Judas Priest - Sad Wings Of Destiny (1976 Reissue 2018) Hi-Res

This foundation sounded like little else on the metal scene at the time, and gave Sad Wings of Destiny much of its dramatic impact. Its mystique, though, was something else. No metal band had been this convincingly dark since Black Sabbath, and that band's hallucinatory haze was gone, replaced by a chillingly real cast of serial killers ("The Ripper"), murderous dictators ("Tyrant"), and military atrocities that far outweighed "War Pigs" ("Genocide"). Even the light piano ballad "Epitaph" sounds like a morbidly depressed Queen rewriting Sabbath's "Changes." Three songs rank as all-time metal classics, starting with the epic "Victim of Changes," which is blessed with an indelible main riff, a star-making vocal turn from Halford, explosive guitar work, and a tight focus that belies its nearly eight-minute length. "The Ripper" and "Tyrant," with their driving guitar riffs and concise construction, are the first seeds of what would flower into the New Wave of British Heavy Metal movement. More than any other heavy metal album of its time, Sad Wings of Destiny offered the blueprint for the way forward. What's striking is how deeply this blueprint resonated through the years, from the prog ambitions of Iron Maiden to the thematic echoes in a pair of '80s thrash masterpieces. The horrors of Sad Wings are largely drawn from real life, much like Slayer's Seasons in the Abyss, and its all-consuming anxiety is over powerlessness, just like Metallica's magnum opus, Master of Puppets. (Though this latter preoccupation doubtlessly had more psychosexual roots in Rob Halford's case -- witness the peculiar torture fantasy of "Island of Domination.") Unfortunately, Sad Wings of Destiny didn't have as much impact upon release as it should have, mostly owing to the limitations of the small Gull label. It did, however, earn Judas Priest a shot with Columbia, where they would quickly become the most influential band in heavy metal not named Black Sabbath.