From onstage last night (March 14th) at a packed Izod Center New Jersey, Iron Maiden vocalist Bruce Dickinson announced the second and final US leg of their eagerly anticipated “SOMEWHERE BACK IN TIME — WORLD TOUR 08”. Tickets for Iron Maiden’s current dates at the Los Angeles Forum and New Jersey’s Izod Centre having sold out months in advance, the band are delighted to announce they are coming back for more major USA concerts this summer which will take them to a number of cities they have not played in many years along with a return to the New York area at PNC Bank Arts Center,NJ, on June 14th and Madison Square Gardens on 15th June.
Tickets for these shows will go on sale to the public soon as listed below.
A special pre-sale will be made available exclusively to members of the Iron Maiden fan club.
SOMEWHERE BACK IN TIME — WORLD TOUR 08′ USA TOUR DATES:
| 6/11/08 Rosemont, IL 6/12/08 Cuyahoga Falls, OH 6/14/08 Holmdel, NJ 6/15/08 New York, NY 6/17/08 Camden, NJ 6/18/08 Columbia, MD 6/20/08 Mansfield, MA |
Allstate Arena* Blossom Music Center PNC Bank Arts Center Madison Square Gardens* Susquehanna Bank Centre Merriweather Post Pavilion Tweeter Center for The Peforming Arts |
Shows already announced and on sale ( http://www.ticketmaster.co.uk/artist/719339) :-
| 5/21/08 San Antonio, TX 5/22/08 Houston, TX 5/25/08 Albuquerque, NM 5/26/08 Phoenix, AZ 5/28/08 Concord, CA 5/30/08 Los Angeles, CA 5/31/08 Los Angeles, CA 6/2/08 Seattle, WA |
Verizon Wireless Woodlands Journal Pavilion Cricket Pavilion Concord Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre White River Amphitheatre |
* These venues will be able to facilitate a special ‘First to the Stage Barrier’ privileged early admission for members of the Iron Maiden Fan club through an exclusive draw.
The “SOMEWHERE BACK IN TIME — WORLD TOUR 08” was inspired by Maiden’s recently released DVD, LIVE AFTER DEATH (New Door Records/Ume). Filmed and recorded over four spectacular nights at Long Beach Arena on the “Powerslave Tour” in 1985, this has long been a benchmark for rock concert videos and live albums, and the CD remains one of the biggest-selling live albums ever with sales in excess of six million worldwide. With the video having been largely unavailable for many years, the fans’ massive interest in this legendary concert continues to this day with the DVD debuting at No. 1 on charts around the world (including The UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark and Finland), as well as No 2 on the Billboard USA Chart and in Canada.
This tour revisits the band’s history by focusing almost entirely on their classic 80’s period in both choice of songs played and the stage set, which is based around the legendary Egyptian Production of that ‘Powerslave Tour’ as portrayed on the Live After Death DVD. This will arguably be the most elaborate and spectacular show the band have ever presented. Furthermore the band intends to bring along for this summer leg of the tour the colossal mummy of Eddie, as featured on the Live After Death DVD, along with various other elements of the show that would not fit on their 757 on the first leg of this tour, which included the shows at the Forum and Izod Centre.
Says vocalist Bruce Dickinson ; “For this summer tour we will be able to bring along all of Eddie’s toys which we couldn’t get on our plane during this first leg. We are all having a great time on this tour and really can’t believe the excitement it is creating around the world and the huge numbers of people who are turning out to see us. It makes for a really very exciting time for all of us, fans and band alike”
‘Maiden Mania’ has been gripping countries around the world as tickets for the 2008 World Tour flew out of box offices everywhere when they went on sale. On the first leg in Feb/Mar alone, tickets in Sao Paulo, Brazil, at the 42,000 capacity Palmeiras Stadium sold out in just a week ; Mexico City’s 22,000 capacity Sports Arena sold out in a record-breaking four days leading to the show being moved to the 52,000 Foro Sol Stadium; a first ever visit to Colombia, where first day ticket sales were the biggest for any music event there ever, saw the Simon Bolivar Stadium in Bogota sell out the 30,000 original capacity in 10 days and being been extended to 50,000; 14,000 capacity arenas in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia, sold out in less than half an hour with second shows being added in both cities and the band playing to 70,000 fans there; 25,000 fans in each of Argentina, Chile and Costa Rica quickly snapped up all available tickets.
