HISTORY OF IRON MAIDEN: The Final Frontier? (2010 - 2011)

 2010–2012: The Final Frontier?

On January 12, 2010, the band, together with producer Kevin Shirley, hired the Compass Point studio in the Bahamas to record material for their 15th studio album, entitled The Final Frontier. The publication was finally released on August 16, 2010. On June 8, 2010, at 1 a.m., a single titled "El Dorado" was made available on the group's internet home page. At the turn of 2010 and 2011, Iron Maiden celebrated their 35th anniversary with a spectacular concert tour.
The band announced their participation in the Sonisphere 2010 traveling festival as a headliner of concerts in Great Britain (Knebworth House) taking place on July 30/31 and August 1, in Sweden on August 7 and in Finland a day later. The British stars were to be accompanied by, among others: Heaven & Hell, Slayer, Anthrax, Mastodon, Iggy Pop & The Stoogies, Alice Cooper and Mötley Crüe.

The whole leg of 25 concerts played in 2010 in North America turned out to be a huge commercial success. The group headlined the Bluefest Cisco Festival in Ottawa and the Festival d'eté Quebec held on the Plains of Abraham, in front of 125,000 people. Iron Maiden, supported by progressive metallers Dream Theater, regularly performed in the USA and Canada in front of audiences of twenty thousand people. Only 36 concerts that the band gave in 2010 attracted over 1.3 million people. The popularity of Iron Maiden has busted into the stratosphere once again. At that time only Metallica was a bigger phenomenon in terms of commercial success. 

 

After the end of the North American tour, the band gave eleven concerts on the Old Continent. They performed, among others: as the headliner of the Swedish, Finnish and British versions of the Sonisphere Festival, during which the average attendance reached 65,000 people.
For the second time, they graced the German Wacken Open Air 2010 with their presence, where 100,000 people have gathered especially for the band's evening.
Iron Maiden also performed as a headliner of the Belgian Pukkelpop Festival and the Hungarian Sziget Festival in front of 80,000 people which came from all over the continent.

 

The musicians also reached Transylvania, Romania, where about 45,000 people came to their concert. During the first stage of the tour, the band only performed the single El Dorado, as a song promoting the latest album The Final Frontier.
The tour representing the repertoire of the new album took place in 2011, including headlininh the festivals in Europe, Southeast Asia and North America. The fifteenth studio album The Final Frontier turned out to be the best-charting entry in the band's career, eventually reaching the first position on bestseller lists in 30 countries around the world, as a result of which the group earned a number of gold and platinum records, also in Poland. 

 

At this stage of their career, the band had already recorded about 450 gold and platinum records. "Coming Home" and "The Final Frontier" were released in electronic form and as promotional singles for the media. The album, although perceived as evidence of the stylistic progression of the band's music, aroused extreme opinions among the fans who accused the musicians of moving away from a strictly heavy metal direction in favor of quasi-progressive explorations.
The composition "El Dorado" promoting the album was nominated for a Grammy Award in the "Best Hardrock Performance" category; in February 2011, the British musicians were awarded the first American statuette in their career. 

 

 Meanwhile, the band began the next leg of the tour titled "Around The World In 66 Days", covering 27 concerts in Asia, Oceania, Europe and both Americas, during which they played to approximately 770,000 people. Once again, Iron Maiden and the crew traveled on a specially prepared Ed Force One plane. The British musicians performed, among others: as the headliner of Soundwave Festival 2011 in Australia (the Australian tour includes seven concerts for 200,000 people), they gave two open air concerts in Indonesia, they also reached South Korea for the first time, but due to the effects of the ecological disaster and atmospheric contamination with atomic radiation in Japan, were forced to cancel two sold-out concerts at the 25,000-capacity Saitama Arena.

 

Concerts in South America were usually held in sold-out large stadiums, such as Mexico's Foro Sol, Brazil's Estádio do Morumbi, Peru's Universitario San Marcos, Colombia's Simon Bolivar Park, Argentina's Velez Sarsfield, and the largest in Chile, Estadio Nacional de Chile. The Chilean concert was filmed for another DVD.
During the concert in São Paulo at the aforementioned Estádio do Morumbi, Iron Maiden was watched by approximately 80,000 people, which was a record for a heavy rock performer. Popularity of the band in Latin America became a kind of religious devotion.

The last stage of the tour included performances on the Old Continent, including a tour of arenas in Germany and Great Britain, where the band's eleven concerts attracted approximately 160,000 people. Seven concerts as the headliner of the Sonisphere Festival in Poland, the Czech Republic, Italy, Turkey, Spain, Switzerland and Greece - attracting audiences of several dozen thousand people - made history. For the fourth time in their career, the British played as the headliner of Roskilde Festival for 150,000 people, almost 100,000 rock fans were present during the first performance in his career as one of the stars of the Belgian Werchter Festival.

To sum up the Scandinavian stage of the tour, it is worth adding that in 2010–2011 the band gave seven stadium and festival concerts for 480,000 fans, gathering a record audience in Scandinavia! The Final Frontier World Tour 2010/11 concluded with two sold-out shows at London's O2 Arena, after 103 performances for approximately three million people in 39 countries. The premiere of a live album and DVD titled En Vivo! was announced for March 26, 2012. Audio-video publications commemorate the concert at the Estadio Nacional de Chile in Santiago, in front of over 50,000 people - and the course of the "Around The World In 66 Days 2011" concert tour. The documentary and concert film released in March 2012 turned out to be another commercial success, reaching the top of sales charts in about 30 countries and bringing the band a number of awards. It was the fifth publication of this type that enjoyed international popularity.