Empire of the Clouds story of the R101 airship, which crashed on its maiden voyage in northern France on 5 October 1930. The song was written entirely by the band's lead vocalist, Bruce Dickinson, who initially intended it to be about "World War I fighter airplanes;" Dickinson abandoned the idea after using the same theme for the song "Death or Glory," also from "The Book of Souls". At the time of recording, Dickinson was reading "a big, sort of encyclopedic crash report" of the R101, entitled "To Ride the Storm", which gave him the idea for the song's eventual subject. Dickinson describes it as
A Way to See in the Dark for dark times, but they come up just short of being straight worship music". Lennie of Cross Rhythms wrote that the "main strengths of the album are the radio-friendly production, Jason's fine vocals and, most notable of all, the original, thoughtful lyrics that attend every one of these dozen tracks." However, Lennie also said it was unoriginal and like Steven Curtis Chapman's works, but did go onto say "this is still a fine album." Caldwell of Jesus Freak Hideout says "A Way to See in the Dark" that it "delivers on all those levels, and then some," and notes the