Why Judas Priest aren't as popular as Iron Maiden?

IMO, a few factors helped Maiden to regain their popularity since Bruce and Adrian came back:
1) Management and marketing: Rod for sure knows his job way better than Priest's management, and really took the good decisions about how to promote the band and bring them to the top again (the mix between album and history tours is a perfect example how to keep fan's interest awake).

2) Live performances: Judas Priest and specially Rob really do look their age. I saw them in 2015, I was in the front row and it was really painful seeing Rob performing, not talking about the vocals but just his presence on stage, I couldn't help but thinking "please stop, you're hurting yourself old man". The rest of the band, apart from Richie, doesn't do a lot on stage either. In this area, Maiden are on top of their game, specially Bruce and Steve look like they're still in their 30's running all over the stage and even the more quiet ones like Dave and Adrian look healthy and not ready at all for a retirement home.

3) The music released since both of their reunion: for me since Maiden is by far my favorite band, it's hard to be objective but I listened to all of their albums and I feel Maiden isn't as nostalgic as Priest (per example, on Angel of Retribution, it really feels like they tried to use the formula of their most well-known albums and songs, in order to please their fans, way more than what Maiden did with BNW).
 
Christoffer said:
People who were around back then, who were bigger during the 80s? I get that Turbo and Ram It Down might have ruined the momentum for Priest but British Steel and Screaming for Vengeance were albums with some huge hits
Click to expand...

Priest was more well-known in the mainstream in the U.S., at least for music. "Livin' After Midnight" and "You Got Another Thing Coming" both got lots of radio play; Priest played the US Festival in '83, and were among the bands specifically singled out by Tipper Gore's PMRC (though so were The Mentors, so maybe that's not a good indicator of hugeness). But Maiden T-shirts were everywhere (at least everywhere that long-haired teenagers hung out), and like today everybody knew of them even if they couldn't name one of their songs. Eddie has got to be one of the best branding ideas in the history of rock and roll, right up there with KISS's makeup.

But both bands played similarly-sized arenas and sheds on their 80s U.S. tours, and together with Ozzy, Scorpions, and Van Halen [edit: oops, forgot AC/DC] were the top draws in the metal genre for most of the decade -- Metallica was still low on the bill on the '88 Monsters of Rock tour (I missed their set because we were stuck in traffic getting to the show, got there toward the end of Dokken's set), and Guns 'N Roses were still opening for Maiden and Aerosmith that same year. But I think that was the last year Metallica was an opener -- they sold out the same arenas and sheds later in the year when they toured Justice -- and Def Leppard were also at the top by '87-88. I couldn't tell you who sold more albums without doing research, but Maiden and Priest were about on par with each other at least between about '83 and '87. Priest was bigger before that -- they'd been putting out albums longer, but didn't really have a U.S. hit album until British Steel in 1980 (trivia: Judas Priest ended their first ever U.S. tour as the opener for Led Zeppelin's last-ever U.S. show, at Oakland Coliseum in 1977). Maiden didn't really have a U.S. hit album until Number of the Beast.

Priest lost momentum after Turbo, and Maiden lost momentum after Seventh Son. Part of it was that the business and the "in" sounds were changing; thrash and glam-pop were the hot tickets by the end of the decade and Priest / Maiden's new sounds lost some old fans while failing to capture enough new ones.
 
Last edited:
Let's not forget that Maiden are popular (without radio airplay and TV appearances) because of their great tours/concerts and dedication to the fans. And Eddie is a legendary marketing move - even better than the makeup of Kiss!

Also - I think it's more difficult to write long songs, they're more complex than the short rockers with more time changes, harmonies and a lot of lyrics. That's one thing that Maiden are best at, and definitely better than Priest.
 
Last edited:
It has to do with the fact that IM has a better coherence in their visual-marketing-merchandising strategy than JP. In other words, the answer can be phrased in two words: Derek Riggs. ;)
 
Where does all this “Maiden never had any radio or tv help” bullshit come from? Maybe they didn’t in the US but in the U.K. they were on the tv loads back in the day.

From number of the beast right up to fear of the dark practically every single they realised went into the U.K. charts top ten so their videos were played on the weekly top of the pops show which was on mainstream channels at a popular tv time (7pm). Plus I remember hearing them on the radio when I got into Maiden. Bring your daughter definitely got radio play and so did from here to eternity. There was a weekly chart run down on the biggest radio station in the U.K. at the time, radio 1 and they definitely played maiden singles when they were out. Plus they broadcast the whole of Donnington 92 live, not just maiden but the whole day. I remember because I sat there all day with a bunch of blank cassettes recording it lol.

