“I looked around and everybody was just down. But we started bashing through some songs that we knew, a bit of AC/DC, a bit of Deep Purple. And suddenly we were all smiling”: Bruce Dickinson recalls his audition for Iron Maiden

Bruce Dickinson says that when he auditioned for Iron Maiden in 1981, his first thought was: “This is going to be rough.”

The singer tells MusicRadar that when he arrived for the audition the mood within the band was miserable — and the gloom only lifted when they started jamming on a few rock classics.

Prior to joining Maiden, Dickinson had been the singer for rival New Wave Of British Heavy Metal band Samson, founded by guitarist Paul Samson.

But by 1981, Dickinson and Paul Samson were experiencing time-honoured ‘musical differences’.

Dickinson says now: “Paul wanted it to be more of a blues thing and I wanted more of a metal thing.”

There was also tension between Samson and Iron Maiden after drummer Clive Burr left the former to join the latter in 1979.

“The other guys in Samson were all a bit sniffy about Maiden at the time because Clive had joined them,” Dickinson says. “There was a little bit of jealousy there, I think. And I was like, ‘They seem to be doing rather well!’”

At one point, Samson’s record company suggested that Dickinson make a solo album.

“I told them that was a bit premature,” he says. “You do a solo album when people have actually fucking heard of you! I said, ‘I actually like being in a band. I like that band feel.’”

Dickinson watched enviously as Iron Maiden’s career took off.

“We knew how they were progressing — it was fucking obvious!” he laughs.

“Maiden were doing a 50-date headline tour of Europe, and Samson was supposed to support them. But it got pulled at the last minute — our record company ran out of money and couldn't pay for us to do it.

“So the different trajectories were obvious. We turned up in our transit van, and Maiden had two articulated lorries parked outside. I thought, ‘Ah, I can see where this is going!’”

However, by the summer of 1981 Maiden were having problems with their singer Paul Di’Anno.

“They were not happy,” Dickinson recalls. “The cracks were starting to show, and people were starting to talk about it.”

Maiden bassist and leader Steve Harris decided that Di’Anno had to go, and knew that Dickinson was the perfect replacement.

Harris and Maiden manager Rod Smallwood met with Dickinson backstage at the Reading Festival after Samson’s performance there.

“They made the decision that it was going to happen,” Dickinson says, “and they called me in at Reading.”

Soon after, Dickinson was summoned to a secret location in London for his audition with Maiden.

“It was weird,” he says. “They rehearsed with me up in Hackney with everybody sneaking in — not that anybody in Hackney actually gave a shit!

“So I turned up and Steve wasn't there, he hadn't arrived yet, but everybody else was. And I looked around and everybody was just… not happy.

“Everybody was just down. And I was thinking, this is going to be rough.

“But we just started bashing through some songs that we knew, and it turned out we all knew half of every fucking rock song on the planet.

“We had a go at a bit of AC/DC, a bit of [Deep] Purple — Woman From Tokyo then Black Night — and so on. And suddenly we were all smiling and having a laugh.

“And then Steve turned up. We went, ‘Right, let’s have a bash at some Maiden songs!’ And we never looked back.”