Listen With Nicko! Part V

What ho.... sed de ting!

Welcome to "not alot of people know that, part 5." Yes, you lot out there, ah you're so lucky! How can you
be getting so lucky, my God! Flight of Icarus in those grubby dirty by now horribly sticky little fingers and
hands and grubby palms, and oh what else is grubby, I don't know. Flight Of Icarus, I've Got The Fire!
Wooo, I have right now thinking about this, oh my goodness the memories for this, my very first exotic
jaunt over to the island of Jersey, followed by a swift little airplane ride 3000 kilometres due...east of
ah...well no, no, got that wrong, due west of Watford. My goodness, I go the wrong way and get to bleedin
Russia, it'd be all over. Yes, due west of Watford, 3000 odd bloody miles -- forget this kilometre stuff, what
do you think you are, bleedin France? No thanks very much, I'm right here!
Anyway, Flight of Icarus, doo doo doo! Flight Of Icarus, my first single, released the 11th of April 1983,
chart position number eleven...da de de da! Didn't quite get to number ten, did it? Anyway, my first record
with the band...I starred in the video! Did you see that? Did you see that handsome geezer with the blue
chops? Wasn't half cold out there! Anyway no! We did this...ah, fantastic! First trip from Jersey to Nassau to
do the album, we had five weeks rehearsal in Jersey....well, we had two weeks really because ended up three
weeks partying at the bar. My goodness, we had the only 24-hour bar on the island, and we ah...funnily
enough we managed to cram 25 hours in a day, hahaha! So there we are, fifteen days before we're supposed
to leave....fifteen days! We hadn't even written any...well, the boys had written some....but we really hadn't
rehearsed anything cause we was partying to much and having a good time, and all that good stuff. So there
you are, we get this....most of the song's written, get to Jersey, boom!
Oh, by the way, when we first arrived in Jersey, the first place we went to was a place called The Traveller's
Rest. Dear Tony Wiggins our tour manager, he told us all about this place because he checked it out before
us. Said "here look, you've got to come in this place before we go" and that's the first thing we did, got of the
plane, picked the suitcase up, "HILLO!" they said, "HOWWYOU!", "we're fine", "Ok you can come
through". So we go through, get in the cabs...off we go, Traveller's Rest. Stopped in the Traveller's Rest.
"You've gotta have a banana daquery" says Tony Wiggens. Well allright, lets have a drop.. banana... we
says, bananna... it's a poof drink! So, fair enough, so there we are sitting at the bar, and there's five poofs
sitting at the bar, us! Hahaha! Drinking these daqueries. Hahaha, no! So, the first one goes down, we
thought "f'king great, nothing to it, lets have another one!" F'king second one goes down... fifteen minutes
later we're on our third banana daquery. Now, we're talking serious alcohol here but you don't taste it
because it's a frozen drink, it's bunged in a blender, loads of ice, (unintelligable) banana liqueur,
na...bananna (unintelligable), and lots of wizzing around of varous parts, and you stick it in a glass and suck
it up with a straw. For about...three of these as I said later, ...quarter of an hour goes by ... half an hour, we
try to stand up and leave. I mean, it was like, you know, "Gaaaahh, where we goin?" Ah, we were gone! We,
we, we spent many a night down in that place, but only after an hour...we did have a party after we actually
recorded Flight of Icarus... we went down to the pub and ah, tried to get it and gave up. The next day it
weren't happening, but we went after we celebrated... we went out and celebrated the first single being
recorded.
But just before we did this, recorded the song. Steve said to me, he said, "don't you think we ought to speed
it up a bit?" I said, "Yeah, I think it should be a bit faster." And Dave and H....um, Bruce and H, sorry, had
written this song. And they were like very adamant about the tempo of this thing, they didn't want it sort of
speeding up or anything like this. So 'Arry said "play it a bit faster." I said "yes, I'll (unintelligable) it up,
don't worry" So we get in the studio and rehearsed it, we done it once or twice and it was, you know,
happening. But not so...f'king hell, I'll boost it up a tad... I'll pump it... you know. So I'm out there, "boom do
do da do do doom do do da! do do doom..." you know, allright we go... hah! and ah Bruce, Dave and H
going "aah Nick, what you.. f'king... what'd you doing?" You know, I said "Nothing!", and I thought to
myself, "Ah there we go, the new boy in the band, and they think he's only been in the band f'king two
months and he's speeding everything up, you know." Anyway, as it turned out, it's great, wasn't it? It was
really a good song.
