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21 things about Iron Maiden

Facts and figures about the iconic metal band, which has not played in Philly proper in more than 21 years

Iron Maiden plays at the Wells Fargo Center on Sunday, June. 4.
Iron Maiden plays at the Wells Fargo Center on Sunday, June. 4.Read moreJohn McMurtrie

As best as we can tell, it has been 21 years and change since Iron Maiden played within the Philadelphia city limits, but the popular metal band from England returns to the Cradle of Liberty on Sunday night at the Wells Fargo Center.

Over the missing 21 years, the band did play six times in the variously named venue on the Camden waterfront, but, in honor of those 21 missing years, here are 21 things about Iron Maiden:

   1. The last Iron Maiden show in Philadelphia was Feb. 17, 1996.

   2. The band played at the Electric Factory in support of its album The X Factor, featuring then-vocalist Blaze Bayley.

   3. Ed Force One, a Boeing 747, is the official jetliner of Iron Maiden.

   4. Lead singer Bruce Dickinson is the jet's official pilot.

   5. Dickinson, a longtime aviation buff and licensed commercial pilot, once hosted a TV show in the United Kingdom titled Flying Heavy Metal that's available on DVD.

   6. The band was founded in 1975 by Steve Harris, the bassist and the band's primary songwriter.

   7. Harris is the only original member in the band.

   8. His first career aspiration was to be a footballer, or in American parlance, a soccer player.

   9. Dickinson joined Iron Maiden in 1981, replacing Paul Di'Anno, who left in 1993 (replaced by Bayley), then returned for good in 1999.

  10. That year, Maiden finalized the lineup that remains to this day: Harris, Dickinson, drummer Nicko McBrain, and guitarists Dave Murray, Adrian Smith, and Janick Gers.

  11. The current album, The Book of Souls, is Maiden's first double album and was their first project since Dickinson recovered from throat cancer. Two cancerous tumors — one the size of a golf ball — were found in late 2014 during a routine checkup.

  12. By the time the band wraps up its U.S. tour in support of the album, in July in Brooklyn, Iron Maiden will have played 117 shows, performing for more than two million fans in 36 countries.

  13. Ed Force One will have wracked up more than 100,000 miles on the tour, despite a serious accident in March 2016 on a runway in Chile that damaged two engines.

  14. For the current tour, the jetliner is emblazoned with the song titles painted in ancient hieroglyphs, as translated by Penn professor Simon Martin. Read colleague Tom Avril's story about it here.

  15. Iron Maiden's most famous song is probably "The Trooper," which is based on Alfred Tennyson's "The Charge of the Light Brigade," about the 1854 Battle of Balaclava in the Crimean War.

  16. The Trooper is also the name of a British ale that has Iron Maiden's imprimatur. Last year, the musicians released Trooper Red and Black, an English porter-style beverage named after "The Red and the Black," from The Book of Souls.

  17. War and history are recurring themes in Iron Maiden's songs; among the best is "Aces High," about an air military engagement during the 1940 Battle of Britain from the point of view of a Royal Air Force pilot. On the official video (and during many live performances), the song is preceded by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill's famed "We shall fight on the beaches" speech, a vow that England would never fall to the Nazis. Sunday's show is the 77th anniversary of that speech.

  18. Iron Maiden: Flight 666 is a must-see documentary, for Maiden fans and should-be Maiden fans.

 19. Among the more serious plot twists in this 2009 documentary is when drummer McBrain is struck on his wrist by a golf ball while out playing, and nearly was unable to perform because of the injury.

 20. For a while, you could buy McBrain-signed golf balls on the Iron Maiden website.

 21. McBrain is good friends with golfer Nick Faldo and once gave the six-time major winner a drum kit in exchange for golf lessons.

Email: woodeld@phillynews.com

Twitter: @DebWNJ

If you go:

Iron Maiden, with Ghost, 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Wells Fargo Center. Tickets $39.50 to $99.50, 215-336-3600