Judas Priest update!

- JUDAS PRIEST Frontman Says 'Nostradamus' May Turn Into Double Album

JUDAS PRIEST is currently recording a concept album about the 16th Century French prophet Nostradamus. In a recent interview with Rockdetector's Garry Sharpe-Young, Rob Halford admitted the band's often perceived secrecy was sometimes intentional. "Look, I love the Internet as a tool for knowledge gathering and for its amazing marketing possibilities but sometimes you have to step back a bit and present something in a better way," he said. "Just because the Internet allows you to give everything instantly does not always make that the right choice. I believe that if you go along to see a concert by your favorite band, as a fan, you hunger for that anticipation — what are they going to play? What's the stage look like? All those things. It's the same with a new record for us. We've whetted the appetites by revealing the Nostradamus concept. That's a big deal for us, actually. I could give you song titles and intimate details of the story and each track but we don't want to ruin it for fans. Just remember the last time you bought a record that you had been wanting to get your hands on for months and that magical moment when you hear the first note. We'd like to bring some of that excitement back. Metal in particular thrives on that kind of fan-driven word of mouth. It worked very well for us with 'Screaming for Vengeance' and very much so with 'Painkiller'. Fans were talking to each down the pub and saying, 'You really need to hear this!' We had it back in the very early days too when we were playing every pub and club that would have us. It was word of mouth that generated that huge support from all over the country that the London media suddenly saw manifest itself at the Reading festival in 1975."

Rockdetector.com: OK, without giving too much away then, what clues can you tease us with for "Nostradamus"?

Haford: "Not a lot, except that it's absolutely massive in its scope. I mean, it really is a very big concept, even possibly a double album. We're all totally into the whole idea and researching the man's life has opened up so many possibilities. Right now Glenn [Tipton] and Ken [K.K. Downing] have all the music written but we have to construct all of that into a meaningful story. It's hugely ambitious but I know the fans will be blown away."

Rockdetector.com: With your enthusiasm to build the excitement for this record, it seems you embrace both old style promotional tactics and you are obviously very keyed into the present game with your website and this new round of HALFORD solo releases.

Halford: "You have to be. I'm only looking at what works. Of course you have to have a great product in the first place, which is why the HALFORD albums and this new crop of releases has had so much effort gone into them. I didn't just want to rehash the existing albums so there is a lot of attention to detail. I actually think the possibilities for music distribution in the future are going to be wonderful but of course the whole industry is in a very painful transitional stage right now. Music consumption is going up very fast, but CD sales are going down. More people are coming out to shows too, so the world wants music. The question for the labels is how they deliver it. Won't won't change is that JUDAS PRIEST will be out there delivering the goods on stage"


Wargod48

i am definetly looking forward to this, however i hope this doesn't turn out to be some pompous overly dramatic wankery. i'm sure it won't suck, but will it live up to the hype? that's we'll have to see.

Yeah I agree MC. I am also looking fwd to it!

Yeah...oh yeah, I can't wait.

The future of music sales is bleak IMO. The excitement that Halford
talked about with a new release isn't what it use to be because of
MP3s. It's no longer about the cool album cover and the overall album,
it's about that one single. My kids (both teens) load up their MP3
players with music, but it's never full albums. It's always a song or
two. It's not even about the artist as much anymore, but once again
about that 'hit' single. Who plays the single, for the most part, isn't
important.



A band like Aerosmith, Judas Priest or even a band like the Rolling
Stones, were huge for decades. Priest were big in the 70's, even bigger
in the 80's, and had one of the biggest selling records in 1990. Even
after little activity through the 1990's they came back and had two of
the biggest tours of their carreers in 2001 - 2002. All these bands had
their more popular eras and songs, but they were still rock stars. What
rock/metal band's from now, or even the 1990's for that matter, will
still be big 20 years later and recording music that is relevant? I
don't see many.

I think that is very true ult. I think it is very indicative of most peoples attention span though. We cant sit for more than 5 minuted w/o getting bored and no one wants to listen through an entire cd now.. although it might be due bands doing one great song and the rest of their album is lousy and people dont want to sift through the garbage for that one song anymore..

Alex

i use mp3's & ipod as well...but i load the full albums. i've always been like that. i like to hear an album from start to finish.

Me too, i like to listen albums from start to finish but not on any MP3 or IPOD. I still have my old cd walkman but normaly i just listen to vinyls and cds home, but 99%of the time from the first song till the last one.

mc666 wrote:

i use mp3's & ipod as well...but i load the full
albums. i've always been like that. i like to hear an album from start
to finish.

Same here. I have my ipod loaded up with full albums from my CD
collection. I have some oddball tracks on there as well in a folder
labeled "Metal", but it's mostly weird b-side tracks and such that
aren't on regular albums.

The biggest challenge is that radio is more"corporatized" than ever. With Clear Channel owning 1200 stations !!.. Ridiculous and with new cd's still costing in the $15-20 range. All depending on where you buy. Both my teenage boys load up their itunes with 'singles'mps3's or burn discs from friends.
We all remember how you had to go to Tower or Record Factory to get the new lp's. There were only a few main sources for tunes. Until the industry wakes up (which will never happen) it will continue to strangle itself in corporate greed which screws the artist and the fan.... I'm a complete package kinda guy. I want the cover, lyrics lots of live photos... (turns around and realizes he's on a soapbox)... oops sorry....