Tuyo, the theme track from Narcos, wafts lazily within the background of the dimly lit studio, as Rob Halford, Judas Priest’s iconic frontman, glares by way of the darkish lenses of his aviator sun shades, his head topped by a shiny leather-based cop hat. The photographer snaps away.
Dressed to the nines in his black biker coat, arms adorned with fingerless, studded gloves, Rob appears to be like like he’s able to rain hellfire and brimstone upon a stadium filled with surging, wild-eyed headbangers. Then issues get bizarre. “Are you prepared for a kitty cat?” inquires Travis Shinn, the photographer.
“I’m all the time prepared for a kitty cat,” Rob replies, with palpable pleasure. That is no saucy volley of double entendres, however an alternate that introduces a heart-melting spectacle. A tiny, orange tabby kitten is handed to Rob, and his stoic metallic façade crumbles, revealing a person bursting with unadulterated pleasure. It’s apparent to each metalhead with an web connection that Rob loves kittens.
On Instagram (727,000 followers and counting), he posts an inordinate quantity of feline memes, poses in kitty t-shirts, and infrequently tags LA nonprofit Kitten Rescue. Nevertheless, at present’s photoshoot is at a recording studio in Rob’s hometown of Phoenix, Arizona, so we’ve known as in native organisation the Arizona Animal Welfare League to brighten Rob’s day.
Kiwi, the tabby, gazes deeply into the Metallic God’s face earlier than immediately turning fugitive. After a swift rescue, he’s changed with Hazel, a shy black kitten with saucer-sized eyes. She purrs her means into Rob’s embrace, discovering solace in his snowy white beard. The room is now a symphony of coos and clicks, as Travis immortalises the love fest. Rob, misplaced within the second, lavishes Hazel with affection, in a scene that’s oddly tender and starkly totally different from the metallic fury that he’s recognized to command.
“I like all creatures,” Rob says wistfully, after the final kitten has been whisked away. “Animals have been right here earlier than we have been, weren’t they? Ha ha! So there’s the respect proper there. They’re such an vital a part of your life, whether or not you’re an proprietor of a canine, cat, lizard, snake… You develop a bond to this dwelling, respiratory creature. They’re companions, they’ve empathy. Significantly when there’s some sort of problem happening of their individual’s life, like a bereavement, they snuggle as much as you. It’s a really profound second.”
We retreat to a comfortable again lounge within the studio – a hallowed floor the place Rob’s etched numerous tracks into the annals of metallic historical past. His longtime companion, Thomas, delivers a steaming cup of espresso to him. We hunch into the black leather-based couches, able to get a way of Rob Halford in 2024. Within the public eye, he’s a screeching, leather-clad firebrand, a tireless preacher within the church of heavy metallic, ever able to unfold the gospel to the horn-throwing devoted throughout the globe.
He’s additionally a beacon of inclusivity and a much-loved member of the LGBTQIA+ neighborhood, popping out on MTV in 1998. However seated throughout from us at present, Rob is mellow. His 72 years have resulted in knowledge born from uncooked life expertise, and a sobriety streak working 38 years sturdy. He speaks with an ease that’s disarming, flipping questions again at us like a seasoned card shark. A long time within the States haven’t scrubbed away that thick Black Nation accent, as if it’s a badge of honour he refuses to shed.
“Who I’m as an individual has by no means actually dissipated,” he says. Smiling, he continues, “We name ourselves ‘Yam Yams.’ To be a ‘Yam Yam’ is to come back from my a part of the West Midlands, or the Black Nation, as we name it. And also you don’t put your self on a pedestal. You don’t elevate your self as a result of we’re all individuals, all of us do totally different sorts of jobs. I occur to be a singer in a heavy metallic band. The truth that it’s who it’s and what we’ve achieved is irrelevant.”
In 1973, Rob joined forces with the rampaging British metallic beast often called Judas Priest, including his otherworldly vocals to a basic line-up that included guitarists Glenn Tipton and Okay.Okay. Downing, alongside bassist Ian Hill. Members have come and gone all through the following half century, together with Rob himself, who took go away of the band from 1992-2003 to pursue varied solo initiatives.
Okay.Okay. Downing left in 2011 and, for a number of years now, the line-up has featured Rob, Glenn and Ian alongside drummer Scott Travis (since 1989) and guitarist Richie Faulkner (since 2011). They’re now poised to launch Invincible Protect – extremely, it’ll be the nineteenth album for the band, and the seventeenth for Rob.
