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.
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.
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 onYouTube.
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.
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.
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!
I am pleased to announce that Jex Russell is returning to the Grab A Stack of Rock live arena this Saturday morning. In addition to that, Harrison Kopp and Mike will still be doing Episode 16 of 50 Years of Iron Maiden on Friday night, at our usual time. Here are the details.
Friday July 4 at 7:00 P.M. E.S.T.: Grab A Stack of Rock Episode 106 50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 16: Live At Donington & A Real Live Dead One
Mike and Harrison will tackle FOUR CDs of live Iron Maiden…live!
Saturday July 5 at 8:00 A.M. E.S.T.: Grab A Stack of Rock Episode 107 Ask Jex Anything! Music and Mental Health
Jex Russell returns to Grab A Stack of Rock for his first full live episode since fall 2024. Jex has had a lot of “Where have you been?” questions and he is eager to answer. We’ll be talking about music, mental health, and the importance of taking little moments for yourself. Mike will talk about his own journey with a chapter of his tale that he has never told before.
Don’t miss these two crucial live episodes of Grab A Stack of Rock!
50 Years of IRON MAIDEN bonus episode:
Collections! Stories! Maiden on Vinyl, Bottlecaps & More!
With special guest Aaron “Mr. Books” KMA and Jex Russell
GRAB A STACK OF ROCK bonus episode
Originally run: June 16 2023. Now edited with new content.
This special bonus episode of 50 Years of Iron Maiden may be an old show from 2023, but most Maiden viewers never saw it, so I re-edited it and we’re running it again! This episode was a special fun one that we did with Aaron “Mr. Books” KMA, showing off parts of our Maiden collections.
Aaron, being Mr. Books, had one of Bruce Dickinson’s novels on hand. He also had a near-mint collection of Trooper beer bottle caps, and a rare Iron Maiden menu from Toronto. Harrison tended to focus on CDs. He had some rare bootlegs, including a DVD. For myself, I was eager to show off my Maiden vinyl collection at the time, including coloured vinyl, picture discs, some sealed records, and much more. Early on, Jex Russell showed up just to crash the party!
Speaking of books, we also took a look (for the very first time) at a Maiden book that features Mike himself. Chances are, you’ve never seen this book before. You definitely have never seen it on 50 Years of Iron Maiden before.
This was the infamous night that Jen had a seizure, fell, and almost broke her jaw. I’ve edited most of that stuff out but some remnants remain.
Friday June 27 at 7:00 P.M. E.S.T. Enjoy onYouTube.
50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 15: Fear of the Dark
GRAB A STACK OF ROCK #105
In the spring of 1992, Iron Maiden returned with new music, less than two years since No Prayer for the Dying. Album #2 for Janick Gers, and final album (for a long time) with Bruce Dickinson. It was also the final production before retiring for longtime Maiden compatriot, Martin “Black Knight” Birch. An historic album, significant in the discography, but of mixed reception. We tackle Maiden’s direction(s) on this album, the first of the “grunge era” which found bands like Iron Maiden with diminishing sales. We also had to address the new artwork by Melvyn Grant, the first Maiden album cover without Derek Riggs.
Eeeeewhhh-ZACH! Maiden began to explore current events in their lyrics, along with some different musical directions, from ballads to Zeppelin-like dirges. Were they chasing trends? Harrison makes some arguments for this, while Mike bluntly states what he likes and does not like about each of the 12 album tracks.
There are more than just the 12 album tracks to discuss: a variety of B-sides are included, such as covers of Montrose, Budgie and Chuck Berry songs. There are comedic novelty songs (plural!) for fans only, and there are live tracks, plus one rare remix. We tackle all of them.
As usual, Harrison discusses the tour, and how many of the songs were actually played live. You can count on us to give you a complete picture of every era of Iron Maiden, and Fear of the Dark is one that makes for good deconstructing. You can also count on our honesty, and Fear of the Dark is an album that divides fans…again.
Tell us what you think tonight on 50 Years of Iron Maiden.
Friday June 20 at 7:00 P.M. E.S.T. Enjoy on YouTube.
BONUS! We also unboxed Martin Popoff’s new book HALLOWED BY THEIR NAME: THE UNOFFICIAL IRON MAIDEN BIBLE in a bonus episode earlier this week!
50 Years of IRON MAIDEN bonus episode: Unboxing Martin Popoff’s Hallowed By Their Name: The Unofficial Iron Maiden Bible
GRAB A STACK OF ROCK bonus episode
Welcome to a special “teaser” episode! At long last, Martin Popoff’s Unofficial Iron Maiden Bible, called Hallowed By Their Name, has arrived at Grab A Stack HQ! Check out this monstrosity in the bonus video below.
This is a gorgeous book, and heavy as the metal it represents. Looking much like an actual hardcover bible, this book covers the entire 50 year history of the band, with loads of full colour pictures and 666 fully loaded pages.
Check out the unboxing video and let’s look forward to talking to Martin about this incredible book in the future.
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