Judas Priest -- Bethlehem, PA -- August 26th, 1982

[devilball]

Originally Posted by DethMaiden

Wow, four years after Stained Class and they couldn't play one goddamned thing from it?

Yeah, that's a severely underplayed album. In the last 30 years only Beyond The Realms Of Death has been regularly played. Exciter was played in 81 & at a few shows in '05 (It was played on the 2nd US leg of the Demolition tour during the Ripper years as well). Better By You... was played once!! after the Reno court case. Other than that, nothing...
Shame as it's quite possibly their best ever studio release....

[DethMaiden]

Originally Posted by devilball

Yeah, that's a severely underplayed album. In the last 30 years only Beyond The Realms Of Death has been regularly played. Exciter was played in 81 & at a few shows in '05 (It was played on the 2nd US leg of the Demolition tour during the Ripper years as well). Better By You... was played once!! after the Reno court case. Other than that, nothing...
Shame as it's quite possibly their best ever studio release....

Couldn't agree more. I'll take Painkiller over it but nothing else.

[devilball]

Originally Posted by stomper622

Keep in mind that Dave Holland was their drummer then and he didn't have the chops to play a lot of the Les Binks material.

It's a common line of thought that Dave was an unskilled drummer, but I don't buy into it. What he was found guilty of in later life was despicable, but as a drummer he played all the 70's songs live just fine. The bands music evolved over time, becoming simpler and more commercial in the late '70's and early '80's. Compare Sin After Sin to British Steel to see what I mean. And don't tell me Dave was the cause because Killing Machine was the point the songs started to became shorter, simpler and more commercial and Les Binks was still the drummer then.....This reply is becoming a bit longer than I imagined. but a short grouping together of the JP back catalogue follows -

Rocka Rolla - I don't really consider this anything but an embryo which needed fleshing out. Many of the songs are half formed incomplete ideas to my mind.

Sad Wings Of Destiny
Sin After Sin
Stained Class - All outstanding, full of new ideas and clever lyrics. At this point JP where doing new things with each album.

Killing Machine
British Steel
Point Of Entry - Shorter, more concise songs, bigger choruses, more commercial, one eye on expanding the fan base. Still leading the pack ideas wise.

Screaming For Vengeance
Defenders Of The Faith - Keeping the commercial edge, tightening & hardening the sound. These albums epitomise '80's metal with the look and the lyrics. No longer cutting edge though.

Turbo - JP tried to crossover ala Def Leppard's Pyromania. More commercial than ever, lyrics took a nose dive to. No longer leading the way though, for the first time following the pack.

Ram It down
Painkiller - One is much better songwriting than the other, however nothing really original by now.

Jugulator - Well it's heavy, but no variety, no melody, lyrically worse than ever, it's the worst album since the first

Demolition - Nobody likes this album except me, but it is just another heavy metal record, therefore fail by JP standards.

Angel Of Retribution - Kinda a superior Demolition, but hardly essential

Nostrodamus - Another string to the bands bow, harking back to the '70's output albeit with a 2008 sheen.

OK, so I put that up, now shoot me down....

[Sanitarium78]

Originally Posted by devilball

It's a common line of thought that Dave was an unskilled drummer, but I don't buy into it. What he was found guilty of in later life was despicable, but as a drummer he played all the 70's songs live just fine. The bands music evolved over time, becoming simpler and more commercial in the late '70's and early '80's. Compare Sin After Sin to British Steel to see what I mean. And don't tell me Dave was the cause because Killing Machine was the point the songs started to became shorter, simpler and more commercial and Les Binks was still the drummer then.....This reply is becoming a bit longer than I imagined. but a short grouping together of the JP back catalogue follows -

Rocka Rolla - I don't really consider this anything but an embryo which needed fleshing out. Many of the songs are half formed incomplete ideas to my mind.

Sad Wings Of Destiny
Sin After Sin
Stained Class - All outstanding, full of new ideas and clever lyrics. At this point JP where doing new things with each album.

