The Priest Is Mad!!!!!!!!!
- Thread starter Savatage
- Start date
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Judas Priest hit Melbourne in a big way last night, on their first Australian tour in their long history. The band released its first album Rocka Rolla in 1974, and strung together many great albums in the ensuing years, but had never toured Australia.
I must admit I was pretty disappointed that Priest never toured with former frontman Rob Halford. To many people, he WAS the face and sound of Priest. Tim "Ripper" Owens replaced Halford a few years ago, and while the material since the line-up change hasn't been to the standard of Priest's 70s and 80s classics, Owens' energy and presence as a vocalist and performer would have done his predecessor proud.
The support band were US rockers Heaven. They were fat, they were old, they were LOUD, they were rough as guts... they effing rocked. Their brand of tight and powerful AC/DC-Cult-Jackyl riffs and screeching vocals made them a capable and solid opening act for the Metal Gods.
Indeed it was Metal Gods which Priest used as their opening track. Owens, clad in baseball cap, sunglasses, and leather jacket looked like Mark Wahlberg with balls
and took front position on stage and commanded it all night. K.K.Downing stood on Owens' right, Glenn Tipton stood on his left, and bassist Ian Hill behind Tipton. Scott Travis was inconspicious at the back on drums, but only to the deaf! As soon as the drums started up, he made his presence felt even if he was hard to see.
After buying the Demoliton CD only last week (had previously downloaded about half of it), I got the feeling that Judas Priest was fast becoming the Glenn Tipton band. Tipton wrote five of its 13 songs, and co-wrote all of the other eight, as well as co-producing the album. Both of the two albums recorded with Owens on vocals, sounded a lot (musically & vocally) like Tipton's 1997 solo album BaptiZm Of Fire (Tipton did all the vocals on his solo album).
Upon seeing the band last night, it was pretty clear that it was Tipton's band now. Downing retreated a few steps from the front of the stage, while Tipton was always practically hanging over the edge of it. The days of alternating solos were long gone too, as Downing played only a few short lead breaks, sticking mainly to the thunderous rhythm parts while Tipton took off on tangents playing almost every lead part for the night.
It was great to hear some of the late 70s tracks, and several off British Steel, seeing the expectation was to hear mainly stuff off the two disappointing, more recent albums with Owens up front. (This is not a slight on Owens as a vocalist - just an opinion about the songs not being as good as the older stuff).
Owens did well with all the old stuff and sang them with enthusiasm, power and energy. Instead of being the weak link in the perenially formidable line-up, he was in fact one of the strongest links!
Ripper Owens - I dips me lid to ye!
Glenn Tipton - brilliant guitarist and the brains behind the band
Scott Travis - great drumming all night, a powerful performance
K.K.Downing - those chugging chords kept thundering through the speakers all night
Ian Hill - well... he's just Ian Hill
Set List
Metal Gods
Heading Out To The Highway
A Touch Of Evil
Blood Stained
Victim Of Changes
One On One
The Ripper
Diamonds And Rust
Beyond The Realms Of Death
Green Manalishi
Burn In Hell
Hell Is Home
Breaking The Law
You've Got Another Thing Comin'
Painkiller
Encores
Hellion/Electric Eye
United
Living After Midnight
Hell Bent For Leather
I must admit I was pretty disappointed that Priest never toured with former frontman Rob Halford. To many people, he WAS the face and sound of Priest. Tim "Ripper" Owens replaced Halford a few years ago, and while the material since the line-up change hasn't been to the standard of Priest's 70s and 80s classics, Owens' energy and presence as a vocalist and performer would have done his predecessor proud.
The support band were US rockers Heaven. They were fat, they were old, they were LOUD, they were rough as guts... they effing rocked. Their brand of tight and powerful AC/DC-Cult-Jackyl riffs and screeching vocals made them a capable and solid opening act for the Metal Gods.
Indeed it was Metal Gods which Priest used as their opening track. Owens, clad in baseball cap, sunglasses, and leather jacket looked like Mark Wahlberg with balls
and took front position on stage and commanded it all night. K.K.Downing stood on Owens' right, Glenn Tipton stood on his left, and bassist Ian Hill behind Tipton. Scott Travis was inconspicious at the back on drums, but only to the deaf! As soon as the drums started up, he made his presence felt even if he was hard to see.After buying the Demoliton CD only last week (had previously downloaded about half of it), I got the feeling that Judas Priest was fast becoming the Glenn Tipton band. Tipton wrote five of its 13 songs, and co-wrote all of the other eight, as well as co-producing the album. Both of the two albums recorded with Owens on vocals, sounded a lot (musically & vocally) like Tipton's 1997 solo album BaptiZm Of Fire (Tipton did all the vocals on his solo album).
