You just gotta hang out where the beer is.
Actually yeah I missed a lot of people too but hear about them being there later on. It was too damn crowded.
Iron Maiden in Chicago
- Thread starter Azrael LenGraden
- Start date
You just gotta hang out where the beer is.
Actually yeah I missed a lot of people too but hear about them being there later on. It was too damn crowded.
War Ensemble
Enos, You Dipstick!
If I remember correctly, the openers for the last few North American tours were:
BNW - Queensryche & Halford
Ed Hunter - Dio & Motorhead
DOD - Arch Enemy
Early Years - Part of Ozzfest (Rob Zombie & Mastodon at Denver headline show)
AMOLAD - Bullet For My Valentine
SBIT- Lauren Harris (Anthrax & Trivium at select dates)
TFF - Dream Theater
Jasonic
Doom On!
Jasonic
Doom On!
Powerslave - 1st leg Twisted Sister, 2nd leg Accept (Jasonic's first show!)
Somewhere Back in Time - Waysted
Seventh Son - Megadeth (was originally Guns n Roses)
No Prayer - Anthrax
FOTD - COC and Testament
X-Factor - Gravity Kills
Virtual - Dio / WASP (might have changed tho)
Ed Hunter - Monster Magnet and Clutch (originally Machine Head)
I think above, you meant "Give Me Ed Til I'm Dead"
Then earlier on, they supported KISS on the Unmasked Tour, Scorps on Blackout, and I think Piece of Mind was either supporting Priest or with Quiet Riot, or both.... Before my time, so I am not 100% clear and lazy to look up!
War Ensemble
Enos, You Dipstick!
I think above, you meant "Give Me Ed Til I'm Dead"
That is what I meant. Jetlag setting in. Not functioning at 100%
War Ensemble
Enos, You Dipstick!
I had never seen a show at this Chicago venue before. The sound was not good. It was a bit of a let down to me after seeing the show the previous nights in Pittsburgh, Cleveland & Detroit. I still enjoyed the show, afterall I was at an Iron Maiden show.
skyrefuge
Member
I'm sure no one is surprised that I did some fact-checking on this topic!
I'm pretty sure that the seating at Maiden's last Allstate Arena show was like this:
*Maybe* they went one more section to the left, but definitely the whole left end of the seats was unavailable.
The listed capacity for basketball is 17,500, so the 18,500 figure must refer to concerts in the round (17,500 in the stands + 1000 on the floor). Thus, due to the end-stage setup, Maiden's last show there had to be well under 18,000.
For FMBA, apparently there are "over 12,000 reserved seats". I counted the seats for sale on the LiveNation interactive seating chart, and came up with ~10,500. Add in the skyboxes, seats that don't appear on the map, and the pit if it was filled with seats, and I could see this number reaching 12,000.
From my position on the lawn, the seats were completely full. Even all the "obstructed view" seats all the way in the back.
So then the question is, were there 6,000 people on the lawn? Initially, I would say no, because the density wasn't all that high. But once I started walking around, I realized how truly huge the lawn area is, and I'm not used to doing crowd estimates in such large spaces.
So I'd go 50/50 on the statement that there were 18,000 there. It wouldn't surprise me if there were, and it wouldn't surprise me if that was fudged a little. But Bruce saying it with such authority tells me it was a ticket-sales number that he was given.
Either way, I'd give 90% confidence that it beat their last show. Then the only remaining question is, have they ever done a multiple-night stand in Chicago? I almost thought that they had for the Powerslave tour, but Wikipedia says no. But maybe they did on another tour? If so, this would technically still be the largest single-day show (it clearly beat their 2003 show at FMBA), but perhaps not an indicator of their peak in popularity.
Neil
The Invisible Guest
Member
That's the knock on that joint, and the ultimate reason I passed on going. The sound has been bad at that place since it opened. I don't think there is anything the bands can do about it .. it's the way the joint is constructed or something.I had never seen a show at this Chicago venue before. The sound was not good. It was a bit of a let down to me after seeing the show the previous nights in Pittsburgh, Cleveland & Detroit. I still enjoyed the show, afterall I was at an Iron Maiden show.
Jason, Jose, etc .... I read a few things on the net that listed the First Midwest Amp. or whatever it's called at 28,000 capacity.
According to this seating chart/info page .. 28,589
http://www.ticketseating.com/seats/first-midwest-bank-amphitheatre-tickets-tinley-park-il/
Britt
labrekk
Member
I was there for the Powerslave tour, Twisted Sister was indeed the opener here.
As for the Virtual XI tour, here we had DIO in the middle slot and DIRTY DEEDS opening, which were really excellent through their 25-minute set. DD featured Pete Franklin (ex-CHARIOT, who reunited a few years ago). The first Dirty Deeds album, 1998's Danger Of Infection, is a killer traditional HM disc BTW.
