Judas Priest - Invincible Shield (album)

[Dinosaur David B]

 

[Haffner]

I thought "Serpent and the King" was the best thing out of all the Maiden/Priest reunion material. Just me. It's the first time I felt exhilirated by Priest since 1990.

I wanted to mention...my wife is a huge KK fan and has been (in her own words) stubbornly resistant to the Richie-Priest (she hasn't listened to the albums before this). I've been like that myself in several instances (went decades without giving Zakk much credit in Ozzy due to my allegiance to Jake etc). I finally got her to break down and listen to the first three singles, emphasizing Panic Attack and the abovementioned Serpent. 

She liked them both, but seemed to have significant reservations. I asked her if it was still the KK thing standing in her way and without knowing it, she described one of the huge missteps of 21st century recordings. She said the songs sounded dynamically flat compared with the 70s and 80s classics, too samey, etc. I went back and listened again, which only reinforced my suspicions.

I could be wrong, but this (and pretty much all Metal audio produced by the major bands this century) is squashed all to hell and the only culprit I can think of is adding WAY too much compression during the mastering process.

Dave would know more about this than I would, but to me it stands out especially after having compared it to the production on Stained Class and even Screaming for Vengeance.

All that long windedness aside, I'm so happy for Priest that this is as good as it is. There are things I really like about both Angel of Retribution and Nostradamus (and Firepower had its moments), but to me this is without question the best thing they've done since Painkiller. That's saying quite a lot imo. 
 

[Dinosaur David B]

she described one of the huge missteps of 21st century recordings. She said the songs sounded dynamically flat compared with the 70s and 80s classics, too samey, etc. I went back and listened again, which only reinforced my suspicions.

I could be wrong, but this (and pretty much all Metal audio produced by the major bands this century) is squashed all to hell and the only culprit I can think of is adding WAY too much compression during the mastering process.

Dave would know more about this than I would, but to me it stands out especially after having compared it to the production on Stained Class and even Screaming for Vengeance.


 

That's undoubtedly true, but if you're going to ding JP for that, you have to ding everyone else doing that as well. Would your wife say KK's Priest album suffers from that as well?

We're talking about 40 years of production evolution -- both good and bad. Sure there were the volume wars where everyone over compressed everything, but around 2015, the streaming services sort of put a fork in that by normalizing everyrone's volume. Thus, over compressing won't make you louder than the next guy anymore. Since then, some of that over compression has settled down. But it's never going back to where it once was.

So we still use a lot more compression these days than they did 40 years ago. I don't necessarily see that as a bad thing. FWIW, I think doing so probably works better in Metal than it does for subtler genres where you might be dealing with acoustics, pianos. Metal typically has less loud/soft dynamics anyway. 

All that long windedness aside, I'm so happy for Priest that this is as good as it is. There are things I really like about both Angel of Retribution and Nostradamus (and Firepower had its moments), but to me this is without question the best thing they've done since Painkiller. That's saying quite a lot imo. 
 



 

Bottom line here, AS ALWAYS is songs. Do you have the songs? I agree with you, Andy. FWIW, I'm not sure there's anything that really sticks with me on Painkiller other than that track itself. 

I am a JP fan. I am a Halford fan. But JP were never in my personal top favorite of metal bands. I have a few of their albums, but to me, JP is mostly a playlist band. I say that without derision, because at this point, 99% of my listening is playlists. I put the songs I like on playlists and rarely revisit the albums -- unless the album hits me as killer from the jump. And that's true for even the bands I enjoy more than JP. 
 
I'm also not sure any of the Dino bands from the classic era have put out music that equals or passes their iconic classics (maybe Perfect Strangers, but that was only 10 years later).

How do you top an album people have loved for 40 years?  I'm not even sure that's even possible. I think Accept got close with BotN and Stalingrad. I'd rate those in the class of Russian Roulette and Objection Overruled. But they're never going to be as revered (even to me) as Restless, Balls, and Metal Heart, because because those albums are iconic. They weren't iconic the day/year they were released -- they were just really good. They became iconic over decades. 

It's the same with trying to compare Invincible Shield to Screaming, British Steel, or whatever. It's not a fair comparison. The best they can be -- for now -- is really good. If the new songs are great, the album's stature will rise over time.

 
 

[Haffner]

I'm with you on every point.

FWIW, my wife and I are very disappointed with KKs Priest. We don't like any of it. I think recent output shows that KK might need Priest one helluva lot more than vice versa.

[Stitsel]

See, I agree with most points here but I really dig KK's new deal.... sure there's a cheese factor to it sometimes, other times it's quite good raging metal. 

[Stitsel]

This new Priest is awesome.... still digesting it. At 1st I kinda had a problem w/a KK-less JP, but as time goes on ( & great album after great album ) I've begrudgingly come around & have to admit it's pretty killer. I remember thinking no way could they ever top Firepower, which I was pretty blown away by....but this record is the shit. Halford's voice is unbelievable & Travis is a monster......I know it's a stupid comparison, but between Rob & Bruce dare I say it, Halford's got the edge...& Dickinson sounds excellent these days. 

The guitar work on this album is superb, but most importantly the songs are there. 

Musically at least, 2024 is starting off nicely.....

[merlo_zeppelin]

I find it cool that Maiden, Priest and all this old bands are still writing songs and putting out albums. There's no money in it, they just do it cause they want to. They might be better off just being a legacy act (which to a point they are) and just play the hits live (which they do).

Many bands say it out loud, they don't bother with new albums cause they don't even recoup the costs and the fans don't care for the new songs at the live shows. But some of them do, I do and you guys here do too.

[Dinosaur David B]

Not that Glenn and KK didn't come up with some classic, memorable solos, but in general, I like Richie Faulkner's style a lot more. I know it's sacrilege. 
 

[veeman]

FWIW, my wife and I are very disappointed with KKs Priest. We don't like any of it. I think recent output shows that KK might need Priest one helluva lot more than vice versa.

 

I think KK's Priest suffers from lack of a quality singer. In MY opinion, Ripper is horrible, ruins everything he "sings" on. KK could have picked any no name singer and done better. He also need to slow down the leads, 1500 notes per second gets old real fast, go back to quality, not quantity solo's.

[Haffner]

FWIW, my wife and I are very disappointed with KKs Priest. We don't like any of it. I think recent output shows that KK might need Priest one helluva lot more than vice versa.


 

I think KK's Priest suffers from lack of a quality singer. In MY opinion, Ripper is horrible, ruins everything he "sings" on. KK could have picked any no name singer and done better. He also need to slow down the leads, 1500 notes per second gets old real fast, go back to quality, not quantity solo's.

 

I'm okay with Ripper (I'm a fan of Jugulator, plus I really liked his work with Iced Earth), but he's never been a great or even really good songwriter in my opinion. I am also not wild about KK's other guitarist tbh. I feel that losing Les Binks hurt them badly.

I submit KK's super tasty lead from Priest's "Savage" as a good idea of what he should be playing. The million notes per second thing does indeed get old fast.