Description
US pressing
Stranger In A Strange Land was the second single to be released from Iron Maidens 1986 album Somewhere In Time. The lyrics are about an Arctic explorer who dies and is frozen in the ice. After a hundred years his body is found preserved by other people exploring there. Adrian Smith was inspired to write about this song after talking to an explorer who had had a similar experience of discovering a frozen body. The guitar solo in Stranger in a Strange Land is played by Adrian Smith. The song is one of only three Iron Maiden songs to fade out, the other being The Prophecy from Seventh Son of a Seventh Son and Women in Uniform, a single included on some pressings of Killers. The lyrics no brave new world were also present in Iron Maiden’s 2000 studio release, Brave New World. Eddie’s appearance on the single cover is an homage to the Clint Eastwood character “Man with No Name”. Though it can also be seen as a mixture of “Deckard” from Blade Runner and “Man with No Name”. In the top-right corner of the cover (slightly right of Eddie’s lit match), the time on the clock appears as “11:58”. This is a reference to a previous Iron Maiden single, “2 Minutes to Midnight”. Several cards can be seen falling from the table. One, (orange background, next to red coloured card) contains a picture of the Grim Reaper, like that on the Trooper cover. Just under one of the stacks of cards, on the edge of the table, Derek Riggs’ signature can be seen. The B-side to this single, “That Girl” were played during The Entire Population of Hackney secret gig on 19 December 1985, with Adrian Smith on vocals. This is probably where the idea came from to play them as B-sides, especially with Adrian’s large presence on this single and the Somewhere in Time album. “That Girl” was originally written for The Entire Population of Hackney by the guitarist Andy Barnett, and was recorded by both Iron Maiden and FM around the same time. It was prominently featured on FM’s 1986 debut album Indiscreet, which was released just three weeks prior to Iron Maiden’s Somewhere In Time. The FM’s version was rewritten by bassist Merv Goldsworthy and drummer Pete Jupp, resulting in the two versions being significantly different, sharing only harmony on the verses and some of the lyrics. However, Iron Maiden’s version is still credited to both Goldsworthy and Jupp alongside Barnett, possibly due to copyright issues. The first guitar solo is played by Dave Murray while the ending guitar solo is played by Adrian Smith, who also played bass on the recording because Steve Harris didn’t want to learn to play the song.
Track listing
1. Stranger In A Strange Land
2. That Girl