Today I'm off on a new journey to listen to a little band by the name of Judas Priest. You may have heard about them. Over their brief career they've released a couple studio albums which faired pretty okay with critics and the general public.
By 1980's British Steel, Rob Halford and company had released five studio albums, contributing to the forging of the road of heavy metal created by Black Sabbath. Though they had a steady following of fans, and their first entry into the decade would also become their highest charting album to date, they had not yet broken out into mainstream. Nor was that going to happen just yet.
Judas Priest would reprise the more commercial sound they adopted with their previously released Killing Machine (1978) and drew inspiration from AC/DC on some tracks after supporting them on tour in 1979. In conjunction with this, they also abandoned some of the dark lyrical themes which had been prominent on their previous releases. To further move towards mainstream success, the band focused on shorter song lengths with hooks, in an attempt to push radio play.
Guitarist J.K. Rowling...er....K.K. Downing would say that the band had a lot of fun recording the album in the former home of Beatles drummer, Ringo Starr. Not yet in a digital age of sampling, the boys had to find unique ways to incorporate the layers of sound they were looking for, which included smashing milk bottles, shaking cutlery trays, swishing pool cues, and whipping guitar strings against suitcases. Downing would joke that since it was Ringo's home and cutlery, that essentially the Beatle was responsible for the creation of the metal sounds on their album.
British Steel would be unleashed among the time that was seeing a surge in new wave British Heavy metal, released alongside Saxon's Wheels Of Steel, and Iron Maiden's self-titled debut. Critically, it was well received and later credited for kickstarting heavy metal's glory days. It's also gone on to be listed by Rolling Stone's 100 Greatest Metal Albums Of All Time and also noted as one of the 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.
What I came to find out was that there were songs from Judas Priest which I had forgotten over time. In particular, from this album, that was Living After Midnight. Personally, I bought it for Breaking The Law and wasn't really expecting to know anything else beyond that.
Unlike my previous listening sessions of Megadeth and Iron Maiden, which catered more so to song length and thrashing metal, Priest slows things down. They're not afraid to let the drums thunder, and the guitars squeal, but what they do in all of that is deliver cohesive vocals and lyrics that you can actually understand.
Though I only found one other standout track, United, as a whole, the album was a solid listening session. I'm totally down and excited to hear more from the band, which actually surprises me. I really didn't expect to enjoy this one as much as I did.
There's not much noted, history wise, between 1980's British Steel, and 1981's Point Of Entry. Rather, it's summed up as essentially saying, "Then Judas Priest made another album similar to this one." While that's not much to go on, I'm excited that it's more of what I just heard. That's where I head to tomorrow.
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