Nowadays, Rob’s a good distance from his fellow Yam Yams. He first set foot in Arizona in 1988, rolling by way of city after a present in Las Vegas. Phoenix, a weird cocktail of painted desert mirage and concrete actuality, whispered seductively to him, its sun-blasted landscapes slicing a stark distinction to the commercial West Midlands.
“I’ve all the time mentioned that everyone has one other favorite place, don’t they?” he says. “Like if it’s a trip place, you retain going again to that one particular trip place as a result of it means a lot to you. That’s what occurred to me with Phoenix.”
Through the years, myriad bands have requested Rob to share his insights for surviving the steel-jawed carnivore that’s the music trade, together with a younger System Of A Down passing by way of Phoenix within the 90s, whereas opening for Slayer. “I advised them that it’s a must to bear in mind to like one another, speak to one another and provides one another hugs,” he says.
“Each band is that this nice huge emotional fireball. It’s a really troublesome course of to maintain all of it working nicely. On the musical stage, issues could be working superb, however it’s the opposite stuff you really want to concentrate to as nicely. That’s why I all the time say, in my bits of Gandalf metallic knowledge, speak to one another. No matter’s in your thoughts, simply say what it’s. The event of your relationship with individuals within the band might be extra vital than your relationship with the music.”
In 1986, after years of relentlessly punishing his physique and his psyche with booze and medicines, Rob put himself earlier than the music and raised the white flag along with his bandmates. He dove headlong into restoration, and has remained clear and sober ever since. In 2020, he underwent remedies to take away cancerous growths from his prostate, receiving the all-clear from docs a yr later.
“Earlier than,” he says, “once I was confronted with life points, significantly once I was within the closet, I’d simply get blitzed out of my thoughts as a result of a) it might make me really feel higher and b) it might sort of dampen down the ache I used to be going by way of. So to be at this place now the place you deal head-on with, ‘Oh, you’ve received most cancers’ – again within the day, it might have been ‘Give me a few traces,’ or ‘Let me do a gram.’”
Right this moment, Rob exudes a deep sense of ease. Each morning, he does a prayer ritual, and each night time he practises gratitude. “Now I’m all the time at this sort of peaceable place, to cope with something that life throws at me,” he provides. “It’s a gorgeous factor, isn’t it? It’s a reward.”
It’s a present that served him nicely in 1998 when, throughout his time away from Judas Priest, he stepped into the obtrusive lights of MTV and got here out to the world. “I believe that most individuals know that I’ve been a homosexual man all of my life, and it’s solely been in latest instances that it’s a difficulty I really feel snug to deal with,” he mentioned on digital camera. “That is the second to debate it.”
“Once I made that announcement on the MTV studio, I didn’t actually realise how huge of a deal that was going to be,” he says at present. “This was earlier than the web, so the best way the message was communicated was at a snail’s tempo. Which isn’t a foul factor, as a result of when Billie Eilish lastly made the pronunciation of who she is [she unintentionally came out as bisexual in 2023], the world was on fireplace for 48 hours after which the world moved on. I believe I understood inside a matter of days how I’d now put myself into a spot of, ‘What’s going to occur subsequent?’”
Within the panorama of the 90s music trade, popping out as LGBTQIA+ was akin to stepping right into a hurricane. An artist risked misplaced report offers, vanishing radio play and a mainstream viewers recoiling of their archaic prejudices. For Rob to go public was pure braveness on show, and he felt a flood of reduction.
“There’s little doubt that I grew to become a greater individual as a result of I may simply let go of quite a lot of the partitions that I needed to create round me for my very own safety,” he continues. “Principally for the band’s safety. If I’d have gone again to Priest as I did, and I nonetheless hadn’t come out of the closet, would I’ve made that announcement? Life has these lovely issues that occur to you which might be typically out of your attain. In order that popping out episode was most likely the most effective alternative that I needed to immediately be who I’m.”
Right this moment, Rob isn’t solely a well-loved member of the metallic neighborhood, however of the mainstream. In 2022, Judas Priest have been lastly inducted into the Rock & Roll Corridor Of Fame, alongside nation music legend – and homosexual icon – Dolly Parton. The ceremony unleashed a weird but good spectacle, with the Metallic God becoming a member of forces with Dolly or a rendition of her huge hit Jolene, resplendent in an extended, black, glinting jacket with vertical, stud-embellished white strips.
“Someway, instinctively, I knew we have been going to satisfy,” Rob explains with a radiant depth. “I all the time inform the story of my mom’s grandmother, who was a clairvoyant, and I nonetheless suppose I’ve received somewhat of that in me, as a result of one thing went, ‘You’re going to satisfy Dolly Parton.’
