Stained Class [Bonus Tracks] [Remaster] (CD - 1978)

All tracks have been digitally remastered.

Judas Priest: Rob Halford (vocals); Glen Tipton (guitar, background vocals); K.K. Downing (guitar); Ian Hill (bass); Les Binks (drums).

Producers: Dennis MacKay, James Guthrie, Judas Priest.

Engineers include: Neil Ross, Ken Thomas, Paul Northfield.

Principally recorded at Chipping Norton Studios, Cotswold, England in 1978. Includes liner notes by Judas Priest.

Digitally remastered by Jon Astley.

Personnel: Glenn Tipton (vocals, guitar); K.K. Downing (guitar); Ian Hill (bass guitar); Les Binks (drums).

Audio Remasterer: Jon Astley.

Recording information: Advision Studios, London, England (1978); Chipping Norton Studios (1978); Trident Studios, London, England (1978); Utopia Studios (1978).

Easily one of the most important heavy metal albums ever released, Stained Class marks the peak of Judas Priest's influence, setting the sonic template for the New Wave of British Heavy Metal more than any other single recording. This is the point where Priest put it all together, embracing their identity as the heaviest band on the planet and taking the genre to new heights of power, speed, musicality, and malevolence. Not until Painkiller would the band again be this single-minded in its focus on pure heavy metal. Their blues-rock roots have been virtually obliterated; largely gone, too, are the softer textures and gothic ballads of albums past. The lone exception is the morbid masterpiece "Beyond the Realms of Death," on which the band finally finds a way to integrate the depressive balladry of songs like "Epitaph" and "Last Rose of Summer" into their metal side. Starting out with quiet, mournful verses, the song's chorus is ripped open by a blazing guitar riff as Rob Halford shrieks about leaving the world behind, a dramatic climax that sounds like a definite blueprint for Metallica's "Fade to Black." Yet it wasn't this song that inspired the ridiculous 1989-1990 court case involving the suicide pact of two Nevada teenagers; that honor goes to the Spooky Tooth cover "Better by You, Better Than Me" (penned by none other than the "Dream Weaver" himself, Gary Wright), on which the band allegedly embedded the subliminal backwards-recorded message "Do it." Astounding implausibility aside (as the band pointed out, why encourage the suicides of fans who spend money?), it isn't hard to see why Stained Class might invite such hysterical projections. On balance, it's the darkest lyrical work of the band's career, thematically obsessed with death, violence, and conquest. That's not to say it's always approving. Sure, there are battle cries like "White Heat, Red Hot," horrific nightmares like "Saints in Hell," and elements of the fantastic in the alien monsters of "Invader" and stone classic opener "Exciter." But the band stays philosophical just as often as not. The twisting, turning title track adopts the biblical view of man as a hopeless, fallen creature preyed upon by his baser instincts; "Savage" foreshadows Iron Maiden's "Run to the Hills" in depicting violent colonizers as the real savages; and closer "Heroes End" laments the many legends born from untimely deaths. So in the end, what really cements the celebrated morbidity of Stained Class is the sinister atmosphere created by the music itself. Never before had heavy metal sounded so viciously aggressive, and never before had that been combined with such impeccable chops. Seemingly at will, Tipton and Downing spit out brilliant riffs that cut with knife-like precision, usually several per song. This means that there's a lot to take in on Stained Class, but if there's nothing here as immediate as the band's later hits, there's also a tremendous amount that reveals itself only with repeated listens. While the album's overall complexity is unrivalled in the band's catalog, the songs still pack an enormous visceral impact; the tempos have often been jacked up to punk-level speed, and unlike albums past, there's no respite from the all-out adrenaline rush. Heavy metal had always dealt in extremes -- both sonically and emotionally -- but here was a fresh, vital new way to go about it. It's impossible to overstate the impact that Stained Class had on virtually all of the heavy metal that followed it, from the NWOBHM through thrash and speed metal onward, and it remains Judas Priest's greatest achievement. ~ Steve Huey

Judas Priest's first live album, Unleashed in the East, was a powerhouse, but Priest...Live! is a document of a heavy metal band trying to hold onto its glory days. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Judas Priest's second live album, Unleashed in the East, was a powerhouse, but Priest...Live! is a sad, lackluster document of an aging heavy metal band desperately trying to hold onto its glory days. No matter how hard it tried, the group could not hide the fact that its power was declining rapidly. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Culled from performances on their mammoth 1986 TURBO tour, Judas Priest's second live album, PRIEST...LIVE! was issued one year later. Including some post-BRITISH STEEL songs, PRIEST...LIVE! doesn't quite measure up to their outstanding earlier live album, 1979's UNLEASHED IN THE EAST, but it has its moments.

Unsurprisingly, plenty of selections from the TURBO album are featured, such as "Out in the Cold," "Turbo Lover," and "Parental Guidance," but "Hot Rockin'," "Don't Go," and several '80s Priest classics are noticeably absent. Still, you can't go wrong with inspired versions of such favorites as "Love Bites," "Some Heads Are Gonna Roll," "Electric Eye," "Living After Midnight," and "You've Got Another Thing Coming."

After the stunning success of 1977's SIN AFTER SIN, Judas Priest offered another exceptional album with its follow-up one year later, STAINED CLASS. Though disco and punk were grabbing all the headlines in the late '70s, Priest turned a deaf ear to these new musical developments, and stuck to its heavy metal guns. Rarely has metal sounded so inspired and precise as this album's highlights, "Beyond the Realms of Death," "Better By You Better Than Me," and "Exciter." STAINED CLASS was Judas Priest's third classic release in a row.

An indisputable metal masterpiece, Stained Class is the apex of '70s Judas Priest, a sinister, muscular collection that ties the disparate strands of their style together while jacking the adrenaline rush up to previously undreamed-of levels. Even the lone slow-tempo track, "Beyond the Realms of Death," has an exciting, visceral intensity, and the whole band is at the absolute peak of its powers in terms of technical execution. Lyrically, Stained Class is probably the darkest moment in a career filled with them; the whole second half of the record is positively obsessed with death, although the ridiculous 1989-1990 court case alleging that the album provoked two Nevada teenagers' suicides was instead centered around the Gary Wright/Spooky Tooth cover "Better by You, Better Than Me," in which Rob Halford allegedly embedded the subliminal, backward-recorded message, "Do it." At any rate, the air of malevolence about Stained Class, and the sheer power of its jackhammer guitar riffs, was unrivaled in heavy metal upon its release (even in Priest's own catalog), stamping the album an instant classic and solidifying Judas Priest's status as arguably the most original and musical metal band of its time. More than any other Priest album, the style of Stained Class also laid the groundwork for the thrash and speed metal that would rise to dominance in the mid- to late '80s, making it a defining moment for the New Wave of British Heavy Metal movement and one of the genre's all-time landmarks. [The 2001 reissue offers two bonus tracks: the previously unreleased track "Fire Burns Below" and a live version of "Better by You, Better Than Me."] ~ Steve Huey minimize