I knew this was going to pop up on music banter It is from an interview he did for the Guardian newspaper in England. Here is the original link.
Iron Maiden: 'Fame is the excrement of creativity' | Music | The Guardian
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Originally Posted by Bruce Dickinson
The closest the "art establishment" ever came to embracing metal was punk. The reason they embraced punk was because it was rubbish and the reason they embraced rubbish was because they could control it.
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This comment by him completely baffles me. The Sex Pistols were perceived as a far greater threat than Iron maiden ever was, its far easier to control a scene based on Maiden's dungeon and dragons fantasy, than disenchanted youth that have politicized music, and want to see the destruction of the establishment.
For all intents and purposes metal had become much more established in the mainstream. If you were a NWOHM, thrash or glam metal band you got signed to a major label. If you were the Dead Kennedys, the Circle Jerks, Conflict or Discharge singing about politics, your music career was doomed to the indie labels.
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Originally Posted by Bruce Dickinson
Half the kids that were in punk bands were laughing at the art establishment, going: "What a ****ing bunch of tosspots. Thanks very much, give us the money and we'll **** off and stick it up our nose and shag birds." But what they'd really love to be doing is being in a heavy metal band surrounded by porn stars."
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Surrounded by porn stars...really? That's a comment I would expect to here from Gene Simmons. Yes punk rock kids are just losers who can't play their instruments. They wouldn't be singing about animal rights, nuclear proliferation and all that BS, is they had real talent because then they'd get to hang out with PORN stars! Wow, really? What a class act, does being a heavy metal superstar come with free herpies medication?
Obviously in Dickinson's world punk rock must boil down to the Damned & bands like Peter & the Test Tube Babies, because to my knowledge Joe Strummer's wasn't musically motivated by snorting coke and shagging birds.
What this boils down as it often does with the NWOHM artists is that they resented having their music sidelined in the late 70's by the punk explosion in England. I've heard other bands like Def Leppard make similar comments on punk.
The thrash bands and glam bands like Motley Crue who would have their sound directly influenced by punk normally praise the scene, so not surprisingly I would rather listen these bands than Iron Maiden any day