Bruce Dickinson shares more about the upcoming documentary of Iron Maiden

Singer Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden discussed the band’s impending feature documentary, “Iron Maiden: Burning Ambition,” in a recent interview with Australia’s Heavy, as per Blabbermouth. The documentary will only be available in theatres starting on May 7, 2026. With “unprecedented access” to the band’s official archives, the movie is said to follow the “remarkable five-decade journey” of the British heavy metal superstars.

When we knew there was going to be a documentary, the first thing was that we really didn’t want to be involved in it in terms of editorial or whatever. You have to have a hands-off approach, because you want somebody to look at it and tell the story. Obviously, there’s so many… this documentary could be ten hours long, but then everybody would lose the will to live. [Laughs] So you’ve got to make the story concise. There are going to be fans who say, ‘Oh, they missed out this and what about that’ — yeah, sure, but for people who don’t know the story of Iron Maiden, this is a great introduction to the band. Because of that, we wanted an external take on our career and you can’t really be fiddling about with that and going in every five minutes saying ‘change this’ or ‘I don’t like that’, ‘Oh, my hair looks messy in that picture.’ None of that crap. We’re not a bunch of poodles. It is a bit warts and all, but I think that’s great. There’s nothing in there that I would want to change.

Dickinson considered how he became the fourth vocalist to lead Iron Maiden, following Paul Mario Day, Dennis Wilcock, and Paul Di’Anno, during the same conversation. Dickinson was the lead singer of Samson, another band that sprang from the New Wave of British Heavy Metal, for two years before joining Iron Maiden in 1981.

The first time I knew the band was going to be huge was when I was in a band called Samson and I saw Iron Maiden. Believe it or not, we were headlining, and Maiden was special guests, I heard a lot of things about Maiden and I went to watch them and I went, ‘Oh my God, this is incredible. Wow.’ My next thought was, ‘I need to sing for those guys.’ What I wanted to do with my voice and what I heard them doing… if you could glue those things together, we could do something even better, that was my vibe. Then, when I did join the band, ‘Number Of The Beast’ [album] happened and my first tryout with the band was in Italy, so that was my first-ever Iron Maiden show at Bologna in Italy and we had to wait three days to do it because we drove all the way from London. At the time we thought we would do the show in Italy because nobody would review it down there. [Laughs] If it really sucks, it never happened. [Laughs]

Upcoming shows:

MAY

• 23 – Athens, GREECE – OAKA (Anthrax)
• 26 – Sofia, BULGARIA – Vasil Levski Stadium (Anthrax)
• 28 – Bucharest, ROMANIA – Arena Națională (Anthrax)
• 30 – Bratislava, SLOVAKIA – Národný Futbalový Štadión (Anthrax)

JUNE 2026

• 02 – Hannover, GERMANY – Heinz von Heiden Arena (Megadeth)
• 10 – Amsterdam, NETHERLANDS – Ziggo Dome (Evergrey)
• 17 – Milan, ITALY – San Siro Stadium (Trivium)
• 22 – Paris, FRANCE – Paris La Défense Arena (Evergrey)
• 28 – Lyon – Décines, FRANCE – Groupama Stadium (Anthrax)
• 29 – Antwerp – BELGIUM – Middenvijver Park (Epica, Testament, Doro, Fleddy Melculy)

JULY 2026

• 07 – Lisbon, PORTUGAL – Estádio da Luz (Anthrax)

August 2026

• 29 Toronto, ON – Scotiabank Arena *

September 2026

• 03 Montréal, QC – Parc Jean-Drapeau *^
• 05 Harrison, NJ – Sports Illustrated Stadium *^
• 09 Boston, MA – TD Garden *
• 11 Bristow, VA – Jiffy Lube Live *
• 12 Charlotte, NC – PNC Music Pavilion *
• 15 Hershey, PA – Hersheypark Stadium *
• 17 Louisville, KY – Louder Than Life Festival
• 19 Shakopee, MN – Mystic Lake Amphitheater *
• 22 Chicago, IL – Credit Union 1 Amphitheatre *
• 25 Los Angeles, CA – BMO Stadium *^
• 29 San Antonio, TX – Alamodome *^

* Megadeth ^ Anthrax

• Wednesday, November 7, 2026 – Auckland, New Zealand – Spark Arena (with Megadeth)
• Wednesday, November 11, 2026 – Adelaide, Australia – Adelaide Entertainment Centre (with Megadeth)
• Friday, November 13, 2026 – Melbourne, Australia – AAMI Park (with Megadeth)
• Sunday, November 15, 2026 – Sydney, Australia – Allianz Stadium (with Megadeth)
• Wednesday, November 18, 2026 – Brisbane, Australia – Brisbane Entertainment Centre (with Megadeth)