The Ghost Of Cain

Ratings & Commentary Bruce Dickinson - Accident Of Birth
The Ghost Of Cain
none 5.0 1
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For sharing thoughts and ratings on the song.

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Oh, this is brilliant. Right from the start it explodes with this fresh, almost joyful energy that’s not matched in any other song on the album. The intro guitar melody is awesome. In the verse, we have a great conversation between Bruce’s majestic lines and the guitar riff with one of my favorite tritones ever. The chorus is relaxed but still powerful, and the guitar solo is good even if not the most memorable one. Probably the best part of the song (in addition to the intro) is the short one just before the solo.

The drum “solo” after the guitar solo reminds me of Sting’s Englishman in New York where you also get a sudden banging of the drums with no other instrumentation. The idea is equally bad in both songs, but here it grooves, at least. Dave’s laid back drumming gives the whole song a somewhat relaxed vibe, as it does in many other cases as well. Yeah, I actually love that guy’s playing especially on AoB and The Chemical Wedding.

Amazing song! How on Earth did they decide to exclude it from the album? (From the version that was sold where I’m from, that is.)

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Indeed. This was an album track on the U.S. version, sandwiched between “Welcome To The Pit” and “Omega”, which makes the album flow much better than the U.K. version, IMO.

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Actually, two versions of the single “Accident of Birth” were released (at the same time, I believe), and one of them, the red one, included “The Ghost of Cain” as a B-side, and the demo of the title song. The other version, the green one, included the demos for “Starchildren” and “Taking the Queen”. I bought the green one and only found out later that the another version included a song that wasn’t on the album.

But one of my friends had somehow got the red one. Again, one of the songs that I clearly remember hearing for the first time. I copied it to a cassette tape and that’s how I listened to it until the Best of… album came out.

EDIT: Oh, right… it’s not on the Best of album :grinning: I do have a vague memory that I might have owned the red single at some point after all. No idea why I haven’t got either of them anymore. Streaming it is nowadays.