Listening Post: Judas Priest - Point of Entry

Priest picks up where they left off...



Judas Priest - Point of Entry - 1981 (iTunes - Amazon)

With Point of Entry, Judas Priest takes everything they learned about how to make more radio friendly music on British Steel and meld that with the no-holds-barred sensibility of Hell Bent. The result?

The first three tracks on Point are prototypes for every hair metal band that was just around the corner. They screech, they blister, and are catchy as hell.
Then the album turns left with the glammy, power poppy Turning Circles. A turn I like, actually. I know this goes against the common accepted truths and wisdoms but I like Point of Entry more than British Steel. And I'm gonna fess up something here: I LOVE that big, arena filling wide, expansive sound. I love bombast and theater. So, having learned how to give the people what they crave on British Steel, all the band is really doing here is cranking up the Priest-juice.
A giant, dual-guitar fuelled track like Desert Plains is MADE for a listener like me. I want my ears to hurt after I listen to a big metal album. I didn't get that with Steel. I GET that with PoE.
It sounds like the band is having fun making this music. They get it. They know what is expected. But they are being forced to find new ways of doing it. On a track like You Say Yes, they channel Zeppelin ina way they haven't tried to since Rocka Rolla. And with much more success.
I know I'm being played. I'm part of the game. As long as they're giving me what I want, I'm in. And, on PoE, they do that. In spades.

Grade B+
A Side: Heading Out to the Highway, Don't Go, Hot Rockin'
BlindSide: Turning Circles, Solar Circles
DownSide: All the Way (just meandering as opposed to bad), (unlike) Troubleshooter (which is bad all over the place)

listening Post: Judas Priest - British Steel

Judas Priest solidifies the formula and speaks to legions of mulletheads the world over....



Judas Priest - British Steel - 1980 (iTunes - Amazon)

I know, I know, this is the classic Priest album. This is the one that broke them wide. They hit #4 on the brit charts and cracked the top 40 here.
But, I don't really like it. Let me explain.
Hell Bent for Leather is a revelation. When you hear it, you will know what I'm talking about. British Steel is, well, formulaic.
The big guitar leads are there. The soaring vocals. The death and destruction lyrics. But it feels like they've discovered what will sell, made it more poppy and sold it to us.
The singles are fine but nothing groundbreaking. Breaking the Law? It's like a metal take on a punk tune.
You know what Living After Midnight is? A really good KISS song. Even the lead licks sound more like Frehley than Tipton.
Its as thought the band looked at Hell Bent and decided to just make that album but more generic. There's even an big chorus anthem, United, like the previous record's Take on the World.
It's a big letdown.
If you've heard Hell Bent for Leather, you don't need to hear British Steel. Blasphemy, I know. But I calls em as I hears em.

Grade B-
A Side: Living After Midnight, Breaking the Law
BlindSide: United
DownSide: Grinder. You don't have to be old to be wise.

Reflecting Pool: Green Day - Dookie

Consider this a different kind of Listening Post and more like a Reflections Column. With Reflecting Pool I will be going back through the catalog of bands that I love and have been following for years. I will try to be as impartial as possible, but I admit that I am biased. This is a little more loosey than the LPs.

With the new album released I realized that I hadn't heard any of Green Day's older material in years. There was a reason. It was my daughter's favorite band. From the time Dookie came out she was a 2 year old inveterate rocker. American Idiot was a family fave and we sang all the songs together.
Then Liz died and it was too hard to listen to Bille Joe and the Boys anymore. I tried to dip my toe with the Dean Grey, American Edit mashup and that was almost bearable.
The new album hit the digisphere last week. I bought it. It's great. Then I thought: You know what? It's okay. I think Liz would like that I still listen to Green Day.
We're not listening to 39 smoothed out blah blah or Kerplunk becuase this is a reflection more than an LP and I'm currently in the middle of a Judas Priest Listening Post. This is a matinee. An afternoon at the beach. This is 15 years with Green Day