Dio, of course was good, but Tracy G butchered the old songs, as usual.
That venue is a mess. There are blocked views because of the endless amount of columns holding up the roof and the skyboxes, the sound bounces off everywhere. The speakers aren't evenly distributed so not everyone hears the same thing, the staff is a bunch of teenagers with summer jobs and no real security, the beer was $11 each even the parking lot is terribly laid out with very little signs to remind you of where you parked. Getting out of there is a nightmare too.
This place needs to disappear.
War Ensemble
Enos, You Dipstick!
When I saw the X-Factor tour, it was Fear Factory opening instead of Gravity Kills.
The second leg of the Powerslave tour that I saw was an outdoor festival show. We had Iron Maiden, Ratt, Accept, & Mama's Boys.
nomisofsiman
Member
Chicago in general just sucks as far as good sound in their larger venues. The United Center isn't bad, but it's rare for concerts to ever be there. I will say though I do prefer First Midwest more than Allstate. Everything is super distorted at the Allstate...not that First Midwest is much better but it has a slight edge.
Harvester
The Promoter
Just got back home after an incredible weekend. A HUGE thanks to my bros Nick Van Dyke for and Chris Lotesto. It was good to see a few friendly faces (Shreddy, Azrael, and sadly miss a few..Swordlord). Here's a few pics from my crappy phone:
And one from Nick's phone (who was kind enough to take me backstage):
And one from Nick's phone (who was kind enough to take me backstage):
nomisofsiman
Member
As much as I love Priest, if Halford got in better shape and didn't bury his face in a teleprompter, they might draw such numbers as well.
Priest is my favorite band, but they really never has been as mobile as Maiden. Most of Maiden have always been in extremely good, almost athletic-like. Priest in general though are at least 5 years older than Maiden. Just the honest truth. Lastly, you have to factor in that Priest are not even in the same ballpark as far as marketing that Maiden is.
TribunalRecords
Record Label(s)/Vocalist
yeah, they are a blast. i even had them open for my metalcore band and our crowd went ape shit for them too. they are just 100% high energy and that kind of show is contagious i don't care what kind of music you like.
we are releasing their new EP on 8/10.
if you pre-order via the estore you get free domestic shipping. can't beat that!
TribunalRecords
Record Label(s)/Vocalist
Jasonic
Doom On!
Excellent point my friend.
I failed to acknowledge the fact that end floor stage set up cuts of a few sections behind the stage, possibly even a couple thousand when you include the balcony sections.
Jasonic
Doom On!
skyrefuge
Member
Yeah, me too.
I *hadn't* been planning on going at all, until the setlist was revealed. The same thing happened with the AMOLAD tour; I had no plans to go until the setlist made me say "whoa, awesome!", but by that point it was too late to get a ticket for a seat I wouldn't hate, so I skipped it.
I have so much respect for them continuing to write and play good music, that I just felt I owed them my support. Particularly since, if I didn't go to this show, that meant I would have skipped their two forward-looking concerts, and gone to their backward-looking one in between. Eek! I SOOO don't want Bruce to be pissed at me for being "that guy", especially since I'm totally not that guy!
Still, I was hemming and hawing, reminding myself how much I hate arena/amphitheater shows, and what a hassle they are. But then my brother seeing them in Seattle and telling me to just fucking go, combined with a $31 lawn ticket (total, due to LiveNation's no-service-fee June) made me take the plunge.
I actually read some encouraging stuff about the lawn at FMBA, saying that it's pretty much as good or better than all but the very best seats (everything being relative in that craphole, of course). And I figured maybe it would be a new way to experience a huge show that I hadn't really tried before. I'd seen Maiden from such a variety of vantage points (general-admission small theaters to soccer stadiums to assigned-seating indoor arenas), but here was something different. I thought I might take a blanket and just lie down and chill way up in the lawn, not even caring about seeing anything. But I ended up hanging out with a younger guy I met right on the rail (of the lawn), and it was great to be around people genuinely excited about the "new" stuff, rather than old men bitching and moaning and shouting "The Trooper!" every five seconds. Maybe I can do the lie-down thing next time!
So the sound was actually quite good where I was (dead center, right behind the line of poles...I can actually identify myself in Glenn's pic!) If I moved farther up the lawn, it quickly got more tinny, but even then, the overall mix seemed good. The only real limits on audibility was Bruce running around too much, getting out of breath and forgetting to sing, or forgetting to hold the microphone near his mouth.
Everything else though, from getting in, to finally getting out, was just stupid. I'm really glad I went, almost more for the giant shared cultural experience than the actual music. But at the moment, I feel just how I felt after the '08 show, that I don't really need to go to another of these. But time and new album(s) and different venues could certainly change that feeling again!
Neil