So, they asked me to do the video. So out we are, and they said, "look do you want to do the video? You can
be the old man in it." I said, "Old man? Look here, look here who do you think you're talking to... old man!
Give us a break!" They said, "well you are, aren't ya." F'king cheek! Swift kick up the jackseat for that! ah
boof! (mumbles something) So there I am, I'm out there, they said...I said, allright I'll do the video. And they
said, yeah but ahhh.....we gotta blue your chops. I said "what?" They said, "we gotta put blue makeup on
your face." I said, "you can piss off! I ain't having none of that!" They said, "You f'king will, if you wanna
star in the video!" Neeah! So there! You wanna do it or not? I thought, "well....f'king I'm the new boy, and I
should do it really, it'll be a bit fun." And it was, it turned out to be the most amazing... fun... I tell ya, we
really had a good time. Couple of dodgy moments when I was standing on the edge of this little cliff looking
down at the...or looking out to the ocean. The wind was blowing, no the wind. I mean, I was (farting noise)
as well, certainly, but nevertheless. It was... I was (uningelligable) sixty... fifty... sixty feet down to the
ocean! F'king great big waves rolling in there, I mean I only needed to fall over and that was it! Goodbye, no
f'king Icky to help me out with the wings....c'mon dad, watch this!
Anyway, that leads me on to I've Got The Fire, which is on the b-side as you know, of Flight Of Icarus.
Now, for you boys and girls out there who've been paying attention and doing your homework, and buying
the first, second, third, and fourth box set of the new singles, et cetera, or the old new singles. I've Got The
Fire was recorded on the very very first Maiden single which was Running Free, now we've already talked
about that. But the boys decided to do it. Steve said, "I'd like to have the penultimate... or not the
penultimate, the definive... de... DEFINITIVE version of this, studio version wise, lets do it again." So that's
why we burned that one on the Icarus single.
Now moving on slowly but surely to The Trooper. Now that's a great old.... thats a song to play, man! (hums
and drums in the background).... All that, yeah! Gosh! Bringing back some.... I wanna go out and do it.
Based on a charge of the light brigade! Watch out! My goodness, woah, never has there been so many to
fight so few! Or whatever, I don't know, that was Winnie, the wrong one. Aces High, that's coming up next
kids. Yeah, well that's you know, in the next box set if you go out and buy it, you'll hear it on the next
"Nicko's uuh, you didn't know... not alot of people knew that..." Right? Number six I guess it'll be then. But
anyway, yeah, oh I remember.... in.... what was it? What was it? Into the valley of death rode the however
many it was, that was what I was trying to think of and I got the Winnie quote down the wrong way.
Nevertheless! Yes, great song.
Cross-eyed Mary. Ian Anderson wrote this song, Jethro Tull played it. We recorded it... the b-side. Did I tell
you it was released the 28th of June 1983? Chart position 12? Well if I told you that once already, f'king too
bad! So what! Nyah! See. Had to get that one in. And as a matter of fact, Cross-eyed Mary recieved.... gosh,
I mean, ulitmates ultimates lots of loads of and indies and outsies of U.S. airplay, I tell ya, this was one of
the biggest... the song to be played the most on U.S. airplay from Iron Maiden. Ain't that funny. It's the best
one that they ever played. Well I guess their answer would say that's f'king life, isn't it.
Oh by the way, just before I sign off... because I've gotta go now... you know, there's a beer waiting for me
down the road in the bar. So I thought I'd better go in and have myself a little liquid libation, being I'm half
way throught these little box sets here. Did you hear the one about the queer shepherd? No? Well, he kept
mounting goats! Hahahahahaha! It's stupid, isn't it? I love it though... oh gosh! Ok, take care of yourselves,
see you later allright? Bye.