The story continues in North America where shows in major arenas in LA, New York, Toronto sold out weeks in advance; and in the summer, when Maiden take the show around the stadiums of Europe, 125,000 tickets were sold in just over 2 hours last November for three stadium shows in Sweden and Finland!
Being able to tour the Southern Hemisphere in such a concentrated way is all due to the band taking their own plane — along with their entire 50-man crew, 12 tons of equipment and stage set — around the world with Astraeus Airline Captain Bruce Dickinson at the helm. As The Age in Australia reports:
“Some bands achieve such colossal levels of success that they get to ride in their own jet. But very few actually fly the damn things themselves. British heavy metal kings Iron Maiden have taken the DIY ethos to a new level — albeit with a much bigger budget than most heavy metal bands — when singer Bruce Dickinson flew his band into the country this week in a specially refitted Boeing 757.”
SELECTION OF PRESS REVIEW QUOTES FROM FIRST LEG OF TOUR @ MARCH 12TH 2008
CHILE
“The day of the Beast has come. Yesterday at 20:25 hrs, the Pista Atlética of the National Stadium , one of the few times ever to be filled to maximum capacity, reached boiling point …”Aces High” was the first punch and the Chilean fans responded at fever pitch”
BRAZIL
Headline: Maiden Iron Maiden back to the golden years left the stage to a standing ovation
“It wasn´t even funny. Everybody knew the score. Parque Antartica filled with 40K people on a Sunday,the feeling was like that of a championship football match…Not even the heavy rain that fell 10 min before the concert started could dampen the enthusiam of the fans : at each drop the crowd screamed “maiden maiden” with the same intensity.This is was the first stop in Brasil on the Somewhere Back in Time” tour and of course Iron Maiden won the game by a big score…
COLOMBIA
Headline “We Are Different”
“The show begins and 50,000 Colombians dive into a Nirvana of molten metal”
“Iron Maiden leave the stage on top of the world, leaving no doubt at all the Metaleros really are different!!!”
COSTA RICA
Headline: “Iron Maiden Shook Central America From Tibas”
“Thousands of Costa Rican fans and Central Americans lived an historic night when Iron Maiden made their debut in the isthmus 33 years after their formation. Such was the madness provoked by Bruce Dickinson when he shouted “Costa Rica you’re the best”, that 27,000 followers responded with a deafening roar”
“Fans came from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and others. Some still couldn’t quite believe that the group was actually there, at what was for them the most important rock concert ever to have happened in Costa Rica….The mood at El Saprissa was one of pure euphoria. The fans were jumping about so much it seemed the whole building had left the ground!”
MEXICO
Headline: “More Than 50,000 Say Goodbye To Iron Maiden In Their Last Concert In Mexico”
“Without doubt, after this concert, Iron Maiden has gone down in history. They’re still the best Heavy Metal band, and Mexico will be waiting with open arms for when they come back”
USA
Headline: “The band turns the way-back machine to vintage year 1985 for its monumental stage set”
“You can never accuse Iron Maiden of wimping out. The three-decade English rock institution proved that Tuesday night at The Forum”
“Blues roots were banished — supercharged Saxon folk is what these warriors do, and in a world where the West is cowering, the rafter-stacked audience found cause for triumphal revelry”
AUSTRALIA
“Iron Maiden will never grow old, sell out or lose their balls of steel. Iron Maiden scream like no other, perform like no other and rocked the socks off Perth like no other”.
INDIA
“it was exactly at that desperately awaited stroke of 7.59pm, that Mumbai’s collective adrenaline, energy , and frantically fluctuating blood pressure levels rushed from almost 30,000 heads and toes at Bandra’s MMRDA grounds. As one of heavy metal music’s most revered super-gods stepped on to the stage, the black T-shirted swarm of helplessly eager metalheads almost risked screaming their lungs out of their mouths