Lost your password?

Search Results for

judas priest

JUDAS PRIEST’s GLENN TIPTON Thought Band Was Finished After K.K. DOWNING Left

Manos Spanos
Rustyn Rose of Metalholic.com recently conducted an interview with JUDAS PRIEST guitarist Glenn Tipton. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below. Metalholic.com: You spent over 35 years playing side by side with the same guitar partner [Kenneth "K.K." Downing]. What was it like for you to suddenly have a new face, a new style of player standing across from you in Richie Faulkner? Tipton: It was a surprise, really. It came as a surprise to us all. At that time, I really, truly thought the band were finished. We were poised to do a farewell tour and, of course, Ken decided he'd had enough of that. I respect his decision. It must have been a big decision to make. I think we've all been through that phase. We've been around for 35, 40 years. But we found Richie, and Richie is a small miracle, because the guy is such a great guitar player and he blended in so well first on stage. And then, of course, he's worked so hard and contributed so much to the [new JUDAS PRIEST] album ["Redeemer Of Souls"] that it's just a miracle. Metalholic.com: You guys declared the "Epitaph" tour to signal the retirement of JUDAS PRIEST and, as [you have] since said, "we lied." Clearly the injection of new blood into the lineup re-energized the band. How did that translate into the writing for "Redeemer Of Souls"? Tipton: Tremendously, you know, because when we got, obviously, new blood in the band, it was needed at the time. It would be the same thing; you get some new blood in there and there's energy and enthusiasm — motivation. You see things in a different way. He just gave everybody a keep up the backside, really. And that's what happened. We went from literally meaning it was our last tour to there's such great songs on this album, it's a shame we can't get out and play them. So, by any means this isn't another world tour. I'm glad we're doing it. I feel that it would be great to get on stage and play these new numbers as well as the old classics. Metalholic.com: When I reviewed "Redeemer Of Souls", I stated it was the band's most fully realized album since "Painkiller", but more accurately, it seems to me it would have been a natural follow-up to that record. Tell us about the album from your perspective. Tipton: I think it's probably in line with "Painkiller", as you say. It's what everybody wants from JUDAS PRIEST. I mean, we've always been a band not afraid to expand and try new things, try new paths and directions. Like "Nostradamus". There were many fans that got what we were trying to do with "Nostradamus", but there were a number of fans that wanted a "JUDAS PRIEST" album, and in "Redeemer Of Souls" we give them a "JUDAS PRIEST" album. We listened, and we learned, and we've gone back, if you like, to what people want from PRIEST. I'm proud of "Nostradamus". It was a monumental task to record and put together. But I think "Redeemer Of Souls" is what people expect from JUDAS PRIEST. Read the entire interview at Metalholic.com.
03 min read

GLENN TIPTON On ‘Epitaph’ Tour Being JUDAS PRIEST’s Farewell: ‘We Lied’

Manos Spanos
JUDAS PRIEST singer Rob Halford says that the addition of guitarist Richie Faulkner to the band's lineup largely contributed to PRIEST's decision to hit the road again four years after the legendary British heavy metal group announced its "farewell" tour. Asked if people may have misconstrued what JUDAS PRIEST said in late 2010 about not wanting to do any more extensive touring ever again, PRIEST guitarist Glenn Tipton said during an appearance on last week's "Rockline": "We, uh, lied. [laughs] The statement we made was we’re gonna do no more world tours. As we said before, it takes a massive chunk out of your life. It's pretty arduous out there — almost two years, the last one, playing two and a half hours every night, four or five shows a week. But we enjoyed every second of it. And we said that at the end of it, we weren't gonna do any more world tours, but we didn’t' rule out any dates. And we just got so enthused with the new album and everything that we put some dates in and we'll see where it goes from there." Asked by "Rockline" host Bob Coburn if it's fair to say retirement didn't work out for the band at all, Tipton replied: "We lied. We lied. We didn't mean to." Halford added: "Actually, it's Richie Faulkner's fault; let's blame Richie. We can't overemphasize the importance of having Richie with us at this point in our career." He continued: "When Richie joined us for the 'Epitaph' tour, extraordinary things were happening night after night after night. And that, accompanied with some of the things that Richie was doing backstage before the show, laying down licks with his little portable recording gear, it was just this energy that was just out of control. So, naturally, when you come off a tour like that and you digest everything, you're just raring to go and we couldn't wait to get into the writing mode and start making music for [the new JUDAS PRIEST album] 'Redeemer Of Souls' together." Faulkner joined PRIEST in 2011 following the departure of the band's founding axeman Kenneth "K.K." Downing. Prior to hooking up with PRIEST, Faulkner was the guitarist in the backing band for Lauren Harris, daughter of IRON MAIDEN bassist Steve Harris. JUDAS PRIEST's 17th studio album, "Redeemer Of Souls", sold around 32,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to land at position No. 6 on The Billboard 200 chart. The band's 2008 double-disc concept album, "Nostradamus", shifted 42,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to debut at No. 11. JUDAS PRIEST's 2005 CD, "Angel of Retribution", premiered with 58,000 copies in the U.S. to enter the chart at No. 13.
03 min read

