IRON MAIDEN frontman BRUCE DICKINSON has offered a blunt take on aging vocalists, insisting he would walk away from the stage the day he can no longer deliver his best. Speaking to Kerrang! magazine, the singer recalled a recent argument with a journalist who pushed back on that idea. The exchange originally came up in connection with longtime MAIDEN drummer Nicko McBrain's decision to step away from touring due to health issues.
"I said, 'Look, there are loads of singers whose voices are shot and everybody knows it,'" DICKINSON recounted. "He goes, 'Yeah, but they're legends.' They're not f***ing legends. They're people who can't sing anymore. When they were singing, they were legends. When they can't sing anymore, they're not legends anymore. That's the end of that — the brutal truth."
The singer added that he could not bring himself to perform below his own standard. "I couldn't go on stage if I didn't think I could do it. I don't know how people get onstage when they can't do it anymore. Obviously, it's their life, but it's not my way."
Asked whether the prospect of his own voice fading worries him, DICKINSON was philosophical. "No. It's just a fact of life that one day it may or may not happen. You take each day as it comes, and you try to give the best performance of your life every night. That's the rules of the game."
The comments come as IRON MAIDEN tour the world on their 50th-anniversary "Run For Your Lives" run, and after DICKINSON's own well-documented health battle — the singer was successfully treated for tongue cancer in 2015 before returning to the stage. A noted advocate for vocal technique, DICKINSON has frequently spoken about the discipline required to keep a heavy metal voice in shape across a decades-long career.