50 Years of Iron Maiden

What’s coming up on Grab A Stack of Rock? And why is Dan wearing his lifeguard hat?

A quick conversation between Mike and Dan…what’s up with the hat??

 

Grab A Stack of Rock theme video – extended version with Blaze Bayley and guitar solo

Music & vocals by Tee Bone, remix and guitar solo by Tim Durling.  Writting by M Ladano, J Ladano, T Erickson

Not including myself, 50 people have been on Grab A Stack of Rock to date.  We started this show on October 28 2022 – happy three years to us!  50 guests in three years – two of which you have not officially met yet! Can you spot them in the new video? Their appearances on 50 Years of Iron Maiden are coming soon.

I know I’m a luddite when it comes to software.  My computer friend Brian, who assembled my new PC for me, has probably been ripping his hair out trying to make sure all my tastes for outdated software (and hardware) are satisfied.  As such, I still use Windows Movie Maker as my sole video editing software.  And it’s glitchy.  No question it’s glitchy.  I put about 5 hours’ work into this video this week!  Tim Durling came to the rescue at the last minute with a lost file of his guitar solo for the song.  You see, so many people have been on the show that we cannot squeeze all 50 guests into it any more.  It has now been extended twice to accommodate all the guests.  This new version will last a long time as now there is plenty of room for more.  And more are indeed coming.

Thanks for watching Grab A Stack of Rock.  Happy Three Years to us!  Cool things still to come.

 

  1. Blaze Bayley
  2. Harrison Kopp
  3. Mike Ladano
  4. Eric “Uncle Meat” Litwiller
  5. Aaron KMA
  6. Tim Durling
  7. Rob Daniels
  8. John T Snow
  9. Marco D’Auria
  10. Grant Arthur
  11. Brian Richards
  12. MarriedandHeels
  13. Kevin Simister
  14. Dr. Kathryn
  15. Jen Ladano
  16. Grace Scheele
  17. Jex Russell
  18. Spencer “Spenny” Rice
  19. Nurse Kat
  20. Peter Kerr
  21. John Clauser
  22. Erik Woods
  23. Jason Drury
  24. Pierre-Luc Allard
  25. Len Labelle
  26. Reed Little
  27. Metal Roger
  28. John the Music Nut
  29. Mike Slayen
  30. Pete Jones
  31. Todd Evans
  32. James Kalyn
  33. Angie Moon
  34. Ryan Gavalier
  35. Chris Preston
  36. Dan Chartrand
  37. Glen “Archie” Gamble
  38. bicyclelegs
  39. Davey Cretin
  40. Melissa Nee
  41. Sidney Cini A
  42. shley Geisler
  43. Martin Popoff
  44. Bert Blotto
  45. F Lee Harvey Blotto
  46. Bowtie Blotto
  47. Broadway Blotto
  48. Jake Not From State Farm
  49. Bob Cesca (Camp Chaos)
  50. Lana Teramae
  51. and (briefly) Max the Axe

VIDEO: State of the Rock – Oct 16 2025

A quick update as we head into the final cottage weekend of the season. Grab A Stack of Rock will roll on with some great content this winter and into 2026, but changes are afoot.

New Grab A Stack of Rock theme video, now with Blaze Bayley!

The culmination of almost three years of work: Blaze Bayley is the latest member added to the Grab A Stack of Rock show alumni!

In November of 2022 I started working on something I’d wanted to do for a long time:  make a show intro video that included every guest we ever had.  Back then there were not many, but the guests kept coming and coming and I kept adding and adding.  Now we have 49 guests on the list!  The Blaze Bayley episode will air this Friday September 19 at 7:00 PM EST.  The Bob Cesca (Camp Chaos) episode will air when we get to Visions of the Beast.

Thank you to all 49 of these special guests.  More to come on 50 Years of Iron Maiden!

