Redeemer of Souls Vs. The Book of Souls

Which is the better album

  • Redeemer of Souls

    Votes: 3 8.6%

  • The Book of Souls

    Votes: 32 91.4%
  • Total voters
    35
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Both albums are very strong. With Redeemer, Judas Priest have made one of their heaviest albums. It harkens back to the 80s, while at the same time adding new elements. Songs like Walls of Valhalla and Sword of Domocles in particular are unlike anything they've done before and alone are worth the price. Amazing harmonies that permeate throughout the entire album. The twin harmonizing is great to hear and the solos kick ass. Always love hearing guitar duals on a Priest album.

With The Book of Souls, Iron Maiden predictably managed another kickass metal album. It has the raw production sound of their last two albums and the progressiveness to go with it. There's even instrumentation never before heard on a Maiden record. This late it the game its amazing to see them continue making music like this. AMoLAD felt like it couldn't be topped, but they just may have. Final Frontier was a very strong record, but one got the feeling while listening to it that AMoLAD was where they reached their peak. But clearly they haven't. It's kinda like AMoLAD musically but darker. And the lyrics are, as usual, deep and intellectual. This is a stark contrast to Priest's lyrics on Redeemer of Souls, where the songs are all about dragons, vikings, and steel.

That's my 2 cents.
 
Book of Souls no question. Redeemer is a solid album but has a lot of flaws. It's nothing new for Priest and all the ground it covers has been covered better in the past. In a lot of ways it's a second rate version of the classic Priest. Still good, but we know they can do better.


TBOS covers some new ground for Maiden and it also has some stuff they've done before, but I feel Maiden has embraced their age much better than Priest. The music is more mature and they don't set out to sound like they did in the 80s. But they have the same energy they did in the 80s, this does not sound like a band in their 35th year of recorded music. Priest on the other hand sounds a bit tired (especially Halford), they sound like dinosaurs trying to play 80s styled Metal.
 
I agree, it's not even a question. I don't want to diss Redeemer too much; I think the album's fun enough and the songs were more or less great live (except for March of the Damned, which was just the same bore it was on the album). But that's the difference - Priest's album's just fun, whereas the Maiden album is amazing. It is probably the weakest of the reunion era for me now (well, fighting with BNW all the time), but that's still enough to go crazy about the album.
 
Redeemer is Priest playing it as safe as possible. Everything is super formulaic, Halford sounds overprocessed and other instruments are too devoid of life & energy. Production is god awful, I honestly think @Saapanael produced better guitar sound in his homemade videos than a 40 year old band did on their 17th album. It's embarassing really. Songs range from tolerable to god awful slow hard rock.

The Book Of Souls is like opposite of Redeemer in every way possible.
 
Night Prowler said:
Redeemer is Priest playing it as safe as possible. Everything is super formulaic, Halford sounds overprocessed and other instruments are too devoid of life & energy. Production is god awful, I honestly think @Saapanael produced better guitar sound in his homemade videos than a 40 year old band did on their 17th album. It's embarassing really. Songs range from tolerable to god awful slow hard rock.

The Book Of Souls is like opposite of Redeemer in every way possible.
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You're right. It sounds sterile. However, so does most of studio Priest, IMHO. I've learned to live with it and nowadays I mostly return to Defenders, B-Steel, Sin After Sin and Painkiller. Sometimes I put on Class or Killing Machine. But nowadays I think they're mostly enjoyable live.
 
I think that's not even a fair comparison, because TBOS is miles better than Redeemer. While I quite like some songs from Redeemer, I can't deny it sounds like they are trying to create another Painkiller and failing at it. On the other hand, TBOS is just another proof that Maiden are not worried about making music to please '80s nostalgic. They are not afraid to experiment and try new things...
 
I disagree, I don't think they were trying to recreate Painkiller. When the first song was released I thought that, then I got the album and listen to every song and realised they are just being Judas Priest. If it has to be compared to any album, it's Defenders of The Faith.

But Redeemer is really it's own thing. Angel of Retribution, although a very solid album, was Priest trying to sound like the different past incarnations of Priest. Nostradamus was something new and progressive, I've even heard it called power metal which I guess there are elements of at times.

But Redeemer of Souls was a new thing for Priest. There are definitely tastes of old JP in it, including Painkiller, but it's also an evolution of their sound. The songs that really stand out in that way are Walls of Valhalla and Sword of Domocles. In a way it's similar to how Maiden has evolved, but obviously to a lesser degree.

So, yea, what was my point? Oh yea, Redeemer of Souls was not trying to be Painkiller.
 
I think I didn't explain myself right. I didn't mean they are trying to recreate Painkiller in terms of sound. What I was trying to say, is that it feels like they are stuck in the past, trying to recreate their past glory and that's why, unlike Maiden, they seem dated. I just mentioned Painkiller, because it's their best... Anyway, it's difficult to explain in english, but I think what I was trying to say is similar to what Mosh said a few posts above.
 
Night Prowler said:
It doesn't sound like Painkiller at all. More like a poor man's heavier British Steel.
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This. And I don't hear them going for the Painkiller sound either. If anything they're going for Defenders meets British Steel.

But I agree that they're trying to recreate past glory.

I think having these albums released somewhat close together has been really eye opening. There's a huge difference between current Priest and current Maiden. Priest is 80s nostalgia, good nostalgia in my opinion, but still nostalgia. Maiden isn't concerned with calling back to their past. They'll do it occasionally on a song or two, but it isn't the focus of the album. They're always trying different things no matter what.

Priest is kinda interesting because they've been consistently open to new things too but the results vary a lot more. Up until the 00s, they were pretty good with staying current. When glam metal was in fashion, they released Turbo. When extreme metal became more and more prevalent in the 90s, they released some of their heaviest albums ever. You can't listen to Painkiller and tell me that sounds like a band 20 years into their career. However, they have a tendency to play it safe after experimenting. Instead of pursuing a proggy direction in the 70s, they pulled back the reigns a ton and released a very straightforward commercial album in British Steel. Redeemer seems to be a similar thing. After the lukewarm reception of the ambitious Nostradamus, they're playing it extremely safe here, taking absolutely no risks.

I can't fault them for that. They're good at what they do. I didn't like Nostradamus, but Redeemer is solid.
 
I think you'd be better off asking a Black Sabbath or Metallica forum, since you're pretty much going to get everyone saying Maiden, myself included here.
 
Redeemer is, along with Super Collider by Megadeth, the weakest recent album by bands that I consider to be favorites.
 
It's not about the playing, which is fine. It's about the songwriting and tradition. KK has a legacy as a writer, and Redeemer didn't have any songs of high quality.
 
That's fair, he was a huge creative driving force for sure.
 
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