662. Paul Di'anno & Dennis Stratton / The Original Iron Men. 1995. 3/5

About five weeks ago, I reviewed an EP by a group of likeminded musicians brought together to form a band called Gogmagog, a project that went nowhere on the back of three very bland and unworthy songs written by a producer rather than allowing the band members to contribute and perhaps write the songs themselves. It raised many questions both now and back when I first discovered that EP, mostly about the ridiculousness of not having writing contributions from those artists, but also about the reconvening of former bandmates into another band. In that group had been former Iron Maiden bandmates, lead singer Paul Di’Anno and drummer Clive Burr, and I wondered at that time as to whether they had thought of or discussed being in a band together after that.
Di’Anno continued in other bands that he formed around himself, such as Battlezone and Killers, along with a short stint in another NWoBHM alumni band Praying Mantis in 1990, where he was alongside another former Iron Maiden member in Dennis Stratton. This line up recorded a live album titled “Live at Last” before Di’Anno moved on to the next of his many projects. Stratton stayed with the reformed Praying Mantis until 2006.
Flash forward to 1995. The music world has changed considerably since those heady days of 1980, surely so much that would be impossible to believe that any sort of revival of combinations from that era would be able to work in that day and age. Enter producer Lea Hart, who had been the lead vocalist and guitarist for the band Fastway on two albums in the late 80’s and early 90’s, co-writing and co-producing the albums “On Target” and “Bad Bad Girls”, both of which had little to no commercial success. Fastway went on a hiatus after this, and Hart went on to become the manager of... Paul Di’Anno. Now, it is probably fair to say that at this time of his career, Paul was struggling to find a focus. He had tried all of these other bands in the years since 1991, creating albums that had some good material on them surrounded by a lot of generic filler, and he seemed unable to find a way to break the cycle. His new manager of course was going to be looking for a project for him that he would have felt would fit his abilities, as well as something that he felt would lift his profile at a time when, let’s face it, music that Di’Anno had been best at was now somewhat prehistoric.
Now I can’t say I know the full story behind this album that I’m talking about today, about how the idea came to present itself to those involved, and how they decided that it was a good idea to carry through. Pulling in Dennis Stratton so that they could use the promotional tool of calling the project’s album ‘The Original Iron Men’ (when that is plainly not quite the case) seemed an interesting ploy, given how the album came together. But with those pieces all in place, the album came to pass, and people like me, who are suckers for nostalgia and have rose coloured glasses when it comes to the hope that something JUST MIGHT be really really good, were attracted to what these two had to offer the world in 1995. As it turns out, the story is even more bizarre that what I have already mentioned.