  1. Harrison Kopp
  2. Eric “Uncle Meat” Litwiller
  3. Aaron KMA
  4. Tim Durling
  5. Rob Daniels
  6. John T Snow
  7. Grant Arthur
  8. Brian Richards
  9. MarriedandHeels
  10. Marco D’Auria
  11. Kevin Simister
  12. Dr. Kathryn Ladano
  13. Jen Ladano
  14. Grace Scheele
  15. Jex Russell
  16. Spencer “Spenny” Rice
  17. Nurse Kat
  18. Erik Woods
  19. Jason Drury
  20. Pierre-Luc Allard “PLA”
  21. Peter Kerr
  22. John Clauser
  23. Len Labelle
  24. Reed Little
  25. Metal Roger
  26. John the Music Nut
  27. Mike Slayen
  28. Peter Jones
  29. Todd Evans
  30. James Kalyn
  31. Angie Moon
  32. Ryan Gavalier
  33. Chris Preston
  34. Dan Chartrand
  35. Glen “Archie” Gamble
  36. bicyclelegs
  37. Davey Cretin
  38. Melissa Nee
  39. Sidney Cini
  40. Ashley Geisler
  41. Martin Popoff
  42. Bert Blotto
  43. F Lee Harvey Blotto
  44. Bowtie Blotto
  45. Broadway Blotto
  46. Jake Not From State Farm
  47. Bob Cesca (Camp Chaos)
  48. Blaze Bayley
  49. and (briefly) Max the Axe

Coming This Week on 50 Years of Iron Maiden… A Chat with BLAZE BAYLEY

Harrison and Mike are thrilled to announce that this week on 50 Years of Iron Maiden, we have an incredibly special guest:  Blaze Bayley himself, the first Iron Maiden alumni to ever grace the show with their presence.  Thank you so much to Blaze for doing this.

In this interview, we cover:

  • Re-recording Wolfsbane.
  • AI, science fiction and technology.
  • The Silicon Messiah.
  • Virus.
  • Canada.
  • Who the King of Metal really is.
  • Mental Health.
  • And so, so much more.

Get ready this Friday for the premiere of our interview with the amazing Blaze Bayley!  You can find all things Blaze at BlazeBayley.net.

Grab A Stack of Rock – Late August Hiatus

Just a reminder that there will be no episode of Grab A Stack of Rock this week, new or re-run, as Mike prepares for his beloved Grandmother’s funeral.

Grab A Stack of Rock will return soon with more 50 Years of Iron Maiden, more Music & Mental Health, and live episodes.

Mike lost his grandmother on July 30 2025, at the age of 101 years old.  He is working on his funeral speech, and will be the only speaker at the funeral.  He feels the need to focus on that task, and supporting his family, before he is able to record new episodes of 50 Years of Iron Maiden.

 

In the meantime, he has created a playlist called The Greatest Grandmother, featuring some of his favourite Grandma stories.

See you again real soon on Grab A Stack of Rock.

 

 

50 Years of Iron Maiden bonus episode: The Best of Blaze Bayley (edited for length)

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN bonus episode:
The Best of Blaze Bayley

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK bonus episode

In 1999, Iron Maiden reunited with Bruce Dickinson.  They have been going strong for a quarter of a century since.  Blaze, meanwhile, has had a solid solo career to celebrate.  Tonight we celebrate everything Blaze on 50 Years of Iron Maiden, to cap off his tenure in the band.

This episode from November of 2023 pre-dates our 50 Years of Iron Maiden series, but we felt now was a good time to edit it down to a reasonable length and give it a replay.  If you’ve seen this episode already, you can safely skip this bonus broadcast.  If you haven’t, we have edited this live show down to the Blaze basics and cut it to a digestible length.  All of Blaze’s career is included in this episode’s Top 11 song list.  Foregoing the traditional rules, Harrison didn’t just pick his 11 favourite Blaze tracks like Mike did.  No, Harrison technically picked 22 songs.  All Blaze solo, or Blaze Bayley-branded live versions.  Mike chose songs from all three eras of Blaze:  Wolfsbane, Iron Maiden, and solo.

Harrison and Mike only had one song in common.  That means combined we have given you 32 songs to check out.  Harrison and Mike also provided a lot of context and background to our picks, and we hope that this episode is in-depth enough for the Blaze diehards.  And we know there are Blaze diehards out there.  We see you in the comments!

We also took a look at some physical rarities:  Two Iron Maiden X Factor Japanese CDs, an X Factor singles box set, two lenticular Virtual XI CDs, a “Holy Grail” live album, one CD that Mike needs, one CD that Harrison needed but since acquired, and a Wolfsbane cassette.

We sincerely hope you take the time to watch this passionate, insightful episode about a singer that deserves more of your attention: Blaze Bayley.

 

Friday August 15 at 7:00 P.M. E.S.T.  Enjoy on YouTube.

 

Past episodes:

Handy YouTube Playlist:

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN bonus episode: The Coolest Iron Maiden Cassette You’ve Ever Seen!