Two or three days later, these emails come into the workplace, and Dolly’s reached out, asking, ‘Would you sing some traces on Jolene?’ You sit at residence and go, ‘Oh my god, that is actually going to occur!’ Being a homosexual man, ‘I’ve received nothing to put on!’ I do know that she likes to glitter and I wish to sparkle, so what I wore on that night time was apropos.”
Once they first met on the rehearsal, the 2 legends clicked instantly. “She goes, ‘I like your beard!’” he exclaims, “and she or he begins to scrub my beard! It was so surreal! I’m assembly this dwelling legend and she or he’s tickling my beard and going, ‘So that you’re going to sing some Jolene with me?’ I used to be simply floating.”
In 2023, the 2 duetted on the track Bygones, for Dolly’s crossover album, Rockstar. Rob opens his arms and gestures broadly throughout the room, explaining that he recorded his vocals on this very studio whereas she was in Nashville together with her producer, Kent Wells.
“We’re on the cellphone to one another and she or he’s going [puts on a credible Southern US accent], ‘Ship me the information! Ship me the information!’ So I despatched her the information and she or he calls again and goes, ‘I like these! That is gonna be nice!’ That is Dolly Parton on speakerphone! Ha ha! She’s simply this lovely beacon of life. You possibly can inform by the best way I’m talking that that is vital to me as a musician, to have had this actually once-in-a-lifetime alternative to work with somebody so nice.”
It wasn’t the one once-in-a-lifetime alternative Rob had final yr. On October 7, he walked onstage at California’s Energy Journey – one of many largest metallic festivals in historical past. With upwards of 200,000 attendees over three days, it featured Metallica, Iron Maiden, Weapons N’ Roses, AC/DC, Instrument and there, like a phoenix rising from the ashes of Ozzy Osbourne’s unlucky cancellation on account of well being causes, Judas Priest.
Reviewers, in a blissed-out, post-festival haze, anointed Judas Priest because the weekend’s zenith, eclipsing even the mighty AC/DC. It was an exhilarating testomony to the electrifying attract of OG British metallic in a world overrun by a mainstream gone stagnant. “It felt proper,” Rob says.
“It felt like we wanted to be there. I noticed all my associates who have been going to be taking part in, together with Ozzy, and I believed, ‘Man, that is so nice. What an important cross part of rock and metallic.’ However Energy Journey was extra about exhibiting this league of musicians collectively in a really distinctive presentation. The disappointment that Ozzy wasn’t in a position to make it and the joys to get the decision – that Ozzy would like to see should you guys would step in – that sort of accomplished the image in quite a lot of methods, minus Ozzy.”
In 2018, Glenn Tipton stepped away from touring duties after disclosing a analysis of later-stage Parkinson’s illness. He’s remained lively within the studio and has appeared onstage with the band quite a lot of instances since. Within the dusty California desert, he joined them as soon as once more to the roaring delight of the gang.
Beaming with delight, Rob says, “It was simply lovely when he got here out and the viewers went, ‘Glenn!’ He’s such a hero and he obtained a lot love and respect, as he deserves, as a result of he’s one of many biggest ever metallic guitar gamers that’s lived. There isn’t a different guitar participant like Glenn Tipton. “That was a particular second for Glenn. It was nearly like a whole cycle as a result of – I received’t say this with my hand on my coronary heart – however there’s a chance that was the final time that you just noticed Glenn play stay.
It’s getting more and more troublesome for him. So for him to search out the power to truly come out and play is a gorgeous factor. Having mentioned that, we’re about to start out the massive Invincible Protect tour within the UK and, if I do know Glenn, he’ll get in his automotive and drive to Glasgow, do the present after which drive residence. Ha ha!”
[since this interview, Glenn has indeed made two more appearances with Judas Priest as part of the band’s UK tour]
With Rob, Glenn and Ian of their 70s, it’d be each simple and deceptive to view Invincible Protect as a bookend to Judas Priest’s storied profession. For Rob, it’s a continuation of what they’ve all the time delivered. “It’s one other sturdy, strong illustration of what this band can do,” he says. “We’re not holding again. There’s nonetheless this full-on willpower to see if we’ve nonetheless received it.”
With Invincible Protect, they’ve distilled the essence of their previous and blended it with the power of recent manufacturing. Within the ‘Don’t Restore Issues That Work Simply Superb’ class, the fellows relied on the songwriting mannequin that’s served them faithfully for many years.
