Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Judas Priest
Label: Columbia Records
Released: 1977
Duration: 47:41
Rating: 3/5
The future was uncertain for Judas Priest. After “Sad Wings Of Destiny” (1976), which failed to put the band on the rock scene’s radar, the lads found themselves in a dead end. Stick it out or call it quits? Faith proved stronger, and that’s when a mighty, wealthy record label, always one of the biggest names in the music business, took the small band under its wing. That surely gave the guys fresh momentum and brought back some badly needed confidence. With “Sin After Sin,” Judas Priest opened a new chapter in their history. None other than Roger Glover, Deep Purple’s bassist, helped them produce the album.
Of course, “Sin After Sin” doesn’t yet make the leap onto the rails that would carry Judas Priest to immortal-legend status in the eighties. Songs like the opener Sinner (in its middle section), Last Rose Of Summer, Here Comes The Tears, or even most of Raw Deal don’t yet reveal what would make Priest the bible of heavy metal in the eighties.
Sound-wise, Judas Priest hadn’t yet developed that constant rawness and destructive aggression, even though they were getting bolder and more arrogant in their sound. Their look at the time was also more reminiscent of some kind of “belated” hippies, because there was no sign yet of the studded leather or Halford’s obsession with riding a Harley Davidson onstage, the very things that did a lot to build the band’s later fame. “Sin After Sin” doesn’t deliver proper heavy metal yet. Instead it’s an interesting record caught in the collision with seventies hard rock, into which Judas Priest were building new, original musical ideas in their own way. In other words, something that was only just about to morph into heavy metal rock. So, an album that still swings wildly from genre to genre, and that shows in its dynamics too.
The album opens with a wound-up riff of sharpened spikes. In Sinner, Halford sings foaming and raspy, straight from the throat, in a style he’d never used on the previous two records. But then in the chorus he screams with full intensity, crystal clear, which brings a fantastic atmospheric contrast to the song. In the middle, Sinner carries psychedelic touches over winding guitars, like a trend from the early seventies. They keep the listener in constant suspense about whether the song might tip over into something like the opener Victim Of Changes from the previous record. But the expressive main riff holds the dominant spot throughout, and the song ends as furiously and notoriously as it began. Diamonds And Rust is a Joan Baez cover. Production-wise the guitars are pushed back, as if they were acting as an orchestra filling out the sound, while the rhythm line steps to the front, with a pulsing bass on one side and Rob’s heartfelt, clean, atmospheric vocals on the other. It brings a fantastic contrast to the record, especially because its basic beat sounds like it was lifted from some seventies disco club. Starbreaker is surely one of the red-hot highlights of the record, one that will instantly set fire to the heart of every true heavy metal fan. An open, simple, punchy, scorching riff. No detours, no overcomplicating, delivering a proper dose of untamed wildness and real rebel attitude, which Judas Priest’s lyrics full of defiance have in spades.
Last Rose Of Summer lowers the intensity and takes a good chunk of the album’s dynamics with it, so you get the feeling that “Sin After Sin” has a pulsing, wound-up beginning and end, while the middle of the record stays lukewarm and less expressive. Of course, that’s not entirely the case, since Priest step on the gas in Let Us Prey/Call For The Priest, while the mid-tempo, six-minute Raw Deal, with its R&B flavors, once again takes the wind out of the record’s sails. The exception is the last two minutes of the song, when Priest finally let the riff run free and it wraps up atmospherically through the lines of the chorus “I’m Going! No Loss!” Here Comes The Tears is yet another ballad, opening gently in the style of Last Rose Of Summer, with Rob shining with his feel for softness and tenderness. The song is a clever trick, and the intensity grows with every round, especially once the rich accompaniment of piano and acoustic guitars comes in, along with steely, self-destructive attacks of distortion that tear the world apart at the end. The listener now craves a final blow, and gets it, because the crumbling mood of the previous song flows straight into the red-hot Dissident Aggressor, which, along with Starbreaker, actually contains the most of what Judas Priest carried over into all their later studio work. A perfect metal assault, with Halford’s vocal acrobatics of exceptional screams, in places split between the left and right speakers, lifting the dynamics and atmosphere. And so the record surges up foaming right at the end, through all the aggression Priest were pouring out of themselves back then.
The first bonus track is an excellent cover of the Gun hit called Race With The Devil (“Gun”, 1969) and a great solution for the 2001 remaster, which I can’t say for the “live” version of Jawbreaker. Jawbreaker is a song written in 1984. So in the seven years since the release of “Sin After Sin” the band made a huge qualitative leap, and in this case it would have been better if Judas Priest, having found no material from the “Sin After Sin” recording sessions, had simply left this bonus track off. The whole retrospective offered by the newly released remasters would have made more sense too, and would have been a nicer (more tasteful) rounded whole.
“Sin After Sin” continues the story of Judas Priest’s trouble with drummers. Alan Moore left the band, and so Judas Priest were rescued by the excellent Simon Phillips, then a renowned and highly respected session drummer in music circles, who today plays with Toto. That’s also why the leap in quality compared to “Sad Wings Of Destiny” is more than obvious. The record is played much more confidently, and the Downing/Tipton guitar duo sounds tighter. Too bad Simon didn’t join the band, because his work blended beautifully with the musical stance of Judas Priest at the time. For the upcoming tour, Judas Priest, searching for an available drummer, recruited Les Binks into their ranks.
Lineup
Rob Halford – vocals
K.K. Downing – guitar
Glenn Tipton – guitar
Ian Hill – bass guitar
guest musician:
Simon Phillips – drums
Production
Roger Glover & Judas Priest
Track list
1. Sinner
2. Diamonds And Rust
3. Starbreaker
4. Last Rose Of Summer
5. Let Us Prey/Call For The Priest
6. Raw Deal
7. Here Come The Tears
8. Dissident Aggressor
BONUS TRACKS ON THE 2001 REMASTERED EDITION:
9. Race With The Devil
10. Jawbreaker (live)
Album length: 47:41
