuts from the more traditionally metal latter albums Accident Of Birth (1997) and Chemical Wedding (1998) and finishes off with a few rarer live versions – and, of course, a couple of entirely new tracks. One of these – Broken – is a superb track, an absolute corker. Dickinson in fine form, doing his turn-of-the-millennium Iron-Maiden-but-slightly-slower-and-heavier style of metal perfectly. The first disc, which comprises the regular edition, is a fine slice through Dickinson’s solo career thus far – certainly enough to satiate more casual listeners.

And then there’s the second disc, exclusive to the limited edition. It’s a compilation of all sorts of rarities, B-sides, outtakes and whatnots. Typically, this kind of stuff is pure fan service offering all sorts of material with curiosity value for fans but nothing much for anyone else.

Not so in this case. Dickinson has dug deep to find some real gems from his vaults, such as the melancholic, acoustic Darkness Be My Friend – or Acoustic Song, which can be described by the very same words. The original, retracted solo version of Iron Maiden’s Bring Your Daughter… To The Slaughter and the more “gothic” version of Man Of Sorrows are good tracks that are also effective fan service.

Of course, there are also tracks which fall into the cateogry of amusing, throwaway curios, such as the blatantly offensive The Ballad Of Mutt or thoroughly silly I’m In A Band With An Italian Drummer, but this stuff is in a clear minority. Even Dracula, a true curio, being the first song Dickinson ever recorded, is genuinely worth a spin or two.

I admit that when it comes to Dickinson solo, I’m more of the aforementioned casual listeners than a “true fan”. I have owned quite a few of his solo albums at one point in time or another, but have ended up selling most of them. Because, for me, this compilation suffices. It’s got the most important gems from the early albums, such as Tears Of The Dragon and the title track of the first solo album, and is a cohesive, coherent whole despite spanning a decade of recordings.

The “Best Of” is a bit of a lost art in this age of streaming, made redundant by all (or most) music being readily available at all times. This compilation is a fine example of why they were a relevant release form in their heyday: best of’s weren’t just a haphazardly cobbled together lump of songs, but well thought-out and assembled wholes, which presented through choice cuts the discography, evolution and career of an artist.

In essence, they condensed a vast back catalogue into a single release, allowing newcomers and casual listeners to get familiar with the highlights in a manner that attempted to give a bit of genuine insight into the artist covered. Bruce Dickinson’s Best Of does exactly this – and with the added second disc, adds a whole different dimension, accessible both to dedicated fans and casual listeners alike.

---

In From The Vaults we take a dive into the record collection at Only Death Is Real HQ and write about about items of iconic stature or personal significance; rarities and oddities from the archives; obscure gems that deserve more attention; classics of yore deserving of a moment in the limelight; and so on.