influenced by Johnny Winter and Pat Travers, leading to him becoming a "melodic player." Janick Gers, on the hand, prefers a more improvised style, largely inspired by Ritchie Blackmore, which he claims is in contrast to Smith's "rhythmic" sound. Singer Bruce Dickinson, who typically works in collaboration with guitarist Adrian Smith, has an operatic vocal style, inspired by Arthur Brown, Peter Hammill, Ian Anderson and Ian Gillan, and is often considered to be one of the best heavy metal vocalists of all time. Although only receiving one writing credit on the Dance of Death album, Harris often relies on drummer Nicko McBrain in developing songs, with Adrian Smith commenting, "Steve loves playing with him. [They] used to work for hours going over these bass and drum patterns." Throughout their career, the band's style has remained largely unchanged, in spite of the addition of guitar synthesizers on 1986's Somewhere in Time, keyboards on 1988's Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, and an attempt to return to the "stripped down" production of their earlier material on 1990's No Prayer for the Dying. In recent years, however, the band have begun using more progressive elements in their songs, which Steve Harris describes as not progressive "in the modern sense, but like Dream Theater, more in a 70s way." According to Harris, Seventh Son of a Seventh Son was the band's first album which was "more progressive," while they would only return to this style from 1995's The X Factor, which he states is "like an extension of Seventh Son..., in the sense of the progressive element to it." The development contrasts with the band's earlier material, which Allmusic states was "clearly drawing from elements of punk rock," and also led to drummer Nicko McBrain stating in 2006, "I don't regard Iron Maiden as heavy metal. I don't think we're a heavy metal band. We're a hard rock band. We're a progressive rock band.Band membersCurrent members Steve Harris bass, backing vocals (1975present) Dave Murray lead & rhythm guitars (1976-1977, 1977present) Adrian Smith lead & rhythm guitars, backing vocals (19801990, 1999present) Bruce Dickinson lead vocals (19811993, 1999present) Nicko McBrain drums, percussion (1982present) Janick Gers lead & rhythm guitars (1990present)Live members Michael Kenney keyboards, synthesiser (1988present)Former members Paul Day lead vocals (19751976) Ron "Rebel" Matthews drums (19751977) Terry Rance guitars (19751976) Dave Sullivan guitars (19751976) Dennis Wilcock lead vocals (19761977) Bob Sawyer guitars (1977) Terry Wapram guitars (1977) Tony Moore keyboards (1977) Thunderstick drums, percussion (1977) Doug Sampson drums, percussion (19771979) Paul Di'Anno lead vocals (19771981) Paul Cairns guitars (19771978) Paul Todd guitars (1978) Tony Parsons -guitars (1979) Dennis Stratton guitars, backing vocals (19791980) Clive Burr drums, percussion (19791982) Blaze Bayley lead vocals (19941999)DiscographyStudio albums Iron Maiden (1980) Killers (1981) The Number of the Beast (1982) Piece of Mind (1983) Powerslave (1984) Somewhere in Time (1986) Seventh Son of a Seventh Son (1988) No Prayer for the Dying (1990) Fear of the Dark (1992) The X Factor (1995) Virtual XI (1998) Brave New World (2000) Dance of Death (2003) A Matter of Life and Death (2006) The Final