#4
January 4, 1984
Judas Priest
Defending the Faith
3.5 out of 5
Highlights:
Freewheel Burning
Jawbreaker
Sentinal
Love Bites
Perhaps it was not the best idea to listen to the entire Judas Priest catalog in one sitting 10 years ago. By the time I got to Defending the Faith I must have been experiencing burnout because this is a lot better than I recall it at the time. In retrospect I had just listened to Screaming for Vengeance and this felt like a redux but I haven’t listened to the former for a couple years now and this is a great companion piece to that album. The dual guitars attack even on songs that sound like outtakes from Screaming (“Sentinal”) but, other than that the record starts to show signs of strain on the second side and I am reminded of why I felt the way I did the first time around. The ballad “Night Comes Down” feels like 8 minutes and it’s followed by...the sludge metal “Heavy Duty”. Please note that Spinal Tap would record a much better, hilariously meta metal version of the same name in the same year, rendering Priest and their song parodies of themselves.
I gave it a C back then. Turns out I was correct.
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