Adrian Smith, the legendary lead guitarist of 100-million- album-selling band Iron Maiden, is well known in the Maiden community as a celebrated angler whose fishing gear travels with him as he tours across the world. In his first, very personal riverside memoir, Monsters of River & Rock, Smith takes us with him on an incredible journey through the highs and lows of life—both on the road and on the riverbank. “If you’re a trout fisherman, there’s a bit of trout fishing in there,” Smith explains. “There’s a lot of course fishing. There’s some sea fishing, fly fishing. There’s a lot of different kinds of fishing.”
Adrian got hooked on fishing as a child growing up in East London, plundering ponds and bomb craters on the Hackney Marshes for newts and sticklebacks, and catching perch from the Grand Union Canal while on outings with his father. Things began to get more exotic when the young angling enthusiast grew up to become lead guitarist in one of the most successful rock bands in history and started traveling the world playing to millions of fans. But once a fisherman, always a fisherman. The gear went with him, the fish got bigger, the adventures more extreme.
Adrian’s rock and roll experiences add a fresh dimension to his unique memoir. “I could have written a straight-out fishing book,” Adrian elaborates, “I thought, to make it different, it would be good to include some music stories.” It is fishing that helps keep him balanced during a rigorous tour schedule. For him, the book illustrates “why you look forward to going fishing when times get a bit hard.”
Welcome to the world of Adrian Smith, as he clocks in to his day job furthering the geographical boundaries of hard rock, and clocks out to explore far-flung rivers, seas, waterways, lakes, and pools on his fearless quest for fishing nirvana. His adventures range from his first sturgeon, a whopping 100-pounder from Canada’s swirling Fraser River that nearly wiped him out mid-Maiden tour, to a close shave with a large shark off the Virgin Islands while wading waist-deep for bonefish. Not to mention an enviable list of specimen coarse fish from the UK that made him a cover star of the course-fishing bible Angler’s Mail (biggest chub of the season, August 2009).
Charming, funny, and moving in equal measure, Monsters of River & Rock is the ultimate fishing-fantasy armchair read and is also the story of a rock star in a fast-moving world who seeks peace and tranquility at the water’s edge – no matter where in the world he happens to be.
About Adrian Smith of Iron Maiden
Adrian Smith was born in Hackney, East London, on February 27, 1957. He joined Iron Maiden at the end of 1980. Adrian is the band member who has collaborated on the most side projects outside of Iron Maiden, as well as writing and recording a series of albums in the early ’90s, before rejoining the band. Iron Maiden has sold 100 million albums, and tours the world playing to millions of fans. Onstage, Adrian uses Jackson and Gibson guitars. Offstage, he is an avid tennis player, however his main hobby is fishing. He takes his rod and gear out on tour with him wherever he goes. This is his first book.