I have put off writing this review for quite some time, because I had to listen to it umpteen times to really work out what I thought of it. This isn’t usual for me with Judas Priest. Normally I can listen to a Priest album – of whatever age and style – and immediately get a sense of whether you dig it or not. I can say this because lately I’ve been literally thrashing old Priest, a lot of which I hadn’t heard before, or was hearing again with a set of fresh ears.
On my first experience of this new, long-awaited album from Priest, I was blown away by its depth and complexity. It is very true that this album marks a change towards greater musicality for the band, but I’m not sure whether it is going to make dedicated fans that happy. In creating the story of Nostradamus’s life in music – nay, in metal – the hugeness of the sound is fitting. You can’t listen to this album and fail to note its grandeur, which, for a philosopher of what many consider the highest order, is quite a tribute. And make no mistake, this is a metal release. If you’re looking for a generic rock album, you might get something out of this, but parts of it are very heavy.
Some of the tracks, like Prophecy, are throw-backs to an old Priest style. The depth and epicness of Revelations shows you the leap that Priest has made, and it’s only the third track. The Four Horseman uses samples within the music to add to its dimensionality. With this album, you get a building sense of the story even if you don’t listen to the lyrics. Given that this is what the band were trying to do, they ought to be congratulated on achieving it. However, some of the lyrics on some of the tracks do make you want to weep with disbelief at their soppiness. Despite Halford and the boys writing Nostradamus as though from the philospher’s perspective, some of the love songs are a bit cringeworthy.
There are some killer riffs here, some well-placed keys, and the almost operatic depth of the release is just begging for a visual reconstruction in the likes of a film. The production is beautiful, as you’d expect from a benchmark band like Priest, and the booklet – complete with a summary of the life of Nostradamus right in the front – is lavish.
Some die-hard Priest fans are likely to listen to Nostradamus and wail, “give me Painkiller any day!” In some respects I agree, but having heard the album so goddamn much over the past weeks, I wouldn’t even attempt to compare it to hallmarks like Painkiller. It’s not even in the same league. I don’t mean that one is better than the other, but Nostradamus is is just so different. You have to remember that Nostradamus is a musical conception of the life of a philosoper; whereas an album like Painkiller is just rockin’.
In many respects, although the band members are the same, it’s not the same band. They’ve grown and changed and adapted, and their musical conception has moved on. The band members have stated that they think this album is their best work. Many Priest fans will disagree utterly with this.
In terms of conceptual maturity, I’m likely to agree with the band that it is their best. In terms of how rockin’ it is, I’m not as sold.
Judas Priest’s Nostradamus is out now on Sony BMG.
