St. Vincent, Metallica Members and Jack Black Salute Iron Maiden With “The Trooper”
Iron Maiden entered the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame on November 14, 2026, while the band was on tour in Australia. At the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles, St. Vincent led a tribute performance of “The Trooper” with Kirk Hammett, Robert Trujillo, Brad Wilk and John 5. Jack Black delivered the induction speech and joined the musicians onstage.
The lineup brought together players from several corners of heavy music. Hammett and Trujillo came from Metallica, Wilk from Rage Against the Machine, and John 5 from Mötley Crüe. St. Vincent handled the lead vocal on a song that usually gives Bruce Dickinson the job of cutting through one of Maiden’s busiest arrangements.
The song choice made sense as soon as the guitars came in. “The Trooper,” from 1983’s Piece of Mind, puts its twin-guitar melody right up front. It is recognizable before anyone sings. A lineup with that many guitarists could treat the opening as an introduction to the players. Here, the melody introduces the band being honored.
Under the guitars, the bass and drums keep the gallop moving. That rhythm carries through the quieter gaps between vocal lines and gives the song a push even when the guitars sit on a repeated figure. It’s a part of Maiden’s sound that can disappear in a noisy audience recording, but follow Trujillo and Wilk through the first verse and you can hear what the arrangement depends on.
Maiden’s absence had been announced well ahead of the ceremony. The band’s official tour dates put it at AAMI Park in Melbourne on November 13 and Allianz Stadium in Sydney on November 15, with Megadeth on both bills. Manager Rod Smallwood had said the Australian shows would go ahead as planned.
That left the Los Angeles tribute to a group of musicians assembled for the night. The audience footage below captures their version from the room. It gives you the sound of the guitars from the theater floor and lets you hear the crowd respond as the band gets going.
The 1983 recording behind the tribute
The original recording gives the guitars a little more separation than the footage from the theater. You can hear how the harmonized opening and the rhythm underneath it fit together before Dickinson enters. It’s also a reminder of how much of the hook is established by the first few bars.
How Maiden plays it in front of a festival crowd
Iron Maiden’s own live cut from Rock in Rio is another point of comparison. The crowd responds to the opening almost immediately, and the band keeps the gallop going under the answer from the field. In Los Angeles, the guest musicians had that same unmistakable opening to work with. That was enough to put Iron Maiden’s sound at the center of the ceremony, with the band itself on the other side of the Pacific.