Upon seeing the band last night, it was pretty clear that it was Tipton's band now. Downing retreated a few steps from the front of the stage, while Tipton was always practically hanging over the edge of it. The days of alternating solos were long gone too, as Downing played only a few short lead breaks, sticking mainly to the thunderous rhythm parts while Tipton took off on tangents playing almost every lead part for the night.
It was great to hear some of the late 70s tracks, and several off British Steel, seeing the expectation was to hear mainly stuff off the two disappointing, more recent albums with Owens up front. (This is not a slight on Owens as a vocalist - just an opinion about the songs not being as good as the older stuff).
Owens did well with all the old stuff and sang them with enthusiasm, power and energy. Instead of being the weak link in the perenially formidable line-up, he was in fact one of the strongest links!
Ripper Owens - I dips me lid to ye!
Glenn Tipton - brilliant guitarist and the brains behind the band
Scott Travis - great drumming all night, a powerful performance
K.K.Downing - those chugging chords kept thundering through the speakers all night
Ian Hill - well... he's just Ian Hill
Set List
Metal Gods
Heading Out To The Highway
A Touch Of Evil
Blood Stained
Victim Of Changes
One On One
The Ripper
Diamonds And Rust
Beyond The Realms Of Death
Green Manalishi
Burn In Hell
Hell Is Home
Breaking The Law
You've Got Another Thing Comin'
Painkiller
Encores
Hellion/Electric Eye
United
Living After Midnight
Hell Bent For Leather
Ya lucky bastards, Darky and Sav. Sounds like you saw a great show.
T
The Hitman
Guest
I was gonna ask how 'Ripper' did replacing Rob, sounds like he did Mr Halford proud!
Lucky guys seeing the Preist live...
The Hitman
Lucky guys seeing the Preist live...
The Hitman
I don't disagree at all.
In my opinion, Halford's best stuff was on Rocka Rolla and Stained Class, which were all but ignored on Monday night.
I thought Owens actually did better on some of the stuff than Halford ever did... songs like Metal Gods (it really does suit his voice), Heading Out To The Highway and even Painkiller.
The relative disappointment in the two albums with Owens, was not a reflection on him - just on the material contained on them being lacklustre.
Sounded a lot like Jugulator... more slow, ground-out sounds, rather than the speed and screaming we associated with the Judas Priest of the 1980s.
Both albums with Owens sound like off-cuts from Tipton's 1997 solo album. Considering Tipton writes most of Priest's material now, methinks he kept the best stuff to himself and let Priest use the left overs.
Vocally, the Priest and Tipton solo efforts are also in the same vein (the slower vocal style suiting the slower music). This is why I thought the studio albums were ordinary, but Owens screamed the house down when he had the chance on Monday night, and did it superbly.
I honestly didn't know he had it in him (I don't have 1998's Metal Meltdown live 2CD set), as the studio stuff doesn't show off his range and obviously not his stage presence.
The only reason to buy Demolition at the moment, is for the special tour edition bonus CD. It contains three songs - two live (Rapid Fire. Green Manalishi) and one track previously only available on the Japanese edition of the CD (What's My Name?). Otherwise, if you didn't like Jugulator, you'll be disappointed in Demolition as it is more of the same.
JB Hi-Fi in the city has it for $30, JB Keilor has it for $30 and JB Highpoint has it for $28.
Hehehe... I just included the JB prices as a guide. The moral of the story is "don't pay a likely $45 at HMV"!
If you can get it for a fiver, do so... it's not necessarily a bad album, but anyone expecting their halcyon years is kidding themselves. If you want the bonus tracks, I might be able to help you out via email etc (need to wait until I get of this dodgy free ISP though, because Hotmail doesn't allow large emails/accounts).
I suppose it's a similar story to Iron Maiden with Blaze Bayley. His two albums were pretty solid but nowhere near the standard of their 1980s stuff which truly kicked anus.
If you can get it for a fiver, do so... it's not necessarily a bad album, but anyone expecting their halcyon years is kidding themselves. If you want the bonus tracks, I might be able to help you out via email etc (need to wait until I get of this dodgy free ISP though, because Hotmail doesn't allow large emails/accounts).
I suppose it's a similar story to Iron Maiden with Blaze Bayley. His two albums were pretty solid but nowhere near the standard of their 1980s stuff which truly kicked anus.
- Thread starter
- #11
What were they thinking when they chose Blaze?
Did they even rehearse with him to see if he could handle the old material?
I felt sorry for him, if I was offered the gig in Iron Maiden I'd take it too! Steve Harris ****ed up big time on that appointment...
Apparantely the Blaze solo cd wasnt too bad...
But watching a bootleg with Blaze singing really hurt! It made me feel like I was straining to hit the notes along with Blaze!!!!!!
