Day three of Aftershock is a rare communion of titans, a moment that borders on the surreal. Two of the most revered institutions in heavy metal — Judas Priest and Iron Maiden — play back-to-back and you can feel the weight of it in the air. Priest have just finished a set that bulldozed the crowd like a runaway train and now it’s Iron Maiden’s turn. This is indeed no ordinary festival lineup; this is metal history unfolding in real-time.
Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson is a creature seemingly untouched by the natural decay of time. At 66, the man is a locomotive - a kinetic force that barrels forward, relentless and unyielding. He lurches across the stage donning a steampunk cloak and dark goggles, like a time-traveling general from a dystopian future. From the first note of Caught Somewhere in Time, it becomes evident that age is irrelevant here. Dickinson’s voice, somehow still soaring, cuts through the Sacramento night like a scalpel, precise and brutal. In fact, the entire band ping-pong across the stage with more energy and glee than bands half their ages. At one point, Dickinson playfully points out a man hoisting a pineapple into the air, awed by the moment’s innate lunacy and unable to let it go, notes that the man’s ability to hold the pineapple in either hand makes him “pineapple dextrous.” Oof.
