“It reminded me of discovering Deep Purple when I was 15 years old, except updated. Everything was really pushing forwards”: Bruce Dickinson reveals the Pau Di’Anno song that convinced him to join Iron Maiden

2025 is a massive year for Iron Maiden even by their standards. The metal icons have been celebrating their 50th anniversary with the mammoth Run For Your Lives tour (now extended into 2026), and then there’s the lavish coffee table book, Infinite Dreams, which is set to land with a satisfying thud on October 7.

Bruce Dickinson has been part of the band for 44 of those 50 years, replacing former singer Paul Di’Anno in 1981 after the latter was fired for not matching up to bassist and band Sergeant Major Steve Harris’ standards.

In the brand new issue of Metal Hammer, we sit down with Steve and Bruce to look back over their half century, with the conversation ranging from the bassist’s memories of the band’s early gigs to why Maiden will never play Glastonbury.

In the interview, Bruce looks back on joining Maiden – and reveals the Di’Anno-era song that convinced him to join the band.

Before he signed up with Maiden, Bruce was a member of NWOBHM footsoldiers Samson, who his future band had actually supported at a fabled gig at London’s Music Machine in May 1979. Bruce says he was fully aware of Maiden’s strengths – and their weaknesses.

“I remember watching them and thinking, ‘Fucking hell, this is something else,’” he says. “The one think I thought about Paul was, ‘OK, he’s good, but what if I was singing these songs…’”

He’d have the chance two years later. The two albums Di’Anno recorded with Maiden, 1980’s self-titled debut and 1981’s Killers, both went Top 10 in the UK.

But Di’Anno’s lack of self-belief and offstage antics would ultimately mark his card, and he was given his marching orders in September 1981.

By that point, Bruce had already secretly been offered the job. And he reveals to Metal Hammer which song sealed the deal for him.

“Killers,” he says, referring to the title track of the band’s second album, which he also sang as part of his auditon alongside Wrathchild and Remember Tomorrow. “It reminded me of discovering Deep Purple when I was 15 years old, except updated. It had the same energy.

“It was in the guitar the drumming, the bass playing, everything. Davey [Murray, Maiden guitarist] was channelling Ritchie [Blackmore, Deep Purple guitarist]. Everything was on the front edge, really pushing forwards. Same with Wratchild and Murders In The Rue Morgue.”

In the same interview, Bruce also shoots down internet stories that he had never met Paul Di’Anno until the wheelchair-bound singer turned up at a Maiden show in Zagreb in July 2022, two years before his death the following October.

“Fuck me, no, that’s internet bullshit,” Bruce says of the suggestion that the pair had never met before. “Samson recorded [their 1981 album] Shock Tactics in the same studio as Maiden recorded Killers. There was a bar and we’d all be in there hanging out.

“The night he came to the Maiden show in Zagreb, everyone was going [fearfully], ‘Do you want to see Paul?’ I was, like, ‘Why the fuck wouldn’t I? Of course I’d like to see him.’”

Read the full interview with Bruce and Steve about 50 years of Iron Maiden exclusively in the brand new issue of Metal Hammer, onsale now.

This bumper Maiden issue comes with a special Eddie patch for your battle jacket, a shiny Eddie keyring, and a killer Eddie anniversary art print!

Order it online and have it delivered straight to your door.