So here is the deal. If you thought the Gogmagog set up was a little strange, then this one will really knock your socks off. Because on this occassion we have a similar set up where the two main players who have been brought in, who have their names plastered all over the front of the album cover, don’t actually contribute to any of the writing of the tracks. And, indeed, at least for the most part if not the whole part, they don’t contribute any instruments to the album either! How is this possible, you may well ask yourself? Well, it all comes back to Lea Hart. You know, the guy who played in Fastway, and then became Paul’s manager? Well it turns out that Hart co-wrote a majority of the songs on those two Fastway albums that he played on, and so must have had some sort of distribution rights to them. Because here’s the thing. Firstly, 8 of the ten songs on this album are songs taken directly from those two Fastway albums, and the other two are songs written by Hart and recorded in a solo environment. But, on top of that, it appears that for at least some, possibly many, and almost certainly all, of the music that appears on this album, are the actual music tracks that were recorded for those other albums. They have not even been re-recorded, they are the actual tracks. Now, can I say this is 100% true? I cannot. But in preparing for this podcast episode, I have meticulously – and somewhat painfully – played both versions of each song against each other, comparing the music, and to me they are all basically the same song. There are a couple where I can’t be totally sure, but that could easily have come from some clean up in the studio for this album. And, the credits for playing on this album are all the same as the people credited with playing on those two Fastway albums. I mean, I can’t see Fast Eddie Clarke and Neil Muray just dropping everything to come in and RE-RECORD these tracks that they had already performed WITH THEIR ACTUAL BAND! Can you? No.
So what we have here are ten tracks, pre-recorded some years prior to this moment, and we’ve brought in Di’Anno and Stratton to contribute vocals to these tracks. Which is interesting, given that Hart himself sang on these tracks initially, so he has just replaced himself with two others. And although Stratton is a guitarist first, while he gets to sing on some of these songs he does not get to contribute is guitar to the album. Yeah... it’s all a bit strange, especially as it is 1995 and this style of songs, 1980’s cheesy soft rock that have been out of favour for at least half a decade, are the ones being utilised. Without any change. I mean, the people who are most likely to actually want to buy this album are old Iron Maiden fans, so wouldn’t you try to make the songs sound at least a LITTLE BIT like that era of music?!
Of the ten songs here, six have Paul on lead vocals and four have Dennis on lead vocals. What is even more amusing is that the original backing vocals from the original tracks is also included here, so it is quite literally just these two guys adding their own voice to these tracks – and that’s it! The chosen tracks do at least seem to have been paired nicely with each singer's range and style. Dennis has a vocal style that suits early 80’s soft rock songs, an amenability that makes the songs pleasant to listen to and easy to bounce along to and even sing along with. “I’ve Had Enough” opens the album in this way, with the vocal and supporting voices matched by the rock anthem feel of the guitars and drums. “It Ain’t Over Til It’s Over” could easily have been on a Kiss album from the early 80’s era, and Dennis’s vocal perfectly fits in with that. The original song had to be going for this angle such is the blueprint of the track, and Dennis slots in nicely. “Bad Girls” more or less heads in the same direction musically and then lyrically. These two songs came from two different albums but the slant is pretty obvious when you listen to it. Dennis is then also in charge of the album closer “Two Hearts in Love”, a real 80’s soft rock road tune, the kind of thing you’d expect to hear on the soundtrack of one of those classic terrible teenage coming-of-age films that you can’t help but watch and re-watch. This fits that genre perfectly.
Paul then has the reins for the remaining six songs. And all of them have the same vibe as a lot of stuff he has done through that decade himself. He has a relaxed and great style of singing hard rock songs, putting his own emphasis on the tracks himself. If you happen to listen to the original versions, I think you’ll agree that he sings them better than his then current manager did. Are any of them great songs? No, but they are enjoyable. Paul’s energy in his vocals are very good, and I have always been a fan of Fast Eddie Clarke, whose guitar remains here from the original tracks, so that is always great. “Lucky to Lose”. Comes at a good clip and has a fun melody. “Let Him Rock” has hilarious lyrics, a strange song structure for the chorus, laughable backing vocals in the chorus... but is surprisingly catchy. “Listen What Your Heart Says” is more a soft rock ballad, something I would have expected Dennis to climb aboard on, but Paul does a great job on it and gives it an essence that Dennis would not have. “She Won’t Rock” meanwhile sounds exactly as you would expect it would from the title of the song. I mean, for Fastway this was a pretty low level ridiculous track. Add Paul Di’Anno into the mix, and he makes it... mildly tolerable, mostly because even though they never toured and played these songs (and there’s a shock!!) I can imagine him on stage singing it and having fun with it. “I’ll Be Miles Away” again has a fun vibe about it, even if the song itself doesn’t really grab you in any shape or form, while Paul’s final contribution is on the track “Death of Me”. This song, like others of its ilk, sounds like it could have been in a mid-1980's teenage high school movie, something like Rodney Dangerfield’s “Back to School”. Paul does a good job with the material he has been hashed up here, making most of this an interesting listen when you are in the mood for something like this. And no, I don’t actually know when that is.

Back in 2009, I was trawling music stores and second hand record stores and websites, trying to hunt down any material I could that former Iron Maiden vocalist Paul Di'anno had been involved in. You see, he was about to tour Australia for the first time, and I wanted to know the songs he was going to perform before I heard them at the gig. I already had stuff from his Killers project and his Battlezone project, and I just wanted to find whatever else I could. During that process, I came across this particular album, and having at first thought ‘maybe I’ve had found what could be one of the great undiscovered albums!’, and secondly thought ‘I’m was going to be ridiculously disappointed if I think this before I listen to it’, I took it home to see just exactly what I had. It is safe to say that I had no idea.
I still remember listening to it for the first time, and trying to work out exactly what had brought this on. It wasn’t until later that I discovered that this was basically just Fastway Mark II, that Paul and Dennis were hired guns, and the whole production was like a cut and paste book. And the same questions raised their heads then as they do now – not only why do this, but why do it at a period in music history when this kind of music had all but been eradicated from the populus? By the time I discovered it of course it didn’t matter, I’m just listening to it like it was released in 1985 not 1995, but at the time it seems like a really strange choice. There is a definite vibe in some of these songs from what was being recorded by both Kiss and Alice Cooper in the mid-1980's, which I guess is what piqued my interest when I first found it, as I love both of those artists and that era of those artists.
But what about the other missed factors. The lack of contribution on guitar at least for Dennis? And isn’t there a missed chance for both singing on the same song, at least a couple of times? And how about writing at least one or two songs, so that they did have an original contribution to the album? Of course, none of that was what was in the producer's blueprint, and I’m sure both Paul and Dennis were offered what they must have thought was free money to participate in it, so there was no need to work harder than required.
I’ve pulled this out again this week. It has been a while, but the same songs still draw me in when I do listen to this album. And even though, let’s face it, this is NOT a great album, I still didn’t mind listening to it once again, a number of times as it turns out. There is something about Paul Di’Anno in particular that keeps drawing me in, and not for the first nor last time I wondered while listening to this album again this week how someone wasn’t able to take his talent and vocals and build something around him that really took off. Given his volatility on and off stage, something we saw on three tours of Australia over the years, perhaps it really isn’t that surprising.
This album is far more accessible on streaming services now than it ever was, perhaps due to Paul’s passing at the end of last year. While most will perhaps dislike or even hate what this album contains, for fans of these artists this album is worth a listen. Just don’t go in with high expectations, and just enjoy the ride.