Iron Maiden rocked İstanbul’s Maçka Küçükçiftlik Park on Sunday night, treating 30,000 fans to a musical feast in the Turkey leg of the Sonisphere 2011, which is a touring music festival taking place across Europe between June and August every year.
The metal legends ended last weekend’s Sonisphere Festival on a high not with a two-hour set following live performances by some of the world’s biggest rock and metal acts, including Mastodon, In Flames, Alice Cooper and Slipknot. Despite the warm weather, as soon as the gates opened, metal lovers from across Turkey filed into the festival grounds in their thousands.
Mastodon took the stage first, followed by In Flames, who treated Turkish fans to a live performance for a second time. The group played a few songs off their latest album “Sounds of a Playground Fading” as well as some of their older songs.
Alice Cooper came on stage after In Flames and created one of the most favorable surprises of the night by waving a Turkish flag on the stage. Alice Cooper won the metal crowd’s hearts in the festival by this small act of diplomacy. Alice Cooper went straight on to a Pink Floyd song, “Another Brick in the Wall” before giving an end to their song ‘School’s Out’. This was a crowd pleaser, after listening to the same song from the Turkish pop singer Serdar Ortaç in the past month, which left negative impressions from the listeners.
Meanwhile, Slipknot’s drummer Joey Jordison impressed thousands with his fast-paced drum solo. Following Slipknot, Iron Maiden took to the stage and played the well known songs — “Fear of the Dark,” “The Trooper” and “Number of the Beasts.” Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson then sent his best wishes for troubled people of Syria and launched ınto the song ‘Blood Brothers’ dedicated to the band’s fans of all races, nationalities and religions.
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