My personal favorite Judas Priest album would have to be Painkiller. I thought their most recent release, Firepower, was right up there, actually, and when frontman Rob Halford said in a recent interview that the new material can be compared to Painkiller, my ears perked up.
Speaking to Talking Metal, Halford described the ongoing writing sessions of new material. "We had some great writing sessions at the start of this year back in the U.K. at Glenn's [Tipton, guitar] setup, his studio," Rob said (see video below). "And, man, it was boundless opportunities that were coming out of those writing sessions. We did a lot of demos. I've got pretty much an [album's worth] of [new] Judas Priest [material] on this phone right now. And it's just amazing.
"I've gotta give a shoutout to the fans, as we always do," he continued. "We can't be who we are without you guys looking after us and giving us the inspiration and the motivation. Because we came off that 'Firepower' tour so energized, and we still were feeling that when we started the writing sessions early this year, and we got a lot of work done.
"On average, we usually have three or four big writing sessions of a month or so at a time. And so we got the first one down, and we've got a lot of material. It's incredibly fierce. I think that energy was just being channeled, especially from Richie. Some of his riffs and some of the core of the songs, they're absolutely lethal. I feel textures of the Painkiller experience in some of the songs, and the classic elements again. It'll have its own legs, like they all do — they've all got their own character. And I think whatever this album is called and whenever it's released, it'll be another great metal milestone for Judas Priest."
I am completely down for everything Rob is saying here. We can't wait to hear new Judas Priest.
If you missed it, we also interviewed Halford last week, and he offered great memories of Eddie Van Halen, and talked about his new book, Confess.
[via Blabbermouth]
