We're better than Metallica. We're better musicians, better players. Put it this way, they can try to walk onstage after an Iron Maiden show if they want.

The celebrity thing, I mean, Lindsay Lohan - what's she for? I look at that and throw my hands up in despair.

My son is in a band, and he’s a singer, and his vocals … they’re screaming-growling stuff … and he’s got a pretty reasonable voice. Yet he practices really hard to get the screaming-growling thing without losing that voice every five minutes. So I’m, like, “Hats off to you.”

I guess it was the first time I really thought about leaving. I don't just mean Iron Maiden, I mean quitting music altogether. I just thought, 'Nothing is worth feeling like this for.' I began to feel like I was a piece of machinery, like I was part of the lighting rig.

We're better than Metallica. We're better musicians, better players. Put it this way, they can try to walk onstage after an Iron Maiden show if they want.

Life on the road can get a little one-dimensional. I didn't want to reach 40 and have to say all I'd done was look out the window of a tour bus and get drunk.

Engineering stimulates the mind. Kids get bored easily. They have got to get out and get their hands dirty: make things, dismantle things, fix things. When the schools can offer that, you'll have an engineer for life.