Something that I didn’t realize until now is that The Metal Years more or less officially ended at the same time as the Vinyl record era. I’ve been trying to recall the music I was buying at the time when I bought my first Compact Disc Player. Although I can’t be certain, I have a pretty good idea what my last vinyl records were. I am absolutley certain of my first 2 Compact Discs. That story is coming up soon. I still have a handful of old vinyls to get through yet.
When Aric and I were shopping for our first real non-pawn shop guitars, the sales technician musician was telling us about this new thing in musical instruments. It was called MIDI which I think he said stood for Musical Instrument Device Interface. It was supposed to be the next big thing in music. He showed us how he could hook up a guitar to this thing and instead of regular guitar sounds, you could have it spit out any manner of digitally created sounds. It was interesting but expensive and at the time we were still deep in our Metal Phase and that didn’t need fancy digital enhancements, just good old fashion Distortion.
Judas Priest didn’t feel that way and on their next album Turbo they used some of that MIDI stuff and the results were rather interesting. I can’t say for certain if MIDI is the reason but Turbo is my favorite Judas Priest album. I suspect that it was the shift towards a more mainstream sound that makes it so easy to listen to.
I’m sure that there are diehard Priest fans that probably hate this album compared to their older more raw and screechy stuff. Yeah I agree, Turbo is Judas Priest that has been washed and pressed and prepped for MTV but I like it. You know, listening to it right now, I think it might be the MIDI stuff. I have always been a fan of electronic music as you know by previous posts. The MIDI element gives it a little electronic flavor that sits quite well with me.
Turbo Lover
Locked In
Private Property
Parental Guidance
Hot For Love