Get your hair and your spandex out, RAWK! is back, Iron Maiden's Visions of the Beast

DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUDE!!! ROCK IS BACK!!!!!!! It can't have escaped anyone's notice that the world of the heavy guitar has gone a bit Bill & Ted of late. In the wake of nu-metal's sudden collapse, the old skool seems to have reared its haggard, weary head and make one more burst for the top. Recent releases from Span and Drunk Horse have thrust fretwankery and screeching vocals back into the public consciousness, and The Darkness' glam Van Halen tendancies even managed to earn them a number one album. With Metallica headlining the Carling Weekend, and much talk of a Grohl-powered Led Zeppelin resurfacing (although it's getting difficult to think of a rock release that doesn't feature Dave Grohl these days), the time seems right for a reappraisal of the true gods of metal themselves. Ladies and gentlemen, please rise for the almighty IRON MAIDEN!

And, in the absence of a time-travelling phonebox, what better way to re-examine our heroes than the recent career-encompassing DVD release Visions Of The Beast? After the fantastic menu page FINALLY arrives on screen after what seems like an age of animated build-up, we head straight for the videos to plough through their incredible career. Women In Uniform is first to rock our asses, and despite seeming more punked-up and primitive than their later stuff, it features both the gravel throat of cooler-than-thou initial frontman Paul Di'Anno and a young, troutless Leslie Ash. There's also some laughably bad monster make-up and tight red leather pants. When they line up together for the solo, you'd be forgiven for thinking you'd maybe got it confused with your copy of This Is Spinal Tap.

In fact, it's not really until Run To The Hills that this collection really takes off, heralding as it does the arrival of Bruce Dickinson. It's difficult to find sufficient words to sum up the importance of their second singer…'iconic' and 'legendary' seem to only touch on his importance in the Maiden's history. Blessed with a voice appropriately like a demon, he also sings probably the best song ever by a white man pretending to be a Red Indian threatened by white men. It's immediately followed by the phenomenal Number Of The Beast, which has only dated in that the spoken intro (from Revelations, apparently) sounds like the bloke who introduced Cosgrove Hall's Count Duckula. And there is more bad make-up too.

By the none-more-Tap Flight Of Icarus, we've seen the basic pattern for Iron Maiden videos; by and large, they're live performances, occasionally cut-up with footage from old films, or else they're cringeworthy '80's graphics and mini-adventures featuring various 'suits' encountering first-hand the nightmare of heavy metal. Perhaps inevitably, this often borders on the more ridiculous of Alan Partridge's TV ideas. You can almost hear the video pitchers: "So they're playing onstage and suddenly this man and woman waltz onstage, and then…get this…SHE TURNS INTO A MONSTER! With hilarious consequences." The live performances obviously show glimpses of some of the best stage sets ever, and if the deliberately hilarious video to Holy Smoke doesn't have you rolling around the floor and clutching your sides, then frankly you are a twat.

With all this visual joviality, it might be difficult to remember that the music is the real reason for the ageing rockers' genius. Happily, by the time the classic number one Bring Your Daughter To The Slaughter arrives, the balance is unquestionably redressed, and it still rocks as many glorious bells as it did all that time ago. It seems strange to consider that they might never have a chart-topper again.

This was in no way a point for consideration in 1996, however. With all the videos in chronological order, the point where third frontman Blaze Bayley arrives is chiefly notable as the moment they turned shit. Their then-comeback single Man On The Edge is far from a bad tune, but Blaze's great name and track record cannot overshadow the fact that he lacked both the larynx and the charisma of Dickinson. Furthermore, you can actually hear him force a change of accent mid-chorus. The rest of his material with the band is subsequently bollocks as well.
Happily, the boys returned to form sans the lamentable Bayley and reunited with the fans' hero Dickinson at the turn of the millennium, and the fantastic Steve Harris-penned Wicker Man demonstrates that not all band reformations have to be shit. It's evident that the Maiden sound never really progressed much after 1982, but the fact that they are so fucking good at what they do renders this point completely insignificant. And Wicker Man manages to stay true to their template whilst still acknowledging the existence of nu-metal in one of their most anthemic and best choruses yet.

The clip from their Rock In Rio show is awesome too. In front of the greatest set ever constructed by man or woman, Bruce runs round the vast stage, whilst the newly-expanded group (now incorporating THREE lead guitarists) harmonise their solos magnificently. It's difficult to top Fear Of The Dark at any show, and with the crowd singing the riff, it's always one of the greatest audience participation numbers in pop history. Here, however, they rip through it in the knowledge that they're probably the greatest show on earth, and this appears to drive them to push themselves further still.

The DVD also includes various novelty features, such as the 'just plain odd' Camp Chaos alternative videos, but even they cannot prepare you for the puzzling, but side-splitting nonetheless, Futureal Football. This comprises clips of the band playing what the Americans call 'soccer', set to the strains of one of their lesser singles. Surprisingly, they're pretty good. And it is impossible not to laugh at it.

It seems impossible to conceive that the band might not be aware of how they have gone from the scariest thing on the planet to a camp-looking collection of near-seniors. They seem to revel in this, however, and at least they're growing old gracefully. Denim has replaced the skin-tight leather of old, and in any case, whatever a band is dressed in, there's always something distinctly homoerotic about a group of men wanting to prance about on a stage together - it's not as though this is something they can avoid. So, as ever, they carry on, but now there seems to be a tongue in the cheek behind the clenched fists.

As an overview of their phenomenal career, this is probably the definitive collection of a largely impressive repertoire. And if the recent material is anything to go by, the band are still getting better and better. The Give Me Ed…'Til I'm Dead! tourbus pulls up on these shores in December. Make sure you're there for it. For those who have rocked, we salute you. There are not many true legends out there today. We're lucky to still have them. 666 may now be their combined age, but the beast is still as powerful as it ever was. All hail the true gods of metal.

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