It started on a dreary November day when, once again, my brother begged me to drive him to the store. He's a CD fanatic, so we stopped in at the Long Ear. While he searched the CDs, I explored the used tapes section. (My car has a tape player only) There I found three bands which I vaguely recognized the names of: Black Sabbath, White Snake, and Judas Priest. They were $2 each, so I bought them. The JP tape was Ram It Down. The very next day I went back to Long Ear to get the rest of the JP tapes they had.
And thus began the obsession.
Now I have all of Judas Priest's CDs save for Priest... Live! which I have the VHS tape of so I didn't bother with the CD. :)

Original Cast
Rob Halford		Vocals
Glenn Tipton		Guitar
K.K. Downing		Guitar
Ian Hill		Bass
misc		Drums

Current Cast
Tim 'Ripper' Owens		Vocals
Glenn Tipton		Guitar
K.K. Downing		Guitar
Ian Hill		Bass
Scott Travis		Drums

Rocka Rolla Favorite track(s): Rocka Rolla & Diamonds and Rust It's softer than a lot of later Priest albums, but it's still good songwriting, good music, great CD.

Sad Wings of Destiny Favorite track(s): Tyrant

Sin After Sin Favorite track(s): Starbreaker I haven't listened to this one as much as I got it only recently, but there are some good songs on this one, including version #2 of Diamonds and Rust

Stained Class Favorite track(s): Beyond the Realms of Death Definately faster-paced than the early stuff, I prefer the one slow song on here.

Hell Bent for Leather Favorite track(s): Hell Bent for Leather, Burnin' Up, Before the Dawn Lots of good stuff on this one

Unleashed in the East Favorite track(s): Diamonds and Rust The first 'live' CD, it has alternate versions of previous Priest songs. It has version #3 of Diamonds and Rust and you can hear Rob talk a little on this one.

British Steel Favorite track(s): Breaking the Law, Metal Gods, United Heh, want to annoy your family fast? British Steel on auto-repeat. :) It's a great CD, and the music video to Breaking the Law is awsome!

Point of Entry Favorite track(s): Heading Out to the Highway, Desert Plains I first heard Highway & Desert Plains on my Priest Live video and fell in love with them. As a result, I really couldn't tell you what the rest of the tracks are like... I skip 'em. *^.^*

Screaming for Vengeance Favorite track(s): Hellion, (Take These) Chains, Devil's Child

Defenders of the Faith Favorite track(s): The Sentinel, Love Bites, Some Heads are Gonna Roll Like Hell Bent, this one's got a lot of good songs on it. One cool thing is that the last two tracks kinda blur into one.

Turbo Favorite track(s): Turbo Lover, Locked In, Parental Guidance, Out in the Cold This one's kind of weird... I'm one of the few people who really likes this CD. Again, I saw some of these on Priest Live and they made an impression. I still visualize Rob moving back and forth on Turbo Lover, and all three of them making their entrance to Out in the Cold. If you can get a copy of the Locked In musicvid, it's awsome.

Priest...Live! I don't have the CD, just the video. My first glimpse of Priest on stage...

Ram It Down Favorite track(s): Heavy Metal, Hard as Iron, Blood Red Skies, I'm a Rocker I blame my Priest addiction on Blood Red Skies. Some of the other tracks get annoying after a while, but I nearly wore out my tape playing this one over and over and...

Painkiller Favorite track(s): Hell Patrol, Leather Rebel, Metal Meltdown, Night Crawler By far the fastest-paced Priest CD, this one drove me nuts the first time I listened to it. Later I decided that a few of them were pretty good after all. Guess it just takes getting used to...

Metal Works '73-'93 A compilation of most of the previous albums, it's still cool in its own right. And the cover rocks. You get to hunt around in it to find mini versions of the other albums' covers.

Jugulator Favorite track(s): -none- I can't say much about this one because I keep falling asleep halfway through the CD... If you weren't aware, Priest changed singers between Painkiller and Jugulator and took a 7 year hiatus.

'98 Live Meltdown Favorite track(s): -none- I can't listen to this one without cringing. Sorry... The new guy, Tim 'Ripper' Owens, might be able to hit the high notes, but he puts no emotion into the songs. ;.;

I'm something of a rarity in Metal fandom, namely, a girl. And to be a fan of Judas Priest at my age (18 as of July '99) is even rarer. So I'm doing my best to catch up on what I've missed, and I can only hope that Priest does another tour once I move down to California this summer. Everyone has been telling me that I have to see a Priest show, and from what I've seen of the videos, I believe them!
Ok, enough babble. I'll send you off to some of the best Judas Priest pages on the 'net, far better than my paltry way of paying homage...

	Official Judas Priest Homepage
	the Judas Priest Shrine
	Metal Painkiller
	Rock Universe: Judas Priest
	Metal Flakes

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