Albums: Judas Priest – Invincible Shield

Judas Priest – Invincible Shield

Panic Attack; The Serpent and the King; Invincible Shield; Devil in Disguise; Gates of Hell; Crown of Horns; As God Is My Witness; Trial by Fire; Escape from Reality; Sons of Thunder; Giants in the Sky.

(COLUMBIA) 19658851611


Heavy metal titans Judas Priest return with their nineteenth studio album, Invincible Shield, on a tour de force of melodic and powerful rock. The follow-up to the 2018 album Firepower sees the band continuing in their typical hard rock style: screeching vocals, drums that pound along like a pneumatic drill, and wailing guitar solos.

While the band has never equalled in terms of success and songs since the 1982 album Screaming for Vengeance, this new set comes nearly close. As Panic Attack opens the proceedings, Rob Halford’s voice is suitably in a frenzy, and a state of anxiety is created as the band rock harder than ever before as the track comes with not one but two guitar solos.

With the band's touring guitarist, Andy Sneap, as the producer of the album, he has been able to give the album a powerful and intense feel that fits in well with the nature of the songs. Original guitarist Glenn Tipton, although no longer able to tour with the band due to Parkinson's disease, duets with Sneap to add the trademark harmonic guitar solos that are part of the distinctive Priest sound.

Now in his seventies, Halford can still belt out the vocals in his traditional falsetto style, as witnessed here on The Serpent and the King and Trial by Fire—his distinctive voice sets Priest apart from their contemporaries.

Things get even faster on As God is My Witness after the ballad Crown of Thorns, though no heavy metal album would be complete without a biker anthem on Sons of Thunder, which will give Halford a new song to ride his Harley Davidson on stage instead of the usual Hell Bent for Leather.

After fifty years of rocking, Judas Priest has delivered yet another album that their fans can be proud of.