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Album Details

• Artist: Judas Priest
• Album: Angel of Retribution
• Label: Epic
• Year of Release: 2005
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: dscanland on 2005-09-21

I was looking at the concert listings in Calgary's weekly entertainment paper and couldn't help feel that I had gone back in time. There were listings for a Megadeth/Anthrax show, Pearl Jam was on their way, Def Leppard was in town, John Mellencamp and John Fogerty just played together, Overkill was playing a pub, Rolling Stones was the ticket to have, Queensryche were playing Operation Mindcrime in its entirety and Judas Priest was playing the 'Dome. I couldn't help but wonder where modern music had gone wrong. Does it just not have enough charm to get a stadium full? I have no idea but I decided to throw caution to the wind and check out the new Judas Priest and I was pleasantly surprised. Angel of Retribution is the first one with Rob Halford back in the lead spot and although I never checked out the Ripper Owens era I heard nothing but bad things as documented by "Rock Star". The album starts off really strong with "Judas Rising" with some raging double kick drum and some classic layered Halford vocals. "Deal With The Devil" gets going quite nicely as well and "Revolution" has some great moments. But "Worth Fighting For" is a piece of crap, almost ruining the album with one song. It's a good thing that they followed up that with the aggressive "Demonizer". "Wheels of Fire" seems like they are just going through the metal blueprint without much soul. And what the hell is "Angel". Is that really an acoustic guitar on a Priest album? Again, the horror is quickly admonished with the heavy handed "Hellrider". Those two moments aside, Angel Of Retribution is indeed one of Priests better albums but not quite up to par with some of their old classics. Hardcore fans will eat this up and people just getting into Judas Priest will get a good idea of what these veterans are all about.

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