Ed Force One Route To Chile (Apocalypse Sound AS 171)
Pista Athlectica Estadio Nacional, Santiago, Chile – March 9, 2008
Running Time: 1 hour 52 minutes
Intro Churchill’s Speech, Aces High, 2 Minutes To Midnight, Revelations, The Trooper, Wasted Years, The Number Of The Beast, Can I Play With Madness, Rime Of The Ancient Mariner, Powerslave, Heaven Can Wait, Run To The Hills, Fear Of The Dark, Iron Maiden, Band Introduction, Moonchild, The Clairvoyant, Hallowed Be Thy Name
This is the third release from AS covering the Somewhere Back In Time world tour with all three releases are from the first leg of the tour that covered 23 concerts in 45 days and over 50,000 miles. This release, like the others, is sourced from the in house video feed and is excellent in both picture quality and sound. You multiple camera angles and each band member gets plenty of screen time. The DVD starts with the footage of WWII dogfights and Churchill’s speech and the band blows though the opening barrage of Aces High and 2 Minutes to Midnight and it you know the band is “ON”. The crowd is loud for and SB recording and starts the cheering during a powerful Revelations, a highlight of the set and one of two songs on the “Flight 666” official release.
Bruce gives a great speech before Mariner, he actually gets the crowd to cheer when he reminisces about the live recording done in 1985, “Scream for me Long Beach” and they do. Again one of the classic of not only the tour but of their entire catalog, Bruce is very animated throughout with tattered robes high above the drum set while the rest of the band focuses on the complexity of the song. The addition of a third guitar gives the music more depth than ever as the familiar strains of Steve Harris’ bass lines in the center section gives way to the fog and spoken interlude with the guitars adding the eerie overtones, spectacular stuff. The crowd of 30,000 go nuts for the opening of Fear Of The Dark supplying chants and hand clapping, and Bruce responds with a “Chile in the Dark”, it is obvious and well documented the band love for south American audiences.
The other song officially released, Iron Maiden, brings the set to a close with cyborg Eddie making a welcome appearance. After the band intros the band starts the opening acoustic beginning to Monnchild but the guitar is not working so Bruce does it without and the crowd goes wild, a great concert from beginning to end. With the release of the Flight 666 official release and its behind the scenes footage it makes you enjoy theses concerts even more, almost like footnotes to a good book. The menu is simple and easily navigated, the curious thing is the music playing is the original version of Iron Maiden with Paul Di’anno singing.
The packaging is like the other releases from this tour (Ed Force One Route To Brazil AS 144 and Ed Force One Route To Mexico AS 161) with relevant graphics and concert pictures adorning the tri fold housing. I am sure someone will write and ask, if I have one or both of the others do I need this ? If you are casual collector no, but for the serious fan or someone who does not have the others this is a fantastic release by AS and worth getting.