Iron Maiden / Twisted Sister Concert 2-16-85

What Is This?
I was asked by many about my musical influences when making stamps and asked to share some of the stories behind the concerts I have seen. I have been to 1200+ live concerts (all national touring bands/singers with albums, not local club bands or tribute/cover bands, have seen plenty of those too) and have saved every ticket stub and backstage pass (when I had one) and kept notes (like a journal) on every show I have ever seen. So from time to time I will scan in the ticket stub from a show I saw (going in no order, skipping around) and talk a little about the show and my opinion. All information property of dA--stamps/dA--bogeyman (me). This is entry#5.

The Concert:
Iron Maiden
Twisted Sister (Opening Act)
February 16, 1985
Lakeland Civic Center, Lakeland, Florida (USA)

Just So You Know:
This was the Iron Maiden "World Slavery Tour" (in support of their 'Powerslave' album). I had seen Iron Maiden before and knew their live show was amazing. This would end up being one of the longest concert tours in music history and Iron Maiden's 'Live After Death' album was recorded on this tour. This was Twisted Sister's tour for the 'Stay Hungry' album and they were on top of the music scene at this time thanks to heavy MTV rotation of their videos.

Personal:
My friend Scott was visiting from Boston and was a huge Twisted Sister fan and I had seen Iron Maiden two years earlier and knew they were awesome live so we were trying to decide what to do this night and ended up going to this concert kinda last minute. We got to the Lakeland Civic Center early so we could have a few beers and pizza. General admission seating (standing on the floor, seats around the side) and we got seats right down by the stage on the right side next to some cute teen girls. Right in front of us were two older girls and one was very pregnant (like ready to deliver any day now). The pregnant girl was sweating a lot and drinking lots of water before the concert. During the Twisted Sister set her water broke (that's what she said) and she was ready to deliver her baby so paramedics came and took her into an ambulance (with her friend) and off to the hospital they went (concert did not stop when this happened). Two days later I saw a little blurb in the newspaper about the girl who gave birth and she named her daughter 'Dee Dee' after Dee Snider (lead singer of Twisted Sister).

The Live Concert (Opener):
Twisted Sister took the stage first and they were in rare form on this night. Dee Snider roamed the stage like a metal madman belting out all the lyrics of the songs that made Twisted Sister famous. Twisted Sister's costumes and make-up were glam metal at it's finest in 1985. Of course the biggest crowd pleasers were "We're Not Gonna Take It" and "I Wanna Rock" but I really liked "Stay Hungry" and "The Price" also. They played for 45-50 minutes and really got the crowd going and primed for iron Maiden. My friend Scott says this is the best live performance he has ever seen in his life (even to this day).

The Live Concert (Headliner):
The lights went out and the black curtain dropped and you heard a recorded speech from Winston Churchill - the crowd went crazy. Went the spotlights and laser lights came on the whole stage was set up to look like ancient Egypt (pyramids everywhere, huge sphinx in the center, coffins/sarcophagi all around the stage). Bruce Dickinson sang "Ace's High" and the tone was set for the night, excellent heavy metal music Iron Maiden style. Third song played that night was "The Trooper" and my friend Scott and I really got into the show at this point and we were dancing with and around the cute teen girls we sat by (they were into the music also). Nicko McBrain was a wizard on the drums this evening and after the song "Powerslave" guitarist Dave Murray played a guitar solo that was amazing. "The Number of the Beast" and "Run To The Hills" brought a big roar from the crowd as Iron Maiden's mascot 'Eddie' came out from one of the large Egyptian coffins and pranced around the stage. Iron Maiden played for around two hours that night and closed the concert with "Sanctuary", my friend Scott and I both bought Iron Maiden & Twisted Sister concert t-shirts on the way out (I still have mine, both in good shape, to this day).

Check out my 'Concert Memories' dA gallery for more of my concert musings da--stamps.deviantart.com/gall…