Green Day - Dookie - 1994 (iTunes - Amazon)

Where were you in 1994?
I was sitting in the office of a ramshackle farmhouse in Lancaster, California. Amidst pot-bellied pigs, goats and horses. My connection to the world was through Prodigy. And my music came from the Columbia House record club.
I had to get the album not for me, but for my daughter who, at 15 months was obsessed with the song "Basket Case". Every time it would come on Alternative Nation, Liz would come running from wherever she was and start dancing like a maniac. So, we ordered the record and she and I would listen to it on my boombox. Only Liz would crank the shit out that thing. I mean, loud.
And when Billie Joe Armstrong sing, "Scream at me until my ears bleed", Liz would point to her ears and laugh.
Listening again to Dookie, 15 years later, I am struck by something that I missed. It's brilliant how, on the second album, Armstrong shows his songwriting prowess by embodying the mind of a serial killer with a bomb attacked to his back. Pure genius.
And then there's Chump. Chump with the 1+minute long outro that falls away leaving only a massive and recognizable bassline that is the basis for Longview.
These guys were playing in the classic rock, concept album, rock opera idiom long before they hit it big. They were "punk" because, well, punk is easier.
No leads in punk.
Lots of tude in punk.
Say what you want in punk.
You can be pissed in punk.
And everyone will accept you regardless of your sexuality because you're an outside and they are all outsiders. (Billie Joe as stated that he's bisexual, only I believe that he also said he never has been with a man....)
The guitarist can't play leads. I don't think there is a lead line until well into the album, three songs before its all over.
The drummer is heir to the Ginger Baker/Roger Taylor/John Bonham throne.
The bassist is rhythm in name only. THIS is where the leads are. In Mike Dirnt's hands.
These guys were a rock band from the start.
And this album is perfect. There is not a wasted note.

Grade A+
A Side: In descending Order:
Basket Case
Pulling Teeth
She
Burnout
She
In the End
Welcome to Paradise
Long View
Emenius Sleepus
Chump
When I Come Around
F.O.D.
Sassafrass Roots
All By Myself (Hidden Track)

DownSide: Are you kidding?

listening Post: Judas Priest - Hell Bent for Leather

"Breaking the Law", "Another Thing Coming", that's just about the depth of my Judas Priest knowledge. Well, I know about the alleged backwards masking. I know that Halford is the leader of the metal/leather image. And gay. I now that the terrible move Rock Star was based on them. Sort of. And I know that a Halford imitator, named Ripper Owens took over when Rob left.
So. In summary. I know more ABOUT the band then their music. Let's change that.




Judas Priest - Hell Bent for Leather - 1979 (Buy it)

Bingo.
You ever want an album to never end? But at the same time you can't wait for it to be over so you can tell everyone how great it is?
From the opening blasts of Delivering the Goods you KNOW that this is a different album than Priest has made, at the same time, it fulfills the promise of the last 4 records and boldly takes its place on the mount of metal.
THIS is what you want. This is what I've been waiting for for, what, over 3.5 hours of listening now?
This is relentless Power Rock.
It's tight, taut, determined and testosterony as hell. There is no room on this album for filagree and experimentation. These songs waste no time, each has a destiny and a destination and it's determined to grab you by the throat and drop you in your fucking place.
Just when you have caught your breath on a track like Hell Bent...the elegiac metal chorus and tribal drums of Take on the World kicks in and doesn't let up. It's about here that I realized that there hasn't been any morass or depression on this record. Take on the World is an Anthem. I want to stand in a room with 15000 other bangers and chant along.
Continuing the tradition of weird genius covers, Priest takes on an OOOOLD Fleetwood Mac prog rock tune, cranks up the Leather and kicks it's ass. If you just listen Green Manalishi, you will get this record. And, like a great drug, you will want more. And More. And more.
It should be noted that the ballad, "Before the Dawn" is the first time I can actually say that Priest has written a song that I could hear someone sing. It's actually pretty. And has a melody.
Not to be outdone, the sludge-metal of Evil Fantasies will probably have you thinking about Tap. But, Tap was still a few years away. This was still fresh. And core. The kind of giant sound that reaches into your skull and rips out your brain stem.
Hell Bent delivers.
(If you see this cover on the racks on an album called "Killing Machine" get it. That's the original pressing. CBS Stateside was afraid of the name. So, the band changed it. But, be warned, Manalishi is NOT on that release. Fuck it. Just go to the link.)

