“I looked around and everybody was just down. But we started bashing through some songs that we knew, a bit of AC/DC, a bit of Deep Purple. And suddenly we were all smiling”: Bruce Dickinson recalls his audition for Iron Maiden

Iron Maiden in 1981.

Bruce Dickinson says that when he auditioned for Iron Maiden in 1981, his first thought was: “This is going to be rough.”

The singer tells MusicRadar that when he arrived for the audition the mood within the band was miserable — and the gloom only lifted when they started jamming on a few rock classics.