2 nights ago I saw Judas Priest and found the concert to be the second best that I have ever been too, the life and vibe I got from that concert still resonate deep within me and this concert will stay with me forever. On June 20th in Paris Priest showed that they were truly metal gods.
The show took place at the Zenith which is a homey 3000 seat stadium just outside of Paris. I went into the moshpit early and I met 2 interesting people. The first guy I met was the photographer for Duff Mcagan, he was extremely cool. He had been going around the crowd riling people up and I started to talk to him, he was not despicable. The other guy I met was a metaller from Brazil. He was 26 and had seen Priest 8 times including the night before at Hellfest. Before the show we talked about Hellfest and his favorite acts there.
The opening act was Duff Mcagan's Loaded. They were a mediocre glam band with really bad mixing and mediocre songs. The bassist (who I was closest too) was a bad Ozzy clone and did not contribute much to the band. Somehow Duff Mcagan already looks as emaciated and pathetic as Iggy Pop does even though he is 20 years younger. I had expected more, but we got very little, there wasn't even a GNR cover to cheer me up.
Then there came the 25 minute intermission and I slowly started to die of excitement. There was some AC/DC playing in the background and the air was electric. You could hear the band slowly making their way onstage and I struggled to glimpse under the Epitaph curtain that covered the front of the stage.
Then the curtain rose and Priest roared into Rapid Fire, I headbanged so hard for that first song that I did not even see the band. You may criticize Priest's newer albums, however their live show is better than ever. What Priest did with Rapid Fire was amazing, they took a crowd of mostly 40 somethings with some younger types mixed in and turned them into a thrashing mass of bodies jumping up and down and screaming out “PRIEST, PRIEST, PRIEST”. The atmosphere was amazing.
After this initial track came Metal Gods, this is where I got my first good look at Halford, he was wearing his traditional leather and his jacket was covered in spikes. I was about 7 feet away from Richie Fletcher, the new guitarist, this was cool, although having Downing their would have been cooler. The chorus of Metal Gods was amazing, we (the crowd) sang so loudly Halford was almost drowned out. Speaking of Halford his stage presence in Metal Gods was mindblowing, he paraded about in his epic leather costume and appeared for all the world to be a dark and angry god raining heavy metal down upon his children.
The show passed on and I was in heaven, some highlights included Painkiller and Nightcrawler. All of the songs though came across as epic headbanging anthems and I had the time of my life. When the curtain finally fell to the last track Living After Midnight I was hoarse and exhausted and so excited I thought I might explode. The reason for my excitement was simple, halfway through “The Green Manalishi” Halford, the metal god himself, pointed directly at me and we engaged in a little pointing conversation, and he flashed the horns at me. ROB HALFORD THE GOD OF HEAVY METAL FLASHED THE DEMON HORNS AT ME. That was my true metal baptism and that is why I love this music, because your god might point at you if you are lucky.
To finish, this show was mindblowing and beautiful with effects that blew my head off, I would strongly recommend that all of you go to see Priest because you will love every metal minute of it. Have fun kid's.
OVERALL 10/10
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