Grade A+
A Side: Hell Bent for Leather, Green Manalishi with the Two Pronged Crown)
BlindSide: Delivering the Goods, Rock Forever, Take on the World, Running Wild, Before the Dawn
DownSide: Are you kidding?

Listening Post: Judas Priest - Stained Class

"Breaking the Law", "Another Thing Coming", that's just about the depth of my Judas Priest knowledge. Well, I know about the alleged backwards masking. I know that Halford is the leader of the metal/leather image. And gay. I now that the terrible move Rock Star was based on them. Sort of. And I know that a Halford imitator, named Ripper Owens took over when Rob left.
So. In summary. I know more ABOUT the band then their music. Let's change that.




Judas Priest - Stained Class - 1978 (Buy It)

Are you looking for speed metal's ground zero? Because, unless I am mistaken, Stained Class is it. The themes, mostly about death or the harbingers of doom, are almost second place to the sheer fire that is the music. All that mid-70s mysticism and prog has given way to straight ahead blistering metal. If you don't find yourself playing Heavy Metal Parking Lot or air guitaring on Invader, I can't do nothing for ya, man.
Funny that, as blistering as this album is, the song that caused all that ruckus with the lawsuit was a cover of a Spooky Tooth song, Better by You, Better than Me.
Alas. Legacies are a hard thing to live down. This record is better than the mess caused in it's name.

Grade A
A Side: Better by You Better than Me, Exciter, Invader
BlindSide: Stained Class, Beyond the Realms of Death
DownSide: Saints in Hell

Listening Post: Judas Priest - Sin After Sin

"Breaking the Law", "Another Thing Coming", that's just about the depth of my Judas Priest knowledge. Well, I know about the alleged backwards masking. I know that Halford is the leader of the metal/leather image. And gay. I now that the terrible move Rock Star was based on them. Sort of. And I know that a Halford imitator, named Ripper Owens took over when Rob left.
So. In summary. I know more ABOUT the band then their music. Let's change that.




Judas Priest - Sin After Sin - 1977 (Buy it)

On their first major label release after parting ways with Gull, Judas Priest uses all the tools at their disposal to launch a full on assault on the headphones of disaffected teenagers the world over.
The bombastic guitars, heavy timpani, massive vocals of the opening track "Sinner" certainly take the lessons learned on Sad Wings of Destiny and builds on it.
Immediately following that with "Diamonds and Rust" is a masterstroke. A Joan Baez song! The first thing I noticed was the melody and how perfect the song sits in Halford's throat. It's a risk and it pays off in spades.
From there, the album settles into a rhythm: screeching metal, power ballad (that doesn't really work but ends side 1 in a traditonally 70s mellow way), and rawk.
Side 2 picks up with the anthemic Let Us Prey/Call for the Priest which is a brilliant speed metal, goth rock piece.
It's all pretty standard Priest Metal after that.

Grade B+
A Side: Sinner, Diamonds and Rust
BlindSide:Let Us Prey/Call for the Priest
DownSide: Last Rose of Summer

Listening Post: Judas Priest - Sad Wings of Destiny

"Breaking the Law", "Another Thing Coming", that's just about the depth of my Judas Priest knowledge. Well, I know about the alleged backwards masking. I know that Halford is the leader of the metal/leather image. And gay. I now that the terrible move Rock Star was based on them. Sort of. And I know that a Halford imitator, named Ripper Owens took over when Rob left.
So. In summary. I know more ABOUT the band then their music. Let's change that.