I’ve heard this line trawled out so many times over the years by both fans and the band themselves and Rod and I always thought to myself “so you don’t watch tv or listen to the radio in your home country then”. Maybe the rest of the world was different but knowing how European countries like Germany, Greece and the Scandinavian countries love their rock and metal I would bet they got tv and radio spots elsewhere too. Of course they never got radio exposure like say Def Leppard or Bon jovi etc bit to say they got none is a bit of a lie surely.
 
Iron Maiden was part of MTV’s first broadcast and were popular especially when Headbangers Ball started as far as I can tell based on the playlists and programming that are all published online. That being said, I don’t listen to the radio anymore but when I did Priest was played more often than Maiden. On satellite radio it seems to be about equal.
 
I like when people say because Priest is older. The avarage age in my band is 25 and we still can't get any gigs.


These things go in cycles. In the early 80's Priest played arenas. In the 90's they played the same places. In the late 80's they played the same places. Priest has lost both their key members at this point so I can't see them grow from this point on. Maiden on the other had have their classic lineup + a bonus dancer.
 
Yeah, I mainly remember Maiden being played during headbanger's ball, but rarely during regular primetime programming.

I actually remember hearing Can I Play with Madness in a Marks and Spencer.
 
Plus I also forgot that phantom of the opera was used in two big advertising campaigns in the U.K. one was in the 80’s for lucozade the energy drink with Daley Thompson the big British celebrity athlete of the time and the other a few years back for Pizza Hut. And they were featured in prime time British tv shows, the most notable being the police drama the bill.

Maybe elsewhere in the world they were absen from tv and radio but not in the U.K.
 
Wayne Bond said:
Where does all this “Maiden never had any radio or tv help” bullshit come from? Maybe they didn’t in the US but in the U.K. they were on the tv loads back in the day.

From number of the beast right up to fear of the dark practically every single they realised went into the U.K. charts top ten so their videos were played on the weekly top of the pops show which was on mainstream channels at a popular tv time (7pm). Plus I remember hearing them on the radio when I got into Maiden. Bring your daughter definitely got radio play and so did from here to eternity. There was a weekly chart run down on the biggest radio station in the U.K. at the time, radio 1 and they definitely played maiden singles when they were out. Plus they broadcast the whole of Donnington 92 live, not just maiden but the whole day. I remember because I sat there all day with a bunch of blank cassettes recording it lol.

I’ve heard this line trawled out so many times over the years by both fans and the band themselves and Rod and I always thought to myself “so you don’t watch tv or listen to the radio in your home country then”. Maybe the rest of the world was different but knowing how European countries like Germany, Greece and the Scandinavian countries love their rock and metal I would bet they got tv and radio spots elsewhere too. Of course they never got radio exposure like say Def Leppard or Bon jovi etc bit to say they got none is a bit of a lie surely.
Click to expand...

I think this notion that they are big without the radio and the tv is true for the US which is one of the biggest markets and so the idea was installed that Maiden didn't receive any radio and tv help worldwide when it was true only in the US.

I'm not saying they didn't appear on MTV or that they never sounded on the radio there but not in the same amount as in Europe.

Besides, in the 90's with the release of the Black Album Metallica became the example of a metal band that would appear on the mainstream media and so other fans including Iron Maiden fans adopted the rethoric that "we are popular without radio and tv help" and so on.
 
Judas Priest were quite bigin North America during the 80s, bigger than Maiden at the time (oh boy how times have changed!). Some would argue that the success came at the expense of sacrificing their integrity, changing their sound several times in the process though...
 
soundwave said:
Depends what market. In the US, I remember Priest being much more visible.

Despite the gold and platinum albums, I always remember Maiden being underground in the 80s (no mainstream radio support and no videos during primetime on MTV). There was a small stretch in 86/87 where Wasted Years got some attention, but that's all I remember. Priest were more in the limelight. You got another thing was their big 80s anthem that was everywhere. Maiden never had anything like that.
Click to expand...

I think Maiden was much more in the limelight than Priest in their homeland (Britain). Priest were nowhere near as successful there.
 
**Replying to a 5 years old quote, but yeah you are still here, probably opinion unchanged so why not:

GhostofCain said:
Some would argue that the success came at the expense of sacrificing their integrity, changing their sound several times in the process though...
Click to expand...

I don’t think this is completely right. Their attempts to more commercial sound weren’t as successful as the “true Priest” ones.
And integrity is all good and dandy but look the result post 80s of Steve not willing to sacrifice his deafness! :D
 
Adding to @Black Bart answer:
- cashing on the reunion ship a bit late (or 4 years later)
- Nostradamus flop (also, not playing an album live lost them respect points in the mainstream media)
- poor tour rotations
- KK Downing
- inconsistent lineup
- longer periods (and more frequent) of hiatus.

Band of that stature deserve much more professional management decisions.
 
Priest made alot more mediocre albums than Maiden and I´d even rank my least favourite Maiden albums higher than the ones of Priest, there's one exception though: T u r b o ! Hated by many, adored by only a few.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top