{"id":708599,"date":"2026-07-24T09:46:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T09:46:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/708599\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T09:46:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T09:46:17","slug":"nicko-mcbrain-names-3-best-iron-maiden-songs-steve-harris-wrote","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/708599\/","title":{"rendered":"Nicko McBrain Names 3 Best Iron Maiden Songs Steve Harris Wrote"},"content":{"rendered":"

Longtime Iron Maiden<\/a> drummer Nicko McBrain<\/a>\u00a0dove deep into the band’s catalog during a recent fan event, listing his picks for the three best songs bandmate Steve Harris<\/a>\u00a0has ever written.<\/p>\n

McBrain, who\u00a0joined\u00a0Iron Maiden\u00a0in 1982\u00a0and played with them until his retirement from touring<\/a> in 2024, made his\u00a0picks during\u00a0last month’s\u00a0“An Evening With CapnHarris<\/a>” event hosted at his Rock n Roll Ribs barbecue restaurant in Florida.<\/p>\n

Fans and co-hosts took turns drawing Iron Maiden songs out of a bucket alongside McBrain, who then\u00a0argued in defense of his favorite of the two. Those preliminary winners then went onto a bracket for McBrain and fans to again vote for their favorites.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\u00a0How Many Songs Each Member of Iron Maiden Has Written<\/a><\/p>\n

You can watch the full segment below and see which song won the tournament \u2014 which, mind you, is different than\u00a0the songs McBrain highlighted as Harris’ best.<\/p>\n

Nicko McBrain Praises ‘Stunning Piece of Music’ From Latter-Day Iron Maiden Album<\/p>\n

When co-host James Tucker drew the\u00a0Powerslave<\/a> deep cut “Back in the Village,” audience members\u00a0were likely prepared for an intense song shootout. But McBrain instantly swatted\u00a0the song down in favor of his own pick: “When the Wild Wind Blows,” the epic, 11-minute closing track on 2010’s\u00a0The Final Frontier about an elderly couple that builds a fallout shelter in anticipation of a nuclear war.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\u00a0The 8 Best Iron Maiden Songs Over 8 Minutes Long (Ranked)<\/a><\/p>\n

“It’s a stunning piece of music,” McBrain enthused. “It is, in my opinion, the second best song Steve Harris has ever written, next to ‘Hallowed [Be Thy Name]’ and ‘The Red and the Black.'” The drummer did not, however, directly disclose the No. 1 Steve Harris song and, while we’d prefer not to speculate, we think we have a reasonable idea at which of the other two songs takes that top spot.<\/p>\n

Notably, those three songs are written\u00a0exclusively by Steve Harris.<\/p>\n

The drummer continued: “It’s got a great storyline to it. It’s a tragedy. It’s a love story but with a tragic ending, isn’t it?”<\/p>\n

Then he deadpanned: “Also, we named our beans in this restaurant<\/a> after ‘When the Wild Wind Blows.'”<\/p>\n

Nicko McBrain’s Favorite + Least Favorite Iron Maiden Albums<\/p>\n

McBrain also\u00a0ranked all 17 Iron Maiden studio albums<\/a> from his least favorite to favorite at last month’s event. Notably, he\u00a0put\u00a0the band’s self-titled debut<\/a> (which featured drummer Clive Burr<\/a>) in last place.\u00a0“I’ll tell you what, the production on that wasn’t the greatest, but nevertheless, still a good album,” he said.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0top spot went to Maiden’s monstrous 2006 album\u00a0A Matter of Life and Death.\u00a0“That’s definitely my favorite album,” McBrain said, while\u00a0citing long-form epics such as\u00a0“Brighter Than a Thousand Suns” and “Lord of Light” as\u00a0standout tracks.<\/p>\n

Watch Nicko McBrain’s Iron Maiden Song Tournament<\/p>\n

See how WE ranked every Iron Maiden song below!<\/p>\n

Every Iron Maiden Song Ranked<\/p>\n

Ranking every Iron Maiden song from worst to best, across 17 albums and other rarities.<\/p>\n

Gallery Credit: Loudwire Staff<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Longtime Iron Maiden drummer Nicko McBrain\u00a0dove deep into the band’s catalog during a recent fan event, listing his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":708600,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[96,150594,5204,128,50,3584,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-708599","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-link-in-bio","tag-metal","tag-music","tag-news","tag-rock","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708599","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=708599"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708599\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/708600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=708599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=708599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=708599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}