A masterful work which is a turning point in the group's career !!!
March 8, 2024. International Women's Rights Day, but not only that. The sun is shining on Metal Town. The whole town trembles with joy. A highly anticipated event is preparing. An important celebration for the local population. All the inhabitants of this town are busy in their respective tasks. The posters are stuck on the advertising spaces provided for this purpose. The merchandising stands are in place. Delicious aromas emanate from the catering. The party favors and glitter are ready to cover not only blonde heads. The finishing touches are being made to the installation of the stage. Even the church was decorated for the occasion. Six long years the community has been waiting for this moment. More than the Messiah himself. The bishopric has just given the green light for the return of the parish priest. The one who is inspired by Bob DYLAN and gives a hell of a performance when morale is low. The one who goes into flamboyant sermons when he takes stock of the world every Sunday morning with firepower like no other. Today, it has become an invincible shield. A fatal weapon for evil. The painkiller for a Humanity whose morality is declining. He was the angel of punishment, then the redeemer of souls. He forged British steel while inspiring vocations among defenders of the faith. Sin after sin, he experienced the sad wings of destiny. To drive the point home, he embarked on a business of demolishing the mystery surrounding Nostradamus by being a particularly tenacious regulator of any entry point to hermeticism. He was punished for rebelling against the established order. Which prompted him to cry for revenge and come back stronger a week exactly before the Ides of March. And he put the turbo on it. It's going to rocka roller in the cottages, dediou. However, it was not an easy thing with this damn particularly crowning pandemic which postponed his tour plans, as well as the heart attack of one of his guitarists. Fortunately, not by much. Indeed, he had a hollow nose to record his orchestrated speeches at the beginning of 2020. Yes, JUDAS PRIEST is back, adorned in beautiful liturgical vestments.
This, to the delight of metalheads who were worried about not having any news from Rob HALFORD and company. It is true that in the 80’s, the combo’s cruising rhythm was more regular, i.e. an album every one to two years. From the 90's onwards, things got complicated with the arrival of grunge and alternative rock which ruined all the work of the old hands of NWOHBM and the like. This was concretely the case with IRON MAIDEN who had great difficulty keeping their heads above water. Same for SAXON. Even more so for JUDAS PRIEST who, after a monumental Painkiller, THE centerpiece in the English discography, wallowed nicely with two big commercial failures, Jugulator and Demolition. The reason is very simple. The replacement of the Metal God by one of his biggest fans, Tim Ripper Owens. Seven springs separate Painkiller from Jugulator. Which is not surprising, given that Glenn TIPTON, KK DOWNING, Ian HILL and Scott TRAVIS had difficulty recovering from the departure of their legendary vocalist at the time. In 2004, after some experimentation within FIGHT, TWO and his solo group, He Qui Pousse La Chansonnette returned home and, with the other members, put together the comeback album, the powerful Angel Of Retribution. Exit Chris TSANGARIDES, Sean LYNCH and John ASTLEY on production, it was Roy Z who stuck to the controls, buoyed by the success of Resurrection, the return to traditional metal of the HALFORD squad. Three brooms later, Nostradamus pointed the tip of his crystal ball. Mixed success for this massive conceptual double-CD with nevertheless remarkable qualities. A few line-up changes later, KK DOWNING was replaced hands down by Richie FAULKNER, then scratcher for DEEDS, Lauren HARRIS and VOODOO SIX. JUDAS PRIEST then circulated quite a bit to familiarize its audience with the newbie and immortalize its presence on the Epitaph DVD. With a hard rock and blues background, the young musician composed with Glenn TIPTON. The result was not long in coming. In 2014, it was the classic Redeemer Of Souls which came out of the Priestian forges. Although the thirteen tracks are excellent in themselves, the mixing and mastering lack logic on the one hand and punch on the other. It is live that the songs will really gain momentum. Battle Cry is here to testify to this. The club of five was not in the habit of resting on its laurels, so he quickly began working on new cantatas again. And, on March 9, 2018, Firepower uttered its first wails through an eponymous song that shatters the eardrums like never before. Illustrated by an old-style cover by Claudio BERGAMIN, which is not without recalling those of Screaming For Vengeance, Defenders Of The Faith and Turbo, works by Doug JOHNSON, with these running lines which evoke movement, Firepower is extremely effective, in particular thanks to Andy SNEAP (HELL, SABBAT), whose knows all the talent of a sound engineer. However, Richie FAULKNER and Glenn TIPTON are the architects of the JUDAS PRIEST sound of the 21st century. Eager not to cling to their glorious past, without denying it, the minstrels then allow themselves all possible freedoms to create something new while retaining the basics. This is how Firepower gives way to innovative refrains that leave baba. Now playing on atmospheres more than on speed and aggression, JUDAS PRIEST gives us masterpieces like Children Of The Sun, Necromancer, Specter or Rising From Ruins. Even if there are still nuclear missiles like Firepower, Lightning Strike, Evil Never Dies or Flamethrower to blow up in our faces.
