As the world is still waking up from its year-long self-induced hibernation, what better alarm clock to use than a big, bold and HEAVY dose of metal? Iron Maiden’s timing is once again perfect, because on September 3 the world will finally be able to experience Senjutsu, the long-awaited 17th release of these British metal pioneers.

The band seems more excited than ever to reveal the new songs to the fans, and the anticipation for this release is building up every week. In preparation for the Earth-shattering event that a new Maiden album represents, Joel Barrios compiled 17 curiosities about Senjutsu:

1. With Senjutsu, Maiden will have released albums in six different decades: 70’s, 80’s, 90’s 00’s 10’s and 20’s. This true if we consider any of these two facts:

  A. Culturally, we say “the eighties” or “the twenties.” In other words, people commonly think of a decade (such as the 1980s, 1990s) as years ending in 0 to years ending in 9. So, 1970 to 1979; 1980 to 1989.  However, today’s Gregorian calendar counts decades starting with the first year 1 CE. The Gregorian calendar goes from 1 BCE to 1 CE; there is no year zero. In this case, 1981 was technically the start of the new decade, and the band’s debut album was released in 1980… or

  B. We consider “The Soundhouse Tapes” as an album, which in reality was self-released, and featured three of the original four songs from the Spaceward demo tape which was recorded in one 24-hour session on 31st December 1978. Only 5,000 copies of “The Soundhouse Tapes” were made, and they have become the “Holy Grail” for Iron Maiden collectors.

2. After this album, Jannick’s 10th with the band, every member of the current lineup will have at least 10 Iron Maiden album under their belts.

3. Senjutsu continues the streak of this being the longest lasting lineup, with six releases. The second one is the classic lineup of “Steve/Bruce/Adrian/Nicko/Dave”, with four albums: Piece Of Mind, Powerslave, Somewhere In Time and “Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son.

4. Senjutsu will be the second-ever double album by Iron Maiden and marks the first occasion the band releases consecutive double albums.

5. Senjutsu will be the first ever Iron Maiden studio album where the album title is not in the English language. It will also be the second album, regardless of studio or live with a non-English title, the first being En Vivo.

6. Senjutsu will be the first time an Iron Maiden album has 3 songs in a row clocking at 10 minutes or more in length. In the spirit of number 3 it will also be the third album they record at the Guillaume Tell Studios, the other two were The Book Of Souls and Brave New World.

7. Senjutsu will be the second time in their history that Iron Maiden taps the Japanese culture for the cover artwork, the first time happened 40 years ago when they used an Eddie wielding a katana for Maiden Japan. Although this wasn’t a single, the topic of samurais was also addressed on a previous Maiden song, “Sun And Steel”, from 1983’s Piece Of Mind.

8. Senjutsu will be the first Iron Maiden album to share the exact same release date with another album, in this case with Powerslave which was released on September 3, 1984. It will also be the fifth Iron Maiden album to be released in the month of September. Besides Powerslave, other were: Somewhere In Time (September 29, 1986); Dance Of Death (September 8, 2003) and The Book Of Souls (September 4, 2015).

9. Senjutsu will be the first album in 26 years in which Dave Murray didn’t contribute to any song. The last time that happened was for The X Factor (1995).

10. Senjutsu will be the first album in 23 years in which Steve Harris penned four songs on his own. The last time that happened was for Virtual X (1998).

11. Senjutsu will be the 11th album which name is also the name of a track. The others had been: Iron Maiden, Killers, The Number Of The Beast, Powerslave, Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son, Fear Of The Dark, No Prayer For The Dying, Brave New World, Dance Of Death, and The Book Of Souls. Another curiosity of title tracks and album names is the fact that Senjutsu will be the first Iron Maiden album having the title track as the first song. “Caught Somewhere in Time” and “Satellite 15… The Final Frontier” came close, but not exactly.

12. Senjutsu marks the longest gap between two Iron Maiden studio albums (6 years) and continues a pattern of adding one year to the gap of their predecessors. It took them three years to release A Matter Of Life And Death, four years to release The Final Frontier and five years to release The Book Of Souls. We can thank Covid-19 for this delay.

13. With the confirmation that the band will be playing two songs from the upcoming album on the remaining dates of the “Legacy Of The Beast” tour, this marks the second time that a new song is introduced before the album’s promotional tour cycle. Previously, “Wildest Dreams” was played during the tour Give Me Ed Til Im Dead, which was not the Dance Of Death tour cycle as the albums wasn’t released yet. “El Dorado” came close to that, but it was played on a handful of dates of The Final Frontier Tour, right before the album of the same name came out.

