Singer Rob Halford doesn't deny that the 12 years he spent away from Judas Priest was longer than he would have wanted. Now that he is back and the group is busy proving its enduring popularity by headlining a summer amphitheater tour, the singer admits it's tempting to want to make up for lost time—not that he has any regrets.
"I think about that," he says. "I still think about what could have been achieved in that decade when we were away from each other. It's been a troubling thought, but just a very human feeling, especially when you're having such a great time now. But you can't live in a world of what-ifs and shoulda-coulda-woulda. You can't live in a world like that because you would get nowhere. You'd end up just going around in a circle. You just have to let that go and be grateful for what you have now and what you're achieving now."
What the venerable British metal band is achieving is a successful—and many would say stirring—comeback following a 2004 reunion that saw the band touring the United States in Ozzfest and recording a new album.
Halford, the band's magnetic leather-and-stud-clad frontman who belted out such hits as "Living After Midnight" and "You've Got Another Thing Coming," left Priest in '92 after 21 years to pursue a solo career. Originally, he had hoped to be able to stay in the band while making time for his own projects. That turned out to be impossible, and he left, first forming the group Fight, which found him exploring more of a thrashy modern metal sound and supplanting the fantasy and science fiction-type lyrics he was known for writing in Priest with more personal and topical subject matter.
Fight lasted for two CDs before Halford joined forces with guitarist John Lowery with the short-lived band Two. He then formed Halford, a group whose two albums found the singer bringing back some of the classic Judas Priest trademarks into his sound.
Judas Priest, meanwhile, went through a considerable period of uncertainty over whether guitarists Glen Tipton and K.K. Downing, bassist Ian Hill and drummer Scott Travis, would stay together. But in the mid-'90s, they found vocalist Tim "Ripper" Owens who, ironically enough, was fronting a Judas Priest tribute band called British Steel in Akron, Ohio.
While Halford and Judas Priest both earned some respect for their musical efforts in their years apart, fans made it clear they wanted the classic Priest lineup. Halford shared that wish, too. In 1999, he wrote an emotional letter to Tipton, Downing and Hill, but it took several more phone calls, a number of meetings and lots of water flowing under bridges for the reunion to occur. It finally happened during plans to compile the 2004 career-spanning box-set, Metalogy.
"I mean, I was waiting and hoping for the moment (when he could rejoin Priest), and it happened when it was ready to happen," Halford says. "These reunions, whatever you want to call them, they just happen when it's right to happen. If it had happened any earlier, maybe we wouldn't have made such a great record."
The album, Angel Of Retribution, came together following a burst of songwriting between Halford, Tipton and Downing. Work went so well that much of it was finished before last summer's Ozzfest.
Halford says the creative chemistry that had existed during the '70s and '80s instantly re-emerged. Halford even thinks the time apart might have even intensified the level of creativity he shares with Downing and Tipton.
"I'm sure it's the fact that we had been out of each other's company for so many years and suddenly we were back together, and it just felt so good," Halford says. "It was just a good feeling, and good feelings generate good results, so there you go."
The album features several songs with the signature Priest sound, but there are also some risky tracks, such as the 14-minute epic, "Lochness."
"It was amazing to see the hate and the rejection coming toward that song when we released the record, not only from journalists, but among the fans, that just did not want to give it a chance," Halford says. "You know, 'What are you doing singing about the Loch Ness monster,' and 'Lochness' is 14 minutes of music. You could have given us two or three more songs.' It was amazing the emotional feedback that we got. And that just goes to show the passion that the fans and I guess everybody has about this band. Everybody has an opinion and everybody has a comment ... Now of course, everybody's like 'This is amazing. We love this track.'"
Halford promises the new stage show will offer the visual feast fans have come to expect—as well as the return of the group's signature stage prop.
"Whenever people talk about Judas Priest, it always (involves) more than the music," Halford says. "And that's something we've been trying to kind of maintain. So this show is by Priest standards, it's a pretty big production with a fantastic light show. And the Harley still comes roaring out on stage. We've always felt we were as much of a visual memory as an audible one."