As these lines are written, Invincible Shield is taking over in this musical long-distance race. Does he have all the assets to be a serious challenger to all his predecessors? It depends on whether you are fans of the status quo, clinging to the glory days of JUDAS PRIEST or, conversely, fans of change who appreciate evolution because it contributes to the general improvement of the group's talents. . Indeed, Invincible Shield is, like Bruce DICKINSON's The Mandrake Project, a record which certainly does not leave one indifferent, but as everyone has varied expectations, it risks being relatively factional. Artistically, this nineteenth ritual offering is a success from start to finish. Technically, all musicians are maestros. Richie FAULKNER and Rob HALFORD shine infinitely. They are the real stars with their respective interpretations on this supercharged Invincible Shield, even if Glenn TIPTON, whose contribution is beyond doubt on some of the pont-neufs, Ian HILL and Scott TRAVIS are no less notably present.
Most of you have already heard the first four singles, namely: the hybrid Panic Attack, a sort of sonic bridge between Turbo Lover and Painkiller, which stands out with its synthwave intro which quickly gives way to a well-honed piece of music. the Flame Thrower, Rob HALFORD being particularly comfortable and in good shape on his vocal lines and the group very cohesive on this criticism of the excesses of the Internet and its ordinary users, mainly from the extreme right, who want to have the put their hand on it in order to distill their hatred of others and their differences, the jerky mid-tempo Trial By Fire which flirts with the first seconds of Judas Is Rising and the structure of Rising From Ruins, the “power ballad” Crown Of Horns which is, from a certain point of view, the counterpart of No Surrender, as well as the edgy The Serpent And The King which, thematically, plays in the same category as SAXON's Hell, Fire And Damnation, but with an Evil Never side Dies pronounced riding the Jawbreaker wave. The rest of the songs are just as enjoyable, even orgasmic, as this album is a pure marvel. It is, in fact, not surprising to see it rise to first place in the charts in the four corners of the globe.
Invincible Shield, in its beginnings, is a nod to Scott TRAVIS' drum break on Hell Patrol, because the two titles are strangely similar in this detail, except that they do not continue in the same way, Invincible Shield is more in a fully assumed 80's vein with some furtive forays into the 70's, which makes this cantata very attractive. Musically, this eponymous aria is quite close to Hellrider and its elder All Guns Blazing. For the rest, we find hints of Exciter and Invader, sometimes sprinkled with Beyond The Realms Of Death at the level of the six-string solos. While Devil In Disguise is a mid-tempo cousin of Traitor’s Gate and Lone Wolf, which quickly slips into pure Necromancer. This fourth title is anchored in the JUDAS PRIEST of the 2000s. Which is the case of Gates Of Hell, even if a sensation of Come And Get It is felt in the intro riff. That said, this fifth track remains quite surprising from JUDAS PRIEST, since it does not quite sound like JUDAS PRIEST. More precisely, it does not necessarily stick to the group's past, but rather opens the doors to the future. Richie's solo is reminiscent of what Adrian SMITH does on many IRON MAIDEN songs, as do the guitar harmonies which are quite reminiscent of what the Iron Maiden did on Somewhere In Time. Scott TRAVIS and Ian HILL hop like goats on relatively thrashy rhythms, while Rob HALFORD wisely stays in a medium register which suits him better. Then comes the steamroller As God Is My Witness with its omnipresence of double-pedal and which borrows as much from Leather Rebel as from One Shot At Glory, the climax of the song being this solo from Richie and this tapping so representative of the combo in the style of Ram It Down. The company has given us one of its best pieces of the last thirty years.
The last trio of the light version of Invincible Shield then arrives and the quintet begins hostilities with the UFO Escape From Reality whose doomesque approach is obvious. It's a block of unusual heaviness from JUDAS PRIEST who, once in a while, asks BLACK SABBATH about Rob's voice, mimicking that of Ozzy OSBOURNE on the bridge before the solos, as well as CANDLEMASS for the power of the riffs and the rhythmic syncopations and SOUNDGARDEN for this nod to Black Hole Sun from 2min22, which gives a psychedelic side ideally fitting into the concept of this original refrain. Sons Of Thunder is an explosive bomb of too short duration which suddenly falls on us while bringing back memories of Hell Bent For Leather, Breaking The Law, Screaming For Vengeance or Deal With The Devil to the surface and which gives an indication of the content of the tenth and penultimate title of the 19th opus of JUDAS PRIEST. As an epilogue, we are treated to the epic Giants In The Sky, very bluesy with its Crossfire and Children Of The Sun accents, from which it partially takes up the melody. It's a majestic song, especially with this acoustic solo in a passage of Olympian calm like Sea Of Red, Angel or Beginning Of The End, which pays tribute to Ronnie James DIO and Lemmy KILMISTER, who died too young in 2010 and 2015 , at the respective ages of 67 and 70 years.