Judas Priest - Sad Wings of Destiny - 1976 (Buy it)

Well. This is different.
What we're gonna do is review this the way it was originally released in vinyl because, weirdly, all reissues on CD by Gull Records has put all the songs on Side B at the head of the record. And the second half is the first half of the album which makes no sense since there is a song on the A side called "Prelude" and one would THINK that would be a clue as to the order.
Oh, well, fuck Gull records.
This album is everything the predecessor was not. It's ambitious, aggressive and energetic. And you can tell from the end of the first full track, Tyrant, that these boys are loaded for bear. (Black Mountain may worship at the feet of all thing 70s metal but their "Tyrant" has nothing on this one.)
Downing and Tipton's dual power guitar assault is as forward thinking as one can imagine.
The ominous apocalyptic metal-mythology Priest would be associated with has it's forebearance in songs like Genocide and Victim of Change. But, Epitaph suggests that someone was listening to a LOT of Queen. Because it owes ALL of it's harmonies and overdubbing (and erstwhile piano) to Freddie and the boys.
Halford's tenor and timbre is like a 3rd lead guitar as cutting knife.If I have any complaint it's that Rob can sing. That's obvious. What they don't seem able to do is write melodies. They try. On Dream Deceiver, for instance. (One of the few real melodiies to be found) Hellfire and guitars and rawk are the stars here, anyway. Although Halford shows what he's capable of.
Priest was, to me, more about the crisp and sharp razor's edge, less about the sludge that their kin, Sabbath had laid claim to. Maybe that makes them more Power Rock than METAL in the long run, but I don't care. Nor should anyone else.
The band is flexing it's muscles here. I look forward to the rest of this decade's offerings.

Grade A
A Side: The Ripper, Deceiver
BlindSide: Tyrant, Genocide, Epitaph, Island of Domination
DownSide: Dream Deceiver

Listening Post: Judas Priest - Rocka Rolla

"Breaking the Law", "Another Thing Coming", that's just about the depth of my Judas Priest knowledge. Well, I know about the alleged backwards masking. I know that Halford is the leader of the metal/leather image. And gay. I now that the terrible move Rock Star was based on them. Sort of. And I know that a Halford imitator, named Ripper Owens took over when Rob left.
So. In summary. I know more ABOUT the band then their music. Let's change that.



Judas Priest - Rocka Rolla - 1974 (buy it)


One day someone really needs to explore British Rock of the early-mid 70s and write about it. Tull, Queen, Priest, it's all so, sludgy and overdone. And I mean that in a good way.
Priest's debut seems to take every opportunity to create a metal/pop/rock hit and turn left. Like the Anti-Sweet.
The suite that follows Winter/Deep Freeze/Winter Retreat is a prog rock, overblown, semi instrumental template for Spinal Tap with it's heavy handed attempt at grandiosity, but the band just isn't up to it yet. It's obvious on this, their debut, that they haven't found their sound yet. They clearly are in love with Jimmy Page and Sabbath but worshipping at that altar at that time isn't so unique.
It should be noted that "Run of the Mill", the 8+ minute near-jazz-prog odyssey is SOOO run of the mill I wanted to pour water on my keyboard and short circuit the motherboard rather than let it continue.
I didn't.
But I can't WAIT to delete THAT track.
This album remains a curio that not even the curious will enjoy.

Grade D-
A Side: Rocka Rolla (if ya gotta pick one.....)
BlindSide: Winter, Diamonds & Rust (It sounds like something Brian May might have written in 74, or the progenitor of Maiden.
DownSide: Winter Retreat, Cheater, Run of the Mill, Dying to Meet You

listening Post: Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - Highway Companion

The last Tom Petty album before MudCrutch. He jettisoned the Heartbreakers and brought back Mr. ELO.



Tom Petty - Highway Companion - 2006 (Buy It)

Live blogging the last TP record.

