On
August 28, 1993 British heavy metal group
Iron Maiden played their final show with vocalist
Bruce Dickinson, who had announced he would leave the band in 1993. Was it really the final show? Not really, since everybody was convinced that Bruce would at least do some sort of
reunion show if the band would quit. Fortunately for the fans, Iron Maiden didn't quit, Bruce Dickinson changed his mind and returned to Iron Maiden in
1999.
The as later turned out not-so-final show they played on August 28, 1993 was titled Raising Hell, and it was at Pinewood Studios in London, in front of a small crowd. It was recorded to be released on video (and recently on DVD), and was shown about a week after the recording on the BBC, and Pay-Per-View channels.
The band was accompanied by horror magician Simon Drake, who performed some tricks inbetween songs. Some things he did were pretty gross, but others were just downright cheesy. During one of the songs, Drake's henchmen grabbed Dave Murray and cut off his hands, so Drake could use them to play guitar.
Iron Maiden's performance was not bad, although it was obvious that it was Bruce's last gig, because he didn't show too much enthousiasm. The rest of the band played tight, and the choice of songs was practically the same as on the tour they did a few months earlier. Eddie, who showed up during the last song, was the same as that was used on the Fear Of The Dark World Tour in 1992.
At the end of the show, Drake's henchmen appeared once again. They grabbed Bruce, and threw him into the iron maiden, which is a medieval torture device. But no blood came out, so Drake opened a small door in the front. It revealed Bruce's face, and blood came out of his mouth. Suddenly, Eddie appeared on stage once again, and grabbed Drake, and impaled him. He then cut off Dickinson's head, and placed it on top of the spike which impaled Drake.
The songs they played during the show:
The
video and DVD showed the entire concert, but the Pay-Per-View show missed a few songs. The cover of the video and
DVD showed
Eddie playing a bass guitar similar to
Steve Harris.