To make the pleasure last longer (like the famous Frenchie brand of condoms), the five did not forget to add three bonus tracks to the Deluxe version of Invincible Shield, namely the rock'n'roll Fight Of Your Life which should really have appeared on the album given its high quality, mix of Dragonaut and Rock Hard, Ride Free, the muscular Vicious Circle, mirror of Hellrider, Evil Never Dies and Rising From Ruins, and the bizarre and quite unpleasant The Lodger , written by Bob HALLIGAN JR., the author of Some Heads Are Gonna Roll and (Take These) Chains, barcarolles more typical and more worthy of JUDAS PRIEST than The Lodger which ultimately remains the black point of the long version of Invincible Shield, something totally dispensable.
Ultimately, apart from this microscopic error at the end, Invincible Shield is a fucking killing spree that jumps down our throats like a lioness on its prey. Three-fifths of the musicians may have reached retirement age a long time ago, but the fact remains that they are in great shape, with the exception of Glenn TIPTON who, unfortunately, contracted this nasty Parkinson's disease. From a writing point of view, however, he remains a monster of precision in his guitar parts and efficiency in his compositions as evidenced by the shells Sons Of Thunder, Escape From Reality and Vicious Circle. His disability in no way prevents him from having excellent ideas that bear fruit. Special mention to Richie FAULKNER who, since his arrival in the ranks of the British heavy mercenaries in 2011, has revived the quintet while making it evolve, constantly taking it out of its comfort zone. Enough to rekindle the flame of the group which, since the operatic Nostradamus and the hieratic Redeemer Of Souls, has continued to grow and assert itself even more vigorously than during its glorious past, resolutely determined to prove to all the heretics who no longer believe in the existence of rock that they are so wrong. Because metal is still standing, its heart beating passionately. JUDAS PRIEST is the ringing confirmation of this. Rob HALFORD shouts like a god, Scott TRAVIS hits his drums as if his life depended on it, Richie FAULKNER remains vibrant with vivacity, Glenn TIPTON goes beyond himself considerably to show that he is an eminent member of the orchestra and, equal to himself, Ian HILL, although embodying quiet strength, remains a rhythmic war machine. All these elements assembled make JUDAS PRIEST a lively torrent which deconstructs the prejudices that ordinary mortals may have in the face of the agony of amplified music, which is only a mirage, and whose main mission remains the dismantling of heads, the breaking of the jawbones and the crushing of the impious. With the redeemer of souls taking a sabbatical and the flamboyant return of the angel of punishment, those who still doubt the happy days to come of heavy metal with baked beans sauce should be forgotten. Since JUDAS PRIEST makes a triumphant comeback thanks to this nineteenth opus, even more than with Firepower which, in a certain way, was only a first draft of Invincible Shield, a draft already very well taken care of, but which sometimes lacked finesse. Now, thanks to the seriousness of the combo and Andy SNEAP's appetite for mixing consoles and recording techniques, we are finally rewarded for our support with a colorful album that avoids bouts of nostalgia without however, we omit the great moments of the story of Priest Judas. The Sentinel keeps watch. But the hardened steel company is not ready to play KISS or AEROSMITH. Rob HALFORD and his friends have long looked to the future without denying their past. Hence this balanced Invincible Shield which never wavers one iota. Three tracks successfully passed the stage test at the end of March and beginning of April, with fans turning out in huge numbers. After an induction into the Rock'n'Roll Hall Of Fame at the end of 2023, Invincible Shield should drive home JUDAS PRIEST's popularity well beyond the borders of metal. This is not a theory, but a fact. Several Western general media took up the subject while praising the band to the preaching apostle. JUDAS PRIEST is therefore at the height of its success, more than it was previously, including thanks to Painkiller. Invincible Shield is a turning point in the careers of the five companions because it carries within it the complete legacy of 50 years of hard work and a host of sacrifices that the clan had to make to succeed in conquering the throne that was theirs. finally had to. It is a shield against the ambient gloom of our times which, if not making us invincible in the face of adversity, at least makes us impervious to the negative energies released by our human peers who are not part of our large and joyful family. This is why it is imperative to have this masterful work in your discotheque, especially since, even if Rob HALFORD confided in an interview that he does not foresee an end to this magnificent adventure that is JUDAS PRIEST, we do not know what the future can bring us, unless, obviously, there is a John of Jerusalem or a Baba Vanga among us, or even an oracle of Delphi. So, let’s enjoy the present moment and this extraordinary gift that has been given to us.
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