Judas Priest
"Sin After Sin," "Stained Class," "Hell Bent For Leather," "Unleashed in the East"

(Columbia Records)

The second installment of Priest's Columbia Record's reissues features the Metal Gods surging late '70s best, four more albums that document their rise to power. This latest round again finds the band in fine digital age form giving fans another look into their influential past. Beginning with 1977's "Sin After Sin," which followed up "Sad Winds of Destiny" three years before, certainly no slag in its own right, but during those "Gull" years the band stood little chance of getting the mass exposure it deserved. A defining moment in their career even in spite of its lack of commerciality, the album rocked hard with the likes of "Sinner," "Starbreaker," the dreary "Let Us Prey/Call For The Priest" and catchy death knell cover of Joan Baez' "Diamonds and Rust." This album flashed the light of brilliance that was to follow while embracing that early darkness that characterized their likeness as a fearsome and mournful Heavy Rock and Blues type. Originally produced by Roger Glover and featuring an inconsequential studio drummer, "Sin After Sin" deserves more recognition than either it got or currently receives. The two bonus cuts include "Race With The Devil," and "Jawbreaker (live)," the studio version of which would appear on '84s "Defenders of the Faith" release. "Sin After Sin" also carried with it the landmark "Dissident Aggressor," a monstrous closing track which shattered the boundary of perception in following the melancholic "Here Come The Tears" and set a good precedent to what would soon follow with songs like "Exciter," "White Heat Red Hot," and on down the line. to the acclaimed "Stained Class." Enter 1978 and who, at the behest of their label, actually opened for eminent Rock and Roll superpowers REO Speedwagon and Foreigner to help break the U.S. market? Unimaginable! "Stained Class" stormed the scene, stained our minds and set the band closer to international superstardom. This record continued on their guitar heavy dominance-"Exciter," "Invader," "Saints in Hell," all still plenty dark, the songs however heavy, were still not quite as individually defined as what would follow. This was also the album that bore the song to eventually bring the infamous wrongful death suit against the band for the subliminally worded "Better By You Better Than Me" track, not even their own song. Subsequently "sanity prevailed" as the band proclaims in their usual inside cover briefing. Still a song that serves them well since its inception, it finds its way here additionally in live form as the last of the two bonuses, the other being "Fire Burns Below," a previously incomplete acoustic piece that identifies better with "Point of Entry." How many original songs could appear on one record and lead the way for generations of Metal bands to follow? '79s breakthrough "Hell Bent for Leather" set about to find out. What "Screaming for Vengeance" meant to the band three years later, such was the impact of this record, the second of the "Binks" years and their high water mark up to that point-maybe for their entire career. The title alone defined the band and their expansive followers. "Hell Bent." was a banner album that spawned star tracks as "Delivering the Goods," "Rock Forever," "Evening Star," and really on down the line, barely a weak link to the Metal chain. The title track said it all-the record reeked with cool, the songs blistered in their pace, pummeled with their power, defiant and set upon to destroy all comers. Bonuses here include a pre-dated "Rock Hard Ride Free" titled "Fight For Your Life" and "Riding On the Wind (live)." If ever there was a classic title worth upgrading in a collection, this is the one. "Unleashed in the East" was recorded during their "Hell Bent for Leather" tour and spotlighted the band's growing importance on the live front. Originally containing only nine tracks which ran the gamut from their early days featuring songs like their all-time classics "The Ripper" and "Genocide," it was recorded during their monumental live in Japan performance proved one of the most substantial live releases of that or any other time-"Priest Live" came some eight years later and still can't hold a candle by comparison for many. The raw power of a Priest live performance roared forth as loudly as the Harley Rob rode to the stage. Here we're granted access to four previously unreleased and vital live cuts-"Rock Forever," "Delivering the Goods," "Hell Bent for Leather," and "Starbreaker." Not that any devoted Metal listeners need reminding, these four releases remain as viable today as they did then, and in spite of the impressive productions they brought with them in this fashionably challenged and folically abundant bell-bottom generation, to hear them again in full remastered clarity today, an oft-overlooked overrating consideration, is incomparable improvement. Twenty years and countless records later, the Priest catalog is still as substantial as ever due in no small part to this latest run of reissues.

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