JUDAS PRIEST Announces U.S. Tour With STEEL PANTHER

Manos Spanos
British heavy metal legends JUDAS PRIEST will embark on a U.S. in the fall. Support on the trek will come from Los Angeles glam-metal jokesters STEEL PANTHER. The dates are as follows: Oct. 01 - Rochester, NY - Main Street Armory Oct. 03 - Hammond, IN - The Venue at Horseshoe Casino Oct. 04 - Louisville, KY - Louder Than Life Fest at Champions Oct. 09 - Brooklyn, NY - Barclays Oct. 10 - Atlantic City, NJ - Harrah's Oct. 11 - Mashantucket, CT - MGM Grand Theater at Foxwood's Oct. 14 - Lowell, MA - Tsongas Center at UMass Oct. 15 - Allentown, PA - PPL Center Oct. 17 - East Rutherford, NJ - Izod Center Oct. 19 - Detroit, MI - Fox Theatre Oct. 24 - Baltimore, MD - Pier Six Pavilion Oct. 28 - Duluth, GA - The Arena at Gwinnett Center Oct. 30 - Hollywood, FL - Hard Rock Live Arena Nov. 06 - Allen, TX - Allen Event Center Nov. 07 - Austin, TX - FunFunFun Fest Nov. 10 - Los Angeles, CA - Club Nokia Nov. 12 - Phoenix, AZ - Jobing Arena Nov. 13 - Highland, CA - San Manuel Casino Nov. 14 - Las Vegas, NV - The Pearl Nov. 16 - San Jose, CA - City National Civic Nov. 18 - Salt Lake City, UT - Maverik Center News about a special fan presale for tickets, merchandise bundles and more will be announced soon. In a recent interview with Full Metal Jackie, JUDAS PRIEST singer Rob Halford was asked what changed the band's minds about playing live more than three years after they announced their "farewell" tour. "It's gotta be the fans," he said. "We went out there, in all genuine honesty, saying that this was a farewell tour, but if we could have picked a better word than 'farewell,' I wish we could have found one. That should have been my job, being the lyricist. But I suppose 'farewell' isn't really goodbye, it's like, 'See you next time.' "What we were trying to explain as we moved along was, we will be going out again, but it won't be these two-year treks around the world that naturally become a little bit more challenging when you get to a certain stage in your life. And we never want to compromise ourselves. We wanna be able to go out onstage, wherever it might be on the planet, and give you everything we've got. So if there's a way of, kind of, readjusting the touring scheduling where we can still do that, and go in the ring and give you everything, then that's what we intend to do. And we've just been discussing, while we've been together in New York, the first time we've been together as a band in three years, ironically enough. 'Cause we saw each other in and out of the studio, but we were never all there at the same time. So, for the first time we were together recently, and we discussed about the touring side of it. And we've actually started to put down setlist ideas. So it looks like we'll be going out in the fall, in America. So you'll be getting us towards that time of the year. And we'll be kicking the tires, as they say, and getting the engine revved up and ready to go out and play live to our fans again." JUDAS PRIEST's new studio album, "Redeemer Of Souls", will be released in North America on July 8 (pushed up a week from the originally announced July 15) via Epic Records. The CD's title track was made available for purchase via iTunes and other digital service providers on April 29. Speaking to the "Trunk Nation" show, which airs on SiriusXM's Hair Nation, JUDAS PRIEST singer Rob Halford stated about "Redeemer Of Souls": "When we finished [the] 'Epitaph' [tour], we just got so buzzed from the fans and the reaction wherever we went. Just to put the 'Epitaph' tour together, which was we tried to put a song from every record into the show, and we were living in the life of JUDAS PRIEST, all those decades, in one show, night after night on the world trek, and I think that really did something to us eternally; as musicians, it should do when you tour. So we realized that this next record really had to be really strong, full of energy, because it's relentless, the tracks are relentless. The energy that you feel off 'Redeemer Of Souls' is replicated in that direction time and time and time again."
04 min read