Taking to Facebook, Iron Maiden producer Kevin Shirley has heavily hinted at a 2020 release from the band. This will be their first album in five years and has been a long time coming from the legends of metal.
Iron Maiden has been touring extensively since their last album, The Book of Souls, so it’s easy to forget that 2020 will mark five years since its release. However, it appears we may be getting new music from the metal legends next year.
The band’s longtime producer Kevin “Caveman” Shirley posted a year-end recap on his Facebook page, heavily suggesting that Maiden spent notable intervals in the studio in the first half of 2019 working on their next album.
In the post he writes: “I left my family for Paris, where I spent the next three months working very hard on an unnamed but not-very-secret project,” wrote Shirley at one point in his recap. “I finished with a loud ringing in my ears.”
Listen to ‘The Trooper’ by Iron Maiden
Shirley’s “not-very-secret” line may relate to an April report from the Italian website Maiden Concerts. The site gathered various social media links which indicated that all six members of Iron Maiden and Shirley had been in Paris over a period of several weeks. And there is the mystery solved. Iron Maiden released The Book of Souls in 2015, the same year singer Bruce Dickinson revealed a cancer diagnosis.
The band delayed touring until Dickinson was given a clean bill of health, launching “The Book of Souls World Tour” in early 2016 and wrapping it up in summer 2017. Maiden then announced “The Legacy of the Beast Tour”, spending good portions of 2018 and 2019 on the road, and recently announcing more dates for 2020.
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The next LP from Iron Maiden will be their 17th studio album, and sixth to be produced by Shirley, if the aforementioned reports are confirmed. Stay tuned as more details emerge.