Saving Grace. A neat little toe-tapping rocker that suggests that this record might actually be fun.
Square One. Oh, but it's not. What is this, a leftover from Wildflowers? Ah, ok. You go, reflect Mr. P. I'll be over here waiting for you to rock again.
Flirting with Time We pick back up with that mid-tempo rock that is TP's stamp. It's not like we haven't heard this song before. On every one of his albums. It's a formula. It works. It isn't great. But, who cares? This is the song everyone will sing along with, right?
Down South You know, I don't hear that big, bright, over produced sound that Jeff Lynne was known for. Everyone is subdued on this affair. And the album is better for it. This song could've been written by Dylan. Why not? Petty has always sort of wished he was the vagabond poet, when he's really just the stoner rocker. Whose getting older and thinking about it.
Jack The kind of song you want to hate and if it were done by anyone else, we would. Since it's Petty and crew, they know how to make it sound not so crappy. Almost.
Turn this Car Around Ah, the middle, fatty part of the Petty record.
Big Weekend Truckin'.........
Night Driver So. Highway Companion. The album is your companion. You are driving on the highway. And, apparently you need to put your head back and just follow the road. And let Tom Petty be your zen guide......
Damaged by Love Why wasn't this album an ep?
This Old Town I would probably drive into the median at this point. Please end.
Ankle Deep Hey, is that the big, semi-overproduced sound we expect? A little too late, I think.
Golden Rose This is how TP&tH wants to go out? Ok. It's third rate, wannabe surreal Beatles, but, fine. At least I'm done.

Grade D-
A Side: Saving Grace, Square One
BlindSide: Flirting with Time, Big Weekend
DownSide: Jack, Turn this Car Around, Night Driver

Listening Post: Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - The Last DJ

With the end in site, we arrive at the concept album (rock opera) about the state of the music industry, which AllMusic gave 1 star. Is it that bad?



Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - The Last DJ - 2002 (Buy It)

In 2002 I was listening to radio late one night. The DJ, Jim Ladd, was talking about the problem with management taking over the reins of all radio. How bad it really is to have all the stations owned by one corporation. How you can't fight with the suits because you can't go to a competing station, since they own them all.
The early 00's were a dark time. The suits, management, the labels, none of them knew what to do or how to control piracy which was still in it's infancy. And Ladd was going on and on and then he played this song, "the Last DJ". It made sense to me. It wasn't until I researched the album that I learned that the song was written ABOUT Ladd.
No matter. He was right. Corporate America destroyed radio. It can't gobble up the internet, can't control the blogs, so it is forced to eat itself.
And Petty made a concept album about what it was like at the time.
Is it any good?

Look, whatever you think of Petty, you gotta hand it to him. He just hates the hands that feed him. He barely suffers them. From the battles on Hard Promises to Last Dj, this is not a guy who wants the untalented unwashed to touch his music or, even, him.
Money Becomes King is like a piece of an opera. From the nosebleed seats to the over priced tickets to the heartbreaking disdain for his hero, the singer of the song laments what it's like to be a rock fan, when money became king and lite beer was the star. It's not a great tune, by far, but the sentiment and approach is somewhat more powerful than 90% of what passes for music these days.
AllMusic called "Joe" the worst song Petty ever wrote. I don't agree. It's pretty angry but it's just a screed about the music industry. Feels like it's about that fat impresario that created NSync. Is it a good? No. Is it indulgent? Yes. But I applaud Petty for writing about something with a passion.
If the album loses direction and strays from it's central theme it isn't all bad. The lush ballad "Like a Diamond" with it's infectious chorus and Lost Children aren't as unlistenable as reviewers have made this album out to be.
Some of it is quite fun, actually. Like the goofy Man who Loves Women, a terrible song, but at least Petty is trying to have a good time.
This album isn't nearly as terrible as some would have you believe.

Grade C+
A Side: The Last DJ
BlindSide: Money Became King, Dreamville, Like a Diamond, Blue Sunday
DownSide: When the Kid Goes Bad