The Best Iron Maiden Album of the Past 20 Years

2025-07-19

Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden.

In honor of Iron Maiden growing throughout the years, Audio Ink Radio presents its pick for the best Iron Maiden album of the past 20 years. – Author: Anne Erickson, Photo from Ken Settle

Iron Maiden is one of those elite bands that has been making music for not only years but decades. It’s rare for a band to have released their debut album back in 1980s and still be releasing fresh and exciting music today, but that’s exactly the reality for Iron Maiden.

The mighty Maiden unleashed their debut studio album, a self-titled release, in 1980, and their latest set is 2021’s “Senjutsu.” Throughout the years, they’ve changed band members, but their sound has remained relatively intact, with just some natural evolution along the way. It’s a good thing, too, because Maiden have developed a massive following around the world for their anthemic, powerful melodic heavy metal with strong guitars, pounding rhythms and operatic vocals. There is truly no other Iron Maiden, and even if some bands have tried to copy them, they just can’t do it.

When rattling off the best Iron Maiden albums of all time, people often go back to the classics, being their earlier works. That makes sense, but let’s not ignore Maiden’s most recent gems. In honor of Iron Maiden growing and remaining a force in heavy metal, Audio Ink Radio presents its pick for the best Iron Maiden album of the past 20 years.

Greatest Iron Maiden Album of the Past 2 Decades

While Iron Maiden has released a collection of fantastic albums in the past 20 years, one that stands above the rest is 2015’s “The Book of Souls.” This is simply an epic collection that gets better as the years go by.

The highlight of “Book of Souls,” and perhaps song that people raised eyebrows about at the time, was Dickinson’s 18-minute “Empire of the Clouds,” which tells a story about the British R101 airship, which crashed in 1930. It’s so Dickinson, who, of course, is a pilot, and it’s one of the most unique songs in Iron Maiden’s catalog. While Maiden’s sound has remained pretty consistent throughout the years, “Empire of the Clouds” marks a rare departure, with lengthy prog passages. It shows the band at their most experimental.

Of the album at the time, Rolling Stone said in a review, “Metal’s most fanciful band has gilded its 16th LP with the usual tales of kings, battles and foolhardy missions to the sky.” Metal Temple Magazine added, “It’s brutal, epic, and a climactic return with some amazing riffs and legendary vocals. The sound production is okay, not too loud to make you deaf.” The Guardian added, “It’s a bit dewy-eyed and romantic to suggest, as some reviewers have, that the rough spirit of Iron Maiden’s days slogging around London’s pubs still clings to them 85m album sales later, not least because two-thirds of the musicians on The Book of Souls weren’t in Iron Maiden when they were slogging around those pubs.”

The only downside of “Book of Souls” is that, like with many of their records, it features a lot of long songs. Coming in at 92 minutes, it’s a long album, but it’s worth it. “Book of Souls” takes the listener on a passionate journey that they’ll never forget.

Also, check out Audio Ink Radio’s pick for the greatest Iron Maiden album of all time in this feature.

Anne Erickson
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Posted by Anne Erickson | Features, Metal, Music

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