• AllMyVinyl #155
• Band: Iron Maiden
• Album Title: Killers
• Release Date: 2 Feb 1981
• Date purchased: 18 Aug 2025
• Location purchased: Amazon
• Color of vinyl: black
• Number of discs: 1
• Links: [ Wikipedia | Discogs | Band Website | Complete album on Youtube ]

As I wrote about when I hit the first Maiden album in this series, I went back and forth on which of the two Di’Anno albums was my favorite.  For the longest time it was Killers.  In recent times it’s swung around to the first album.  But it’s changed before.  As I sit here to start writing this review of Killers, I wonder if it will change again.  Because I’ve had my opinions on albums change when I have to break them all down the way I do in this series.  We’ll see if it happens again.  :)

So anyway, this was the second album with Maiden and Paul Di’Anno.  It’s also the first album of several in a row where there was some lineup change from the prior album.  Most of it is the same lineup, but for this album guitarist Dennis Stratton was out, and replaced by Adrian Smith.  It was the first album in a long line produced by Martin Birch – he continues doing this until 1992’s “Fear of the Dark”.  Marty was almost like an unofficial member doing this period – at least that’s how this fan saw it.

This was also the period where I got into Iron Maiden originally.  When I first discovered them it was late in this album’s cycle.  They had toured it and had started working on the next album.   They had already announced Bruce Dickinson, but Number was months off, so it was still Killers as the incumbent album – barely.   But that was my on ramp to Maiden.  That probably has a lot to do with why it was my favorite Di’Anno era album for a long time.  It was my first.  I never did get it on vinyl though.  My original purchase was on cassette tape, but I no longer that tape in 2025.  I have some of my early 80’s cassettes still, but this was not one of them.  Somewhere along the line I bought it on CD, but that date’s lost to time.  However, as I approached my 60th birthday, I did something have already laid out in the article I wrote for “Iron Maiden” (the album).  My wife and I have this thing where we use the points we get from our primary credit card to buy stuff we want for ourselves a a birthday present.  For me – I got the vinyl for that first Maiden album and this one – totally free using points.  That’s how I got the copy of the album I’m listening to today – totally free.  Gotta love that.  It’s the 2015 vinyl remaster as the source.

One thing I forgot about after I wrote the intro and went to get the vinyl for the listen was that given I was already deep into the vinyl series when I got this album, and I knew it was coming up later…  I never opened it.  So the vinyl I play today on 21 Oct 2025 will be the first ever listen of this specific copy – was taken out of the shrink wrap for today’s entry in my series.

RIP Paul Di’Anno

One thing I wanted to point out.  I’m doing this entire entry on the 21st of October 2025.  That’s one year to the day since Paul Di’Anno died.  Paul had been unwell for some time, and the last many years of his life he was confined to a wheelchair.  But that didn’t stop him – he still got out there and played shows.  Good on him for doing that.  That kind of injury would have probably landed my ass on the sofa (or the bed).

He and Iron Maiden made peace and got together before he passed, which was great to see.  Maiden themselves put a picture from this on their socials announcing Paul’s death.

I realized this early this morning and was determined to get this review out the door today on the anniversary.

Before I get into the individual tracks..  One interesting thing about this album is that it’s almost totally credited to Steve Harris.  Of the main album tracks the only one not credited to just him was Killers (Di’Anno / Harris).  There’s another track that is credited to Harris & Dave Murray – that’s “Twilight Zone”, but that’s not on the base album.  Twilight Zone was the first single off the album, but it wasn’t included in the original 1981 version.  It was added to the US version (similar to Sanctuary on the first album) and was included in the 1998 remasters.  However, the 2015 remaster series was based off the UK original, so Twilight Zone isn’t here.  I’m going to really cover it here since it’s not on my vinyl, but it is a good track, but it does sound like it would fit more on the first Maiden album than this one.

The bulk of this album was written before the first album was recorded (only Rue Morgue & Prodigal Son were more recent).  Maiden had been playing these songs and the first album for years on tour in the 70’s, and there’s some recordings of Killers era tracks with their earlier singer Dennis Wilcock out there (like this with Wilcock singing Di’Anno tracks in 1977).  So by the time they came to record these, they were well in their wheelhouse.

Anyway, to the tracks (finally)….

The Ides of March – This song is an interesting thing.  First off, I always thought it was a killer way to open the album.  It’s an instrumental, about a minute and a half, and I always ALWAYS thought it was a killer lead in to Wrathchild.  Much in the same way that “The Hellion / Electric Eye” are for Judas Priest.  Technically two different songs, but you can’t really do one without the other.  Even now when I put the needle down I was transported to the past.  This is a killer instrumental opening to the album.  There’s not a ton you can say about that music, but I did find some stuff today in doing my research for this review I didn’t know about (or flat out forgot).

