The third of the holy trinity of new albums has now arrived at Chez Morgan and been thoroughly played. I had the new Magnum album in January and the latest from Saxon in February leaving Judas Priest until March. It's their eighteenth studio album, recorded in Derbyshire. All the tracks were written by Glenn Tipton, Rob Halford and Richie Faulkner, the producers were Tom Allom and Andy Sneap, more of him later.
The title track opens proceedings and what a brilliant opener it is. It sets the bar very high for the rest of the album, it's fast, it's loud and it's great!
Second up is 'Lightening Strike,' I love the almost bouncy guitar riff that starts this song, with a very singable chorus and good guitar solo it was a great choice as the first single from the album.
'Evil never dies' is slower than the first two, not a bad idea as you need to catch your breath! The versatile Andy Sneap's production and engineering on this album is second to none. He's becoming quite a force in metal circles, he was ( and probably still is) guitarist and writer with the band Hell (brilliant band, something a little different as well), he's also produced the last three Saxon albums and now due to the illness (Parkinsons) of Glenn Tipton who has had to retire from gigging, he 's guitarist with Judas Priest! How does he fit so much in!?
'Never the heroes' is track four and seems to be about the fact that youth gets sacrificed, as usual, on the altar of war, an ode to World War One maybe? It's a melancholy song, mid paced but very good.
'Necromancer' follows and sounds like quite alot of other JP tracks so this one lost me abit. It tells story of evil and bringing dead back to live etc, it fairly rattles along.
'Children of the sun' is an interesting track, it has a quiet guitar riff with Rob Halfords vocal over the top of it.
'Guardians' is a short instrumental, just keyboards start the track then the guitars join in. It's bit of a waste of time really, it goes straight into:
'Rising from Ruins' the third longest on this album at 5.23 minutes. Rob Halford gives it a very clear crisp vocal, of course all the vocals from Rob are at a lower register these days as he just can't get those high notes he used to, even rock stars get old! Another mid paced track, straight forward, very JP and very good.
'Flame Thrower' is faster and opens with a blinding guitar riff before the drums kick in, it another one that rattles along.
'Spectre' is a more thoughtful track. Both guitarists have a go on this one as there's sort of a guitar duel, its very melodic and quite fast. A good solid JP song.
'Traitors Gate' is the second longest track at 5.43 minutes and is a brilliant track, the Traitors Gate mentioned is of course the one at the Tower of London, the lyric tells suitably about torture etc that goes on therein.
'No surrender' is undoubtedly my favourite track and also the shortest on the album at 2.54 minutes. It's got a simple chorus and is a rip roaring heavy metal track and has within it a restrained guitar solo that fits well in this song.
'Lone Wolf' is another one with a quiet start that soon opens out to a classic metal riff, great stuff !
Finally we have 'Sea of Red' which has a slow build but as this is the longest track on the album at 5.52 minutes there's no need to rush. It's a great end to a great JP album, they seem to be having a run of getting better and better, whether we'll get a tour this year is debatable. They are booked for one festival in the UK only and presently on a tour of the US, I think they need to remember their home fans, the ones who started them off and get some dates for the old country ! However 'Firepower' is a brilliant album and sits nicely with the many Judas Priest classics.