14. Senjutsu is the second time in a row that the band uses their original logo on the cover, as opposed to the one with cut corners, which was used between Virtual XI and The Final Frontier.

15. This is the sixth album in a row produced by Kevin Shirley. Martin Birch remains the producer with the most Iron Maiden albums under his belt, with a total of eight albums (the run from Killers to Fear Of The Dark).

16. Mark Wilkinson, known for his work with Marillion and Judas Priest, delivers his fourth Maiden cover on Senjutsu, the others being Book Of Souls, the compilation “Best of the ‘B’ Sides” and Live At Donnington.

17. Believe it or not, “Hell On Earth”, from the upcoming album, will be the first song in the band’s discography with the word “hell” in the title.

Senjutsu will be released on the following formats and is available to pre-order/pre-save at IronMaiden.com.

- Standard 2CD Digipak
- Deluxe 2CD Book Format
- Deluxe heavyweight 180G Triple Black Vinyl
- Special Edition Triple Silver And Black Marble Vinyl (Details to follow)
- Special Edition Triple Red and Black Marble Vinyl (Details to follow)
- Super Deluxe Boxset featuring CD, Blu Ray and Exclusive Memorabilia
- Digital album [streaming and download]

For Senjutsu - loosely translated as ‘tactics & strategy,’ the band once again enlisted the services of Mark Wilkinson to create the spectacular Samurai themed cover artwork, based on an idea by Steve Harris. With a running time of a little under 82 minutes, Senjutsu, like their previous record The Book Of Souls, will be a double CD/Triple vinyl album.

Steve says: “We chose to record at Guillaume Tell Studio in France again as the place has such a relaxed vibe. The setup there is perfect for our needs; the building used to be a cinema and has a really high ceiling so there’s a great acoustic sound. We recorded this album in the same way we did The Book Of Souls in that we’d write a song, rehearse it and then put it down together straight away while it was all fresh in our minds. There’s some very complex songs on this album which took a lot of hard work to get them exactly as we wanted them to sound, so the process was at times very challenging, but Kevin is great at capturing the essence of the band and I think it was worth the effort!  I’m very proud of the result and can’t wait for fans to hear it.”

Bruce continues: “We’re all really excited about this album. We recorded it back in early 2019 during a break in the Legacy tour so we could maximize our touring yet still have a long set up period before release to prepare great album art and something special as a video. Of course the pandemic delayed things more - so much for the best laid plans – or should that be ‘strategies’!?  The songs are very varied, and some of them are quite long. There’s also one or two songs which sound pretty different to our usual style, and I think Maiden fans will be surprised -  in a good way, I hope!"

Tracklisting:

"Senjutsu" (8:20) - Smith/Harris
"Stratego" (4:59) - Gers/Harris
"The Writing On The Wall" (6:13) - Smith/Dickinson
"Lost In A Lost World" (9:31) - Harris
"Days Of Future Past" (4:03) - Smith/Dickinson
"The Time Machine" (7:09) - Gers/Harris
"Darkest Hour" (7:20) - Smith/Dickinson
"Death Of The Celts" (10:20) - Harris
"The Parchment" (12:39) - Harris
"Hell On Earth" (11:19) - Harris

"Stratego":

"The Writing On The Wall" video:

"The Writing On The Wall" (SFX Version)

Steve Harris, Bruce Dickinson and Kevin Shirley talk about the making of Senjutsu:

In a UK first, Iron Maiden are celebrating the launch of Senjutsu with two other unique products for their fans. 226 of the Asda stores will carry a display unit with an exclusive album edition of Trooper’s Sun & Steel Japanese Lager and their very own album T-shirt featuring band icon, Eddie.

“Iron Maiden are an incredible British institution and the best in their field so it’s really exciting for us to be able to reward their legions of fans with some fantastic products for the launch of their hugely anticipated new album, Senjutsu on September 3rd”, claims Andrew Thompson, Asda’s Senior Manager on Entertainment.

“There are few bands in the world that can provide such a breadth of products that their fan base love and we’re delighted that Asda respect music enough to partner with us across several sectors. Every Maiden studio album launch is an event and their fans get behind it like no other. This partnership offers something for everyone all in one place” adds Warner Music’s SVP Commercial, Derek Allen