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN bonus episode:
Fear of the Cassette?  The Coolest Iron Maiden Cassette You’ve Ever Seen!

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK bonus episode

Lamentably, sometimes we acquire an Iron Maiden goodie well after the episode for that album airs.  In this case, the aforementioned goodie was acquired because of a specific episode.

In episode 15, Fear of the Dark, I showed Harrison an image of the 1992 Canadian cassette edition, which to our eyes, featured a superior front cover design.  Wanting one for himself, Harrison went shopping on Discogs for cassettes.

What he got wasn’t just Fear of the Dark.  He got more.  Alot more.  But enough of our yackin’!  Go check out the episode, which is live now on YouTube as an Iron Maiden bonus this week.

 

Enjoy on YouTube.

 

Handy YouTube Playlist:

🅻🅸🆅🅴 50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 17: Raising Hell – Bruce’s “Final” Show

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 17: Raising Hell – Bruce’s “Final” Show

A special 🅻🅸🆅🅴 episode

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK #108

Scream for me, YouTube! For the “Final” time, Bruce Dickinson takes the stage with Iron Maiden, at Pinewood Studios in the UK.  It was a big pay-per-view worldwide TV broadcast.  Recorded 28 Aug 1993, the Air Raid Siren bid farewell after 11 years in Iron Maiden.

Released on VHS on 5 September 1994, the Raising Hell show is controversial for one main reason:  Simon Drake.  A “horror magician” that was invited not to open the show, but to perform alongside and during the show, Drake’s “magic” was a unique addition to Iron Maiden.  Drake had his own segments on a side stage, but also interacted with the band on “From Here to Eternity” and other segments.

Even watching the show without Drake’s segments, it’s an odd one for Iron Maiden.  A smaller stage inside a studio is an unusual place to see an Iron Maiden concert.  Still, history unfolded that night, and Harrison and I are here to tell you all about it.  And show you, too:  we will run a selection of the Simon Drake bits for you to…enjoy?

Tonight’s episode of 50 Years of Iron Maiden ends the reign of Bruce, as we soon embark on the era of Blaze.  Tune in tonight and join the comments!

 

Friday July 11 at 7:00 P.M. E.S.T.  Enjoy on YouTube or Facebook.

Past episodes:

Handy YouTube Playlist:

🅻🅸🆅🅴 50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 16: Live At Donington & A Real Live Dead One

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 16: Live At Donington & A Real Live Dead One

A special 🅻🅸🆅🅴 episode

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK #106

Scream for me, YouTube!  Harrison and Mike will be live Friday evening, July 4, for our next episode of 50 Years of Iron Maiden.  This period is a busy one in Maiden history.  The 1992 Fear on the Road tour resulted in a live album, 1993’s A Real Live One, which contained no overlap with previous live album Live After Death (ignoring Maiden England for this comparison).  The point was value, but was that a good idea?  The intention was always to follow it with A Real Dead One, but Bruce’s announcement that he was leaving Iron Maiden in 1993 put the dampers over the whole affair.  After Bruce had played his final show and was diving into making his solo album Balls to Picasso, Iron Maiden released a double live Live at Donington to commemorate the significant 1992 live gig with Bruce in the band.

There was also a VHS release of Bruce’s final show called Raising Hell, but we will tackle that subject in the next live episode.  For this week, we are covering 4 CDs of live Maiden, plus all the B-sides.  That means you’re getting A Real Live One, A Real Dead One, Live At Donington, plus the live singles for “Fear of the Dark” and “Hallowed Be That Name”.  Every song – that is how we do it here on 50 Years of Iron Maiden.

Artwork is an interesting subject to tackle when it comes to these albums.  Derek Riggs was back after a one-album absence, to provide artwork on A Real Live One and A Real Dead One.  Donington was issued with a simple white “bootleg” cover, the Maiden logo stamped in black, and no booklet.  Some consider this release to be an early form of an “official bootleg” release.   All these albums were reissued in 1998 with some changes.  A Real Live One and A Real Dead One were combined into one, and Donington was given actual cover art this time by Marillion artist Mark Wilkinson, featuring a demonic bat-Eddie 1992 concert goers would recognise from the show.  Mark will reappear in this series down the line….

Harrison and Mike will attempt to digest all of this live Maiden tonight, live.  Join us in the comments!

Past episodes:

Handy YouTube Playlist: