"You're surrendering your senses completely to this little fascist in your hand." Iron Maiden's Bruce Dickinson really hates mobile phones

Eddie of Iron Maiden performs at Co-op Live on June 22, 2025 in Manchester, England.

(Image credit: Shirlaine Forrest/WireImage)

Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson has once again given brutal feedback when asked for his thoughts about fans recording parts of the band's shows on their mobile phones.

The singer has spoken out previously about phones at concerts, describing the vibe at gigs when phones are banned as "what music should be."

And while Maiden have stopped short of an outright ban, they have urged fans to keep them in their pockets and just enjoy the event. When some fans decided to ignore the request, Maiden manager Ron Smallwood joked: "I wish you nothing but a very sore arm!"

Now Dickinson, 67, has doubled down on his thoughts, saying: " I wish the camera on those things had never been invented."

He tells Appetite for Distortion: "It's like some terrible disease, that people feel the need to look at the world through this stupid little device. It's like a failing of humanity.

"You're surrendering your senses completely to this little fascist in your hand.

"Put it down, put it in your pocket and look around you. Look at the people, look at the joy, look at the band, feel the emotion, feel the music. What a phone does, it cuts all of that off.

"And so I feel sad. I also feel pissed off, because as a performer, I want to perform for an audience of people that have some emotional feedback – not a bunch of Android twerps."

He also repeated previous comments about having seen Ghost in concert recently, and how their phone ban has made a remarkably positive difference to the atmosphere.

This week, Maiden added extra European dates to their Run For Your Lives world tour – including two completely phone-free shows in Paris which are being filmed for an upcoming release.

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Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.

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