JUDAS PRIEST ALBUM RANKING GAME: #5 REVEALED

I'm kinda used to being on the "Sad Wings is kinda overrated" side of the discussion, but this thread might have flipped me. :)

It's got some really interesting, groundbreaking songs, a clear identity and a lot of variety, but it's just not deep enough to rank among the true classics.

Changes, Ripper and Tyrant are fantastic and the Deceivers are very cool, but is that enough to make it great?

Good album that ranked #7 for me, but could have been lower. IMO Sin After Sin offers everything this one does, but better.
 
One of the things I like best about Stained Class is the range of songs and the way they are sequenced. It's a template that carries over to their very best albums and it's probably the imprint that I personally carry a bias toward when judging how any album is constructed.

One of the things I like least is the sound. It's clean and relatively dynamic, and it's not actively annoying like Ram it Down, but it is so freaking dry. It robs the songs of their power.

The songs themselves are a mixed bag. The album is relatively deep, in that there aren't any songs I dislike. And there is some interesting parts and a nice mix of compositions. But where it gains points at the bottom, it loses them at the top. That's because Priest has a very deep catalogue and this album has several tracks that rank in the bottom half of my list, and very few tracks that crack the upper end.

Exciter is an excellent thrash song, but they have better from the same template. Beyond the Realms is fantastic, but it's the solo that truly elevates it. The title track is the only other one that I'd consider an essential.

I think the reason I lean toward Sin After Sin out of that '70s trio is because it has both the high-end songs and the depth.

It sits 10th on my list, but as I said earlier, 11-6 are pretty much pick-'em.
 
1:
2:
3:
4:
5: British Steel
6: Stained Class
7: Sad Wings of Destiny
8: Angel of Retribution
9: Sin After Sin
10: Killing Machine
11: Turbo
12: Nostradamus
13: Redeemer of Souls
14: Ram It Down
15: Point of Entry
16: Jugulator
17: Demolition
18: Rocka Rolla

Highest Score: 18 (@Sth2112)
Lowest Score: 8 (@Eddieson)

Sorry folks for the late update, been quite the busy week. This will be the only update for the week, and I'll try to go back to two a week starting next Monday. If you're missing the frequent updates, maybe you can spend some time with the Nightwish discography?

British Steel appropriately kicks off our top 5. Of the big post 70s albums (British Steel, SFV, Painkiller, Defenders), I think it makes a lot of sense that this is not the preferred Maidenfans album. For one thing, Priest leans way into the commercial on this album. Songs like United, Metal Gods, Living After Midnight, You Don't Have To Be Old To Be Wise show the band really going for it. When listening to the album myself I am in awe of the huge production sound and the tightly written hooks, but I also find myself missing the pure Metal. The other famous Priest albums, notably SFV have a little bit more of a balance there.

1980 was a huge year for rock and metal. I can think of a few monumental albums from this year: Black Sabbath's Heaven and Hell, AC/DC's Back in Black, the debut Iron Maiden album, and British Steel. Each of these albums are similar in the sense that they seem to be responding to the NWOBHM movement and heralding a more mainstream and accessible version of hard rock and metal compared to the 70s. They all do it differently though. Black Sabbath had a pretty radical adjustment to their sound, primarily by bringing on Dio. AC/DC is pretty much doing the same thing as the 70s, but much more refined with a polished production. Iron Maiden is the scrappy underground NWOBHM act, but you still get songs like Running Free that have single potential. Judas Priest exists somewhere in the middle of these acts. They are an older band and almost unrecognizable compared to the band that made Sad Wings of Destiny, but they have also spent a few years moving in this direction (with Killing Machine being a pretty big transitional album). I also always felt like British Steel was a little bit more connected with the NWOBHM sound than any other band that was trying to capitalize off of that movement without actually being part of it. I think Priest correctly and successfully identified that a lot of the musical appeal of the NWOBHM was in the fact that it was often more immediate and easy to digest than the more progressive/psychedelic tendencies of 70s hard rock.

With all of these things in mind, #5 makes sense, although I'm not sure I would take this album over any of the 70s albums aside from Rocka Rolla. Priest created a really accessible album here, but I think they also gave up a lot of their charm and uniqueness to get there. The songwriting and production is obviously leagues above some of the previous albums, but I also miss the atmosphere and attitude in a song like Exciter. I miss the guitar harmonies which are practically non existent on this album, and even the riffing isn't great. They would find a way to marry the commercial with the metal on other albums, but British Steel is really the band embracing FM rock a little too heavily for my tastes.
 
Yeah, British Steel isn’t all that, IMO. “Breaking The Law” is great, and “Living After Midnight” and “The Rage” are good, but I could take or leave everything else on there.
 
British Steel is classic Priest without a doubt and I think its ranking is right. I ranked it 6th and it can't beat the other albums. It's commercial Priest plus heavy metal/NWOBHM, but this time with stronger songwriting overall (unlike the previous 2 albums). With it, I think they found their preferred formula, style and structure of songs. And it works perfectly. The album is great as a whole listen, especially with the several anthems.

The production is great, polished, louder and clean. Rob's vocals are great too, his voice from this album on is what I prefer.
If I categorize anything with this album, it's Glenn and KK's riffs - simple but very effective. Literally in every song and that helps a lot. Some of the solos are shorter, but most of them are very good (Rapid, Metal, Living). The drumming is also pretty solid.

The big classics are: Breaking The Law, Living After Midnight, Metal Gods and Rapid Fire.
- Rapid is one of the best metal openers and the solos battle in the instrumental section is still awesome. I'm not the biggest fan of Metal Gods, but its simplistic and catchy approach (that tempo), like for the other 2 classics, is what makes them memorable. Timeless riffs! I mean, Breaking The Law!! Grinder is a nice typical Priest rocker, Steeler is cool and works just awesome as a fast closer with longer instrumental section (it's like a continuation of the opener) and You Don't Have To Be Old To Be Wise is one of the band's interesting ''lesser'' songs on classic albums. As for the other songs, The Rage is a needed song with a different vibe for the album, United is a filler for me.

This album is a true classic in metal and doesn't need to be more complex or something (like not having guitar melodies at all, the melodic riffs shine here). It really underlines how a strong songwriting can boost the great ideas.
 
British Steel is definitely where the band turns a corner and you can hear it in everything from the performance to the production.

The songs are simpler, often to their detriment, but you can feel that the band is tighter than ever. It's easily the best (and most consistent) Rob has ever sounded on a record up til this point. The hooks are big, even when they're horrifically lame (re: United).

The only perfect songs here, IMO, are Breaking The Law and The Rage. The rest run the gamut from pretty good (Rapid Fire, Living After Midnight) to really, really not good (see again, re: United). My least favorite Judas Priest sound, after the Ripper shit of course, is the "boom bap" discount AC/DC vibe and it's all over British Steel. Thankfully, the songwriting here is vastly superior to what they would do on the follow-up record. Even United, which again, is not good, still never reaches some of the awful lows that they would pander on earlier (and later) records to try and "get a stadium singing like Queen fans".

Wish they'd do more songs like The Rage, though.

This one dropped half a point to earn a respectable 7.3/10, landing just above every 70s record except for Sin After Sin.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top