What I’m getting at here is that this song is nearly identical to the track “Thunderburst” by the band Samson (also from the UK).  If you don’t believe that, click this link and check it out.  The Thunderburst track has its own intro (lasting about 30 seconds) which was left out of the Maiden version.  Now the Samson version is a bit slower in pace, but it really sounds extremely similar.  What’s interesting about that is the personnel swapping here.  The Samson version was co-written by future Maiden vocalist Bruce Dickinson (under his then stage name of Bruce Bruce) and Barry Purkis (under his stage name of Thunderstick).  Purkis was also briefly in Maiden in the 70’s at the time Samson recorded this, but he was never on any Maiden albums. Despite the OG version here being credited to all the members of Sampson – the Iron Maiden Ides of March version was credited to just Steve Harris – so I wonder what the story with all that is.  One final note, Samson’s drummer prior to Purkis was Clive Burr, who ended up playing on the Maiden version.  Bit of a confused mess there, but it’ all stuff that’s new to me in 2025.  If I knew about this before I’d forgotten about it.  Guy by the name of Thunderstick wrote a song called Thunderburst for one band, was in another band, and the other band recorded it – not with him , and no credit?  My head hurts.

Wrathchild – As mentioned, Ides leads straight into Wrathchild, which has from day one been one of my top early Maiden tracks.  Of this particular album it’s Killers and this neck and neck for which is my favorite.  Which one takes the top spot depends on what day you ask me on.  But it’s a killer track.  Starts off with that classic Maiden sound which is much improved over what came on the album before this.  I know a large share of the writing is down to Steve Harris, and it seems like it’s starting to crystallize already.  It will take IMO two more albums before it’s perfected, but you can see shades of what made them spectacular in the studio here for sure.  Also Paul’s voice fits this song well.  I’ve seen video of it done (quite well) by Bruce, but the OG with Paul works best for me.  It has a bit of that galloping sound I like in a Maiden song.  There’s not much of a guitar solo however.  That could be because it’s a pretty short song (2:55) – if they added a solo, probably would be about 3:30, but there isn’t one really.   What he have here is awesome.  I love the bit towards the end with saying “Wrathchild” a few times – good audience participation bit.  Amusingly this was the B-side to Twilight Zone back in the day.

One fun thing I found when researching this – someone who goes by the name of Caveman Ninja pieced together this fun video showing every single person ever in Iron Maiden – and I mean ALL of them (including the 70’s guys) – all playing the track in a single combined video.  Even includes their current drummer Simon Dawson – this thing is a masterpiece.  I’ve embedded it below.

Murders in the Rue Morgue – Nice slow somewhat etherial sound at the start before the band comes in.  The slow part goes into a faster paced sound with the entire band playing, a nice evolution of the first “sound” the song had.  Then we get to about 1 min in and the song reaches full gear when Paul comes in on vocals.  It’s a nice build – It’s not like Rue Morgue is the first song I’ve ever heard to do this, but I really like the way Maiden does it here.  Once we get to the fastest part, it mostly keeps that vibe for the rest of the song.  The chorus is VERY sing-able – “Murders in the Rue Morgue”.. what’s interesting though in doing this I checked out the lyric sheet – in all this time I didn’t know there was a French word in there (gendarmes).  This is one of my favorite things, the about 3:30 long fast paced song.  Gets in, does its thing, gets out.  Always loved this track following Wrathchild on the album.  Great stuff.

Another Life – This starts off with a very fast rolling/galloping drum intro by Clive Burr.  It leads into a different sounding guitar sound before the full band kicks in and the songs gets rolling.  The guitars on this album are by the same pair (Smith / Murray) that would power that classic Maiden sound for many an album, but this guitar sound was different.  I always wondered if that was something written for previous guitarist Dennis Stratton as it sounded different.  Still, it’s not bad or anything, just not that traditional Maiden guitar sound at the start of this.  This one isn’t one of my favorites though.  Nothing bad about it, but the main guitar riffing doesn’t do a lot for me (and I’m not talking about the intro).  I do like the guitar solo section, as Steve Harris is a bit more up front in the mix there.  Yeah, I kept waiting for some different sound or feel to kick in, but it didn’t.  Again, not bad, just doesn’t set the world on fire for me.

Genghis Khan – Another instrumental, only this time a full length song, and a damn good one too.  Great fast pace, good guitar work, and I LOVED the drum fills.  I remember thinking when I thought I might try playing drums, I wanted to play this.  Nice drum work by Clive on this track.

