To some people heavy metal is Motorhead and to others it's Judas Priest
I write a lot of stuff, and some of it I don't even present to Judas Priest. But having said that, my first love is to play Judas Priest music.
We love not just Judas Priest music, but we love heavy metal and we love to get out on that stage every night and perform. It's a joy to be able to do it.
What I do is a bit broader in scope than a heavy metal band like Iron Maiden, Motorhead, ACDC and so on.
There's always a spot, any time we make a new record, where I literally go back to Judas Priest and Motorhead because you have to. You have to go back and understand where this all started for you and keep reminding yourself of that.
All I've got on my iPod is every single Queen song and every single Judas Priest song. Queen were an incredible heavy metal band. I saw them on their first ever tour, at Birmingham Town Hall. They just blew me away.
I'd rather be B.B. King. That's the way I started. Let the heavy metal guys play heavy metal, let the others play the other ... I try to do what I do better, not get away from it.
'Firepower' is the eighteenth full-length studio album for Judas Priest. That's a lot of metal songs over the decades, and the writing process is always the same, really.
Always been a big heavy metal fan. I remember being 15 saying, Dude I'm going to love heavy metal forever. Heavy metal til I'm 60. I'm 35 now. I think I'm going to give it one more year.
I just want to be considered a heavy metal band, because metal has always been around and will always be around. We're just a heavier version of metal. Heavy metal will never go away. It's like a cockroach. It's the best title, because we play metal that's heavy.
Hard rock for me is AC/DC, Def Leppard, Tesla, Kiss. Metal tends to be louder, ruder, darker, like Judas Priest, Slayer, Iron Maiden.
I've always seen this overlap between medieval warfare and heavy metal. You see heavy metal singers and they'll have like a brace around their arm and they'll be singing about Orcs. So let's just make a world where that all happens. That all gets put together, the heavy metal, and the rock, and the battling, actually does happen. Let's not flirt around with this let's just do it.
It tore us up emotionally hearing someone say to the judge and the cameras that this is a band that creates music that kills young people. We accept that some people don't like heavy metal, but we can't let them convince us that it's negative and destructive. Heavy metal is a friend that gives people great pleasure and enjoyment and helps them through hard times.
“Whether there's any 'subliminal effect' from the court, I don't know, but we certainly couldn't let it interfere with our creativity.
I go online, and I love watching heavy metal bands and guitar players play heavy metal versions of the 'Zelda' theme, and people do all the 'Zelda' music, which is one of my favorite soundtracks.
A lot of people are surprised by my love of heavy metal. I fell in love with heavy metal almost before any other genre. One of the first concerts I went to was a Donnington Monsters Of Rock concert.
I just like heavy music in general - from heavy rock and heavy metal and heavy rap and heavy everything. I've always been attracted to it.