Singer, songwriter, pilot, author, fencing champ, air raid siren, force of nature: Bruce Dickinson is simply a man for whom many of the normal rules and restrictions of life do not seem to apply. Heavy metal’s premier Renaissance man is, of course, best known as vocalist and frontman with Iron Maiden, the greatest British metal band of all time and, some four decades after they originally formed, still one of the most widely adored bands on the planet. But as anyone that has followed Bruce’s story will tell you, singing with Maiden is just one part of his grand, substantial and fascinating musical life. Remarkably, given that he is just as likely to be found flying an airliner, Bruce has amassed a formidable catalogue as a solo artist, releasing six extraordinary studio albums that, at this point, represent his freewheeling efforts to date.

Barely a year later after his third album, Bruce released his fourth solo album. This time, heavy metal in its most bombastic and destructive sense was firmly back on the agenda. Once again teaming up with Roy Z, Bruce has rarely sounded more powerful than he does on this unsung’90s metal gem. With the added bonus of a certain Adrian Smith chipping in on lead guitar, “Accident Of Birth” was a flat-out celebration of heavy metal, both past and present, with a sound that was as crushing and timely as anything the younger generation were producing, and songs that soared with the same ageless majesty that fans had long associated with the Dickinson voice. From the rampaging riff-riot of opener ‘Freak’ and the shadowy melodrama of ‘Taking The Queen’, to the insanely catchy twin-lead euphoria of ‘Road To Hell’ and the labyrinthine swell of ‘Omega’, “Accident Of Birth” was much more than a return to metal’s unsullied essence; this was a reclaiming of the throne from the genre’s most unstoppable protagonist.