“When Glenn and Richie and myself get in a room, like Priest have all the time carried out, as a three-piece – two guitar gamers and a singer – that’s the metallic magic,” Rob explains. “All of that vitality, all of that youthful exuberance was nonetheless there in these preliminary writing classes.”
Rob then solutions the query about Glenn that’s been endlessly requested on social media. “He’s nonetheless an vital contributor to every part this band does,” Rob says, “together with his work throughout Invincible Protect. That’s Glenn taking part in the guitar. So whether or not it’s only a chord, whether or not it’s riffs, or whether or not it’s somewhat little bit of lead, Glenn is on Invincible Protect. That must be mentioned. His worth and his enter haven’t diminished; he’s simply as vital part of Priest as he ever was.”
As Rob listened to the grooves coming collectively, the lyrics and themes started revealing themselves to him – significantly the defiant title observe. “I realised that every one of those songs are a part of an invincible protect,” he explains.
“Priest is an invincible protect. Metallic is an invincible protect. Our followers create an invincible protect. I simply love the visualisation. Initially, a protect defends you, however it additionally enables you to push ahead. It’s an important object, a protect. You then put the phrase ‘invincible’ subsequent to it and man, that’s a giant assertion proper there. I introduced the entire thought to the fellows they usually have been like, ‘Yeah, thumbs up – let’s do that!’”
Longtime producer Andy Sneap has taken on a fair higher function. Along with stepping in for Glenn because the band’s second guitarist, he wields a galaxy of expertise gleaned from producing and jamming with a legion of metallic bands.
“Andy’s a blessing,” says Rob. “Firstly, the day that Glenn mentioned he felt that he was going to step again and let Andy stand in his place onstage, that was a really profound second. Andy was in a position to do Glenn’s components very well. He was in a band known as Hell and he was in a band known as Sabbat.” Rob grins. “That’s the black canine metallic – the evil stuff, as I name it.”
Invincible Protect opens with an eyebrow-searing firestorm of Panic Assault, The Serpent And The King and the title observe. “We all the time take into consideration these first three tracks,” explains Rob. “I believe that each band understands that your followers have been eagerly awaiting your new music and also you’ve actually received to be sturdy and forceful in what you’re displaying. By the top of your third track, the dedication needs to be there out of your followers. They’ve received to be going, ‘You guys have gotten it. I’m all-in!’”
At this second, Travis, our photographer, walks into the room to bid farewell. He compliments Rob on the black leather-based codpiece he wore throughout the shoot, earlier than turning to depart. “Travis! Come right here… Travis!” shouts Rob. As he re-enters the room, Rob flings the codpiece to him. “Are you critical?” asks a gobsmacked Travis.
“Sure. It’s a brand new one, truly,” Rob says.
“You simply made my day,” says our intrepid photographer.
“You possibly can ship me a Christmas card with you carrying that,” laughs Rob. “Have you ever ever, in your life, with all of the bands you’ve labored with, had a present like that?”
Howls of laughter fill the room. Together with a brand new album and touring, 2024 ushers in a momentous event: the anniversary of Priest’s debut album. For Rob, it’s one thing of a full-circle second.
“We’re going to be celebrating 50 years of Rocka Rolla, so I’ve simply sat down and been listening to it once more. We’ve received some thrilling issues within the pipeline for that report,” he smiles. “The timing on One For The Highway, and the phrasing on that, it’s so peculiar, so totally different, it’s so never-been-done-before… these little parts have been with Priest from Rocka Rolla to Invincible Protect.”
At 72 years outdated, Rob stays energised, nonetheless delivering metallic bangers with convincing ardour whereas taking time to donate codpieces to wayward photographers, cuddle cats, run a wildly entertaining Instagram account and be a typically superior human being. Although seasoned by the years behind him, Rob Halford continues to look squarely into the long run, embracing change and dwelling in a state of gratitude.
“What I like at present concerning the music enterprise is that individuals used to have to suit into bins. It was nearly like there was an expiration date, you already know? Ageism would play its function and the best way you seemed performed a job. All that’s carried out now.
There’s simply complete respect there for every part that you just do, the way you look, what you say, whether or not you’re straight, homosexual, no matter. That’s irrelevant, as a result of we’re all individuals and we’re all being artistic within the music world.”
He smiles. “We’re nonetheless a bunch of youngsters, actually! Ha ha! We get within the van and flip one another off! It’s silly however it’s lovely.”
Invincible Protect is out now by way of Sony. Judas Priest are on tour now. For the total listing of dates, go to the band’s official web site