Iron Maiden – Stranger In A Strange Land 12″ UK (1986) 12 EMI 5589 original 1st press. Check exclusive video showing the 12″ for sale!

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Check exclusive video showing the 12″ for sale!

Check exclusive video showing the 12″ for sale!

“Stranger in a Strange Land” is a song by the English heavy metal band Iron Maiden, released as the second single from their sixth studio album, Somewhere in Time (1986). The song is unrelated to Robert A. Heinlein’s novel by the same name.
Synopsis
The lyrics are about an Arctic explorer who dies and is frozen in the ice. After a hundred years his body is found preserved by other people exploring there. Adrian Smith was inspired to write about this song after talking to an explorer who had a similar experience of discovering a frozen body.

The guitar solo in “Stranger in a Strange Land” is played by Smith. In a 2020 interview   the guitarist said that it was one of the first Iron Maiden songs that gave him “space to play in”, citing its mid-paced tempo as the reason why; “a lot of the Maiden stuff up until then had been very fast, and aggressive, and heavy, but that actually allowed me a little bit of space to stretch out a bit”, he said.

The song is one of only five Iron Maiden songs to fade out; the others being “The Prophecy” from Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, “Hell on Earth” from Senjutsu, “Women in Uniform”, a single included on some pressings of Killers, and “Kill Me Ce Soir”, a 1990 B-side. The lyrics “brave new world” were also present in Iron Maiden’s 2000 studio release, Brave New World.

Cover details
Eddie’s appearance on the single cover is an homage to the Clint Eastwood character “Man with No Name”, although it can also be seen as a mixture of Rick Deckard from Blade Runner and the “Man with No Name”. This version of Eddie would later be used in the Camp Chaos music video for “Run to the Hills”.

In the top-right corner of the cover (slightly right of Eddie’s lit match), the time on the clock appears as “11:58”. This is a reference to an earlier Iron Maiden single, “2 Minutes to Midnight”.
Several cards can be seen falling from the table. One (orange background, next to red-coloured card) contains a picture of the Grim Reaper, like that on “The Trooper” cover.
Just under one of the stacks of cards, on the edge of the table, Derek Riggs’ signature can be seen.
B-sides
The B-sides to this single, “That Girl” and “Juanita”, were both played during The Entire Population of Hackney secret gig on 19 December 1985, with Adrian Smith on vocals. This is probably where the idea came from to play them as B-sides, especially with Adrian’s large presence on this single and the Somewhere in Time album.

“That Girl” was written by Merv Goldsworthy, Pete Jupp and Andy Barnett in an early line-up of the band FM and was one of the demo tracks which secured them a record deal with CBS in 1984. The song was eventually released by both Iron Maiden and FM in 1986. By then the brothers Steve and Chris Overland had joined FM and some parts of the original song (mainly choruses) had been rewritten for its inclusion on FM’s debut album Indiscreet, released just three weeks prior to Iron Maiden’s Somewhere In Time which featured a cover of the original arrangement. On this Iron Maiden version the first guitar solo is played by Dave Murray, while the ending guitar solo is played by Adrian Smith.

“Juanita” was originally played by Barnett’s band, Marshall Fury, in the early 1980s, and it was written by Steve Barnacle and Derek O’Neil. Marshall Fury never recorded a studio version of the song.

12″ single
Side one
No. Title Writer(s) Length
1. “Stranger in a Strange Land” Smith 5:42
Side two
No. Title Writer(s) Length
1. “That Girl” (FM cover) Goldsworthy, Jupp, Barnett 5:02
2. “Juanita” (Marshall Fury cover) Steve Barnacle, Derek O’Neil 3:45

Bruce Dickinson – lead vocals
Dave Murray – synthesized guitar
Adrian Smith – synthesized guitar
Steve Harris – bass guitar
Nicko McBrain – drums

Production
Martin Birch – producer, engineer, mixing
Derek Riggs – cover illustration
Ross Halfin – photography

Chart performance
Single Chart (1986) Peak position
“Stranger in a Strange Land” Irish Singles Chart 18 Somewhere in Time
UK Singles Chart 22
Single Chart (1990) Peak position
“Wasted Years/ Stranger in a Strange Land” UK 9

Adrian Smith once again calls the shots – 90%

Maiden’s second single from Somewhere in Time once again was a Smith penned track. This time one of his heavier ones. Based around a simple yet effective main riff and a bass line which is almost too simple for Harris to play. It’s a song I always liked because it was extremely different from the rest of the album yet still immensely heavy, catchy and therefore Maiden-worthy.

Filling up this EP were two covers which earlier had been played by ‘The Entire Population of Hackney’, Nicko McBrain’s project in 1985 together with Smith and some ex-Urchin members. The FM cover ‘That Girl’ is great stadium rock and with this production it almost sounds majestic. The Marshall Fury cover ‘Juanita’ is slightly less impressive, being pretty one-dimensional, but still sounding great in the hands of Maiden. The riffs are played with such ease it’s nothing short of impressive and convincing.

‘Stranger in a Strange Land’ is definitely one of the better Maiden singles from the Dickinson-era due to the well chosen a-side and having more than one great cover.

Probably the best track on Somewhere In Time – 89%

I’ve always liked Iron Maiden and this song just happens to be my favourite from them. It stands out as different to me because of course you’ve got a quiet drum beat to start with indicating, as it does most of the time, that a great track will unfold. As it slowly fades in to the almighty riff which personally I think is just brilliant. A slower track than ones like Heaven Can Wait and Deja-Vu, tracks also on the same album, but it has a lot more power to it than those tracks. The vocals are slower allowing more time to finely tune them, and finely tuned they are. The high notes are hit without a trace of a flat start and not a single note is out of tune. As a matter of fact, it may seem strange but as the chorus says “Land of ice and snow”, as you listen to the song, the guitar effects actually give the song a cold, wintery feel to it, or it could be just me.
The bass sounds seemingly complacently played but the guitar solos make up for that. The playing isn’t quite as thrashy or heavy as some of their older stuff, but it’s a good song and it’s worth a listen.

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