Members of Iron Maiden; (below) Bruce Dickinson

He is a writer, a champion fencer, a researcher on train technology and a pilot. But the world knows Bruce Dickinson as the lead vocalist of Iron Maiden. The 48-year-old singer from Nottinghamshire started out with bands like Styx, Speed and Samson but in 1981 found his voice in the band that was named after the medieval torture device used in the movie The Man in the Iron Mask.

One of the conditions for Bruce joining Iron Maiden was he give up his stage name Bruce Bruce. “Well, I haven’t been Bruce Bruce for almost 30 years now,” laughs the man, on the phone from London. “I am happy with the name my mom and dad invented for me, and that’s definitely Bruce Dickinson.”

ong with Steve Harris and Dave Murray, Bruce has become synonymous with Iron Maiden, which with 74 million album sales worldwide is easily one of the most successful and influential heavy metal bands under the sun.

“We established ourselves as a top live act and we have never let people down… We have the loyalty of our fans and in return we look after them,” is how Bruce spells out the secret of the band’s three-decades old success story.

so, unlike some other bands, Bruce and gang “don’t change our sound around to be fashionable”. Iron Maiden, he stresses, “has always been popular but not fashionable”.

“It not only helps us to lead normal lives without being hassled, ordinary people can relate to our music. Iron Maiden has never been about personalities. We just do something we love and we work hard at it.”

Despite being a wordsmith himself, Bruce believes it is the sound that makes Iron Maiden what it is. “I am a singer and I am very fond of words but it is the sound that clearly defines us,” he explains. “Yes, lyrics are important but between sound and words, I would have to go with sound.”

Iron Maiden’s new album A Matter of Life and Death is doing well everywhere and has been released in India under the EMI label. “It is a departure, musically,” reveals Bruce. “With our new album, we have moved in the direction of more progressive rock. We have been playing with this sound for quite some time now. Lyrically, the topics we deal with in the album include problems like global warming, pollution and corruption.”

Movies have always played a big role in the music of Iron Maiden. Not only is the name inspired from a film, many of their songs are actually movie titles — The Duellists, Where Eagles Dare and From Here To Eternity. “We tend to write lyrics in pictorial fashion,” explains Bruce. “Movie titles always evoke fond memories and they themselves are loaded with images. So by naming a song after a movie title, it takes on a picture.”

Having always used music as a message against social demons, Bruce insists that music cannot change the world. “I don’t think words can change anything,” he says. “The music of the 60s, the Beatles… they were a delusion. Music at the most has the power to affect people’s emotions. If they feel something after hearing the music, they may just go out and change themselves. Music cannot change the society, rather society actually changes musicians.”

Twelve years of Iron Maiden later, Bruce left the band to pursue a solo career. “I just wanted to find out if I could do anything outside the band,” he recalls. “As part of Iron Maiden, everybody is your friend. You are looked after, even protected from bad Press. So, I thought perhaps outside Maiden, I am not any good. After a few years, in Austin Powers language, I found my ‘mojo’ again. After a couple of sparkling solo records, I went back to the band in 1999.”

But despite singing for close to 20 years, Bruce calls himself an amateur. “That’s what I like about being part of Maiden,” he says. “I’m a true amateur. All musicians have to be amateurs. If you are too professional, then you will kill the soul of everything you do. I give two or three months of a year to the band and I’m a kid during those days. It’s all play, no work!”

That play includes starting a tour in October that will go on till Christmas. “We have just started rehearsals… Then we take the entire 2007 off before we go for this big summer tour in 2008. And we might be visiting India during that tour.”

Bruce’s brush with India has been interesting, to say the least. As a pilot of the UK charter airline Astraeus, he flies around a lot and has even been to Agra on a couple of occasions.

“I have been there for all of 14 to 15 hours but I can tell you that the Taj Mahal is stunning. I believe India is fascinating. My wife will be going on a holiday to the Himalayas soon but I guess I have to wait till 2008 to come there.”

And what about Eddie, the Iron Maiden mascot, a permanent fixture in the band’s horror-influenced album cover art, as well as the live shows? “All I can say is that he has become pretty ferocious,” chuckled Bruce.