Killing Machine
British Steel
Point Of Entry - Shorter, more concise songs, bigger choruses, more commercial, one eye on expanding the fan base. Still leading the pack ideas wise.

Screaming For Vengeance
Defenders Of The Faith - Keeping the commercial edge, tightening & hardening the sound. These albums epitomise '80's metal with the look and the lyrics. No longer cutting edge though.

Turbo - JP tried to crossover ala Def Leppard's Pyromania. More commercial than ever, lyrics took a nose dive to. No longer leading the way though, for the first time following the pack.

Ram It down
Painkiller - One is much better songwriting than the other, however nothing really original by now.

Jugulator - Well it's heavy, but no variety, no melody, lyrically worse than ever, it's the worst album since the first

Demolition - Nobody likes this album except me, but it is just another heavy metal record, therefore fail by JP standards.

Angel Of Retribution - Kinda a superior Demolition, but hardly essential

Nostrodamus - Another string to the bands bow, harking back to the '70's output albeit with a 2008 sheen.

OK, so I put that up, now shoot me down....

I'm not gonna shoot you down I agree with most of what you're saying. Except that while Painkiller may not have been original song topic wise, they returned to form and the material on there is what they should've been writting through the 80's. That's my favorite album from them simply because they decided to kick ass again and not be as fuckin cheesy as they had become in the 80s. SWOD through BS is all great and with the exception of a few songs here and there, and the Painkiller album, Priest's musical output since 1981 is average or mediocre at best. I'm not as down on AOR as you, I thought it was a decent comback album with four or five pretty good songs on it. Their influence on metal is undeniable, but there musical resume leaves a lot to be desired for the better part of the last 30 years now.

[stomper622]

Originally Posted by devilball

It's a common line of thought that Dave was an unskilled drummer, but I don't buy into it. What he was found guilty of in later life was despicable, but as a drummer he played all the 70's songs live just fine. The bands music evolved over time, becoming simpler and more commercial in the late '70's and early '80's. Compare Sin After Sin to British Steel to see what I mean. And don't tell me Dave was the cause because Killing Machine was the point the songs started to became shorter, simpler and more commercial and Les Binks was still the drummer then.....This reply is becoming a bit longer than I imagined. but a short grouping together of the JP back catalogue follows -

Rocka Rolla - I don't really consider this anything but an embryo which needed fleshing out. Many of the songs are half formed incomplete ideas to my mind.

Sad Wings Of Destiny
Sin After Sin
Stained Class - All outstanding, full of new ideas and clever lyrics. At this point JP where doing new things with each album.

Killing Machine
British Steel
Point Of Entry - Shorter, more concise songs, bigger choruses, more commercial, one eye on expanding the fan base. Still leading the pack ideas wise.

Screaming For Vengeance
Defenders Of The Faith - Keeping the commercial edge, tightening & hardening the sound. These albums epitomise '80's metal with the look and the lyrics. No longer cutting edge though.

Turbo - JP tried to crossover ala Def Leppard's Pyromania. More commercial than ever, lyrics took a nose dive to. No longer leading the way though, for the first time following the pack.

Ram It down
Painkiller - One is much better songwriting than the other, however nothing really original by now.

Jugulator - Well it's heavy, but no variety, no melody, lyrically worse than ever, it's the worst album since the first

Demolition - Nobody likes this album except me, but it is just another heavy metal record, therefore fail by JP standards.

Angel Of Retribution - Kinda a superior Demolition, but hardly essential

Nostrodamus - Another string to the bands bow, harking back to the '70's output albeit with a 2008 sheen.

OK, so I put that up, now shoot me down....

Good post.

I was no way trying to say that Holland was not a talented drummer. But his style was more straight forward (Charlie Watts, Phil Rudd, etc). Tipton has even said that they wanted a more powerful rock style drummer as their music was heading in that direction at the time.

But you're right, when needed Holland could play some complex stuff when needed as he did a good job playing the 70's material during the British Steel/Point of Entry era.

[Nick_to_the_face]

Originally Posted by JudasPriest89

12.Diamonds And Rust