Innocent Exile – Bass intro – Steve right out front at the start!  This is one where I enjoy Paul’s vocal delivery more than the music behind it.  As Maiden songs go, it’s mostly a standard / straightforward track.  Not a ton of different sounds of vibes in here.  Again, not bad, but doesn’t have that “sparkle” that some of the best Maiden tracks do.  But as I’ve already said, I really do enjoy Paul the most here.  The vocals mostly stop around 2 mins, and there’s nearly another two minutes of a long instrumental, which is enjoyable, but like the other parts of the song, nothing terribly unique.   Paul comes back at the end simply to sing “Lord I’m running”, and that’s it.  Not one of my favorites of theirs.

Killers – Then we get to the title track.  One of my top 10 Maiden tracks of all time.  It’s almost like this song sucked all the mojo out of Innocent Exile, as it has way more awesomeness than a single Maiden song should.  “Oh Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa” at the start I love.  I mean fuck I could write 1,000 words on the various parts of this song and how awesome they are, but it would be me saying “that’s fucking awesome” for about 600 of the words, so we won’t do that.  I always used to think the guitar sounds in this sounded appropriate for the subject matter of the lyrics.  I thought this was well put together from a lyrical and musical standpoint.  They both supported each other quite well.  I mean I just started listening to this song after writing that, and I was like “Fuck yeah – this still smokes 40+ years later”.  It’s a timeless metal classic.  This is the only song on the base UK album with a co-write.  I wonder if these lyrics were Paul’s or Steve’s.  I have to imagine there’s some Maiden fan following me that’s more well versed in that.  If you know, let me know.

Prodigal Son – The closest thing Maiden has to a “Grab the girl and get on the dance floor cuz the slow dance song has just arrived” song.  It’s a more mellow track by Maiden standards.  Not like an acoustic ballad (we’ll get there later with Journeyman in a few decades), but it is a very nice change of pace song to the rest of the album.   It’s also the longest song on the album at 6:13.  Has some intense lyrics for sure.  I read in this interview that Bruce Dickinson calls this song “Jethro Tull’s influence on Iron Maiden” – I can sorta see that.

Just.. Who’s Lamia?  Well, right after I wrote that, I decided to go look, and I found my answer.  This is Lamia.  Given the stuff that Steve Harris has written about over the decades, this fits right in with that stuff.  I kind of paid attention to the lyrics tonight for the first time ever.  Yeah, that’s a Maiden song.  I do really like the slower vibe of this.  Normally it’s not my choice, but this really works.  Great track.

Purgatory – We’re back to the 3:20 faster track, one of my favorites.  Oddly, despite being my kind of jam, I tend to forget about this one a lot, probably overshadowed on the same album as Killers & Wrathchild.  The main riff that goes through it is a bit repetitive, but still enjoyable.  It’s one of the faster Iron Maiden songs – they’re not a trash band at all, and while I wouldn’t call this a thrash song either – it is approaching some Metallica level of speed.  Good track I really need to listen to more.

Drifter – The album closes out with Drifter, which I have to admit as I sat to listen, I couldn’t recall what this song was without listening to it – totally forgotten (by me).   This has some odd Maiden lyrics (to me anyway)..

What you feeling when you hold me tight? / I wanna cuddle up to you tonight / Gonna get you feeling so secure
I want you to sing it, sing it, sing it, sing it along / I want you to sing it, sing it, sing it, sing it along / etc…

Oddly the “sing it” part was delivered well vocally, I got into the part at the end there.  Lyrically this is a bit all over the place.  It doesn’t light the world on fire for me, but I did like some of the guitar work in the bridge between the main parts of the song.  I can see now why I didn’t remember it – not one of my favorite tracks.  Odd choice for album closer, I would have reversed Purgatory and Drifter if it was me laying out the album.

Thus ends the Paul Di’Anno era of Iron Maiden.  He was around long enough for work to have begun work on The Number of the Beast, but by all accounts he laid down some early demos of two tracks, but they’ve not surfaced – I’ve heard those stories for years.  There’s some discussion as to whether it really happened or not.  Still..

The two albums he did record with Maiden remain classics to this day 40+ years later.  Maiden – unlike some bands – don’t shy away from their material with singers that aren’t the generally recognized “regular” one.  Props to them for doing that.  But as for the Killers album itself..  I also need to work my wife into this.  Back then I didn’t know her as she was just 13 and living elsewhere.  But she’s told me over the years that her main friend at the time was into Maiden, and she’d play the Killers album all the time back when it was new.  So when I talk about these songs, she knows them – and not just the well known ones, which is cool.  :)

Rest in Peace Paul, you’ve done well with the Killers album.  #UpTheIrons indeed.