Comedian Bill Burr Says Iron Maiden Live “Fucking Blew Me Away”
It turns out that Bill Burr’s recent love affair with metal may have been a long time coming.
The comedian and actor (The Mandalorian, Breaking Bad), you may recall, has been taking drum lessons with Dave Elitch (The Mars Volta, Killer Be Killed). Elitch turned Burr onto Meshuggah, which in turn led to Burr getting hip to Slayer (just in time for them to retire) and even considering an open invitation to play drums for Ministry.
But on the latest episode of his Monday Morning Podcast, Burr reveals that he went to see Iron Maiden when they played Los Angeles on September 14… and as it turns out, he’s a Maiden fan from way back, and even credits Nicko McBrain with being “the reason I started playing drums.”
Said Burr of the show:
“I don’t think the band has ever sounded better. They absolutely fucking blew me away. Bruce Dickinson’s voice was incredible.”
Burr went on to sing McBrain’s praises:
“You should see the guy’s drum kit. His drum kits are works of art. It looks like it’s made out of stained glass when it’s underneath the lights … Each one of his toms, [the artist] did a different motif of all the different Eddies throughout the years, all the different album covers. Despite all the albums that they have, [Nicko] seems to have just as many toms going around his kit. I can not say enough about how great the band sounded.”
The comic continued:
“Nicko McBrain was the reason I started playing drums. I watched that ‘Live After Death‘ VHS tape a million times … I watched ‘Live After Death‘ for so fucking long that it became a catchphrase between me and all my siblings, of Bruce Dickinson saying, ‘Scream for me, Long Beach!’ When we saw them Saturday night, Bruce Dickinson was going, ‘Scream for me, Los Angeles!’ Me and [my sister] just looked at each other like, ‘Oh my god. he’s saying the thing that we watched!’ Total fanboy thing. It was fucking awesome.”
The 51-year-old Burr would have been 17 when Live After Death was first released in 1985… which does kinda make you wonder how the hell he missed out on Slayer for so long. But, hey, better late than never!
You can listen to the full podcast below. Iron Maiden are on tour now; get tickets here. Bill Burr also has a bunch of shows coming up in October — tickets are here.
[via Loudwire]
