The other night I caught a bit of the Iron Maiden documentary on TV. This is the one where Bruce was flying the plan from city to city in his short-sleeved pilot shirt, and then changing to less sober outfits to belt out the hits in wherever they ended up.

This is not a concert film as such, but does include footage of a complete song at each location, and when that happens I have the same thought that I always do whenever I see film of Iron Maiden playing, which is “what is it with all the guitarists?”

As far as I can make out, Iron Maiden have three guitarists and I can’t see why they need that many. Incidentally, isn’t it strange that in a guitar-based genre of music, where the guitarist is usually the star, it is the bass player, drummer and singer who are the names in Iron Maiden. Yes I know that fans of the band will know who the guitarists are, and know the relative merits, but for a casual listener like me they are all interchangeable and anonymous. Steve Harris is the big name, Bruce is the front man and Nicko is… well he is Nicko and I know who he is.

I can just about understand having two guitarists if you are going for a rhythm + lead model, like the Beatles, or for moments of harmonised twin-guitar attack, like with Thin Lizzy, but for Iron Maiden it feels like at least one of them must be redundant. Maybe they are just adding more guitars to make a wall of sound and make them a lounder band.

And then I thought about the number of bands that are not famous for being quiet, but who manage to make a huge racket with only the one guitar, some of them with only three members, so here is a little list of bands who make at least as much noise as Iron Maiden but with only one guitarist.

• Motorhead
• Black Sabbath
• Led Zeppelin
• Deep Purple
• Muse
• Cream
• The Who
• Sex Pistols
• Rage Against The Machine

You could argue that Iron Maiden are, at least on their records in more recent years, more intricate and even proggy than just being out-and-out heavy metal. But then bands like Genesis, Yes and Rush usually only have one guitarist for their stuff.

Anyway, just a thought.