Judas Priest United Kingdom
"Priest are back with their most progressive effort to date. The Priest sound is still there - and alive and kicking - but bolstered with a symphonic feel that, while atypical for Priest, is slightly reminiscent of old tracks like "Run of the Mill" and "Dreamer Deciever".
Come to think of it, 'Nostradamus' is in part, ignoring the symphonic elements, musically similar to many of their pre-'Turbo' releases, but on he production side it is more reminiscent of 'Turbo' and 'Ram it Down', making extensive use of synthesized guitars. I think this combination of classical Priest with a new symphonic and conceptual feel works very well.
One downside is perhaps the many athmospheric fillers which tend to get a bit annoying. Fortunately, Halford sings on many of them, which makes them interesting to listen to after all. And maybe there's too much reverb on he bass and snare drums, but that seems to fit the epic feel quite well."
"Priest with a modern edge, this album integrates elements from thrash metal, nu-metal and classic Priest metal, and things work well most of the time. Not one of the best Priest albums, but cetainly not the worst either. Ripper does a good job on this album like he did on 'Jugulator'."
"This album is actually a great album, where Priest showed that they certainly were fully capable of playing the nu-metal/thrash style that was fashionable in the late 1990s - and much better than most nu-metal bands at the time. Blending the brutality of thrash and the darkness (and downtuning) of nu-metal with elements of traditional heavy metal, Priest made a great and totally underrated album out of 'Jugulator'. 'Ripper' Owens, who is a great and versatile vocalist, did a superb job on this album."
"I was never disappointed with this album. I think it's very much a product of its time in terms of production, and there are lots of uplifting energetic hard rock tunes on this one (especially "Turbo Lover" is great and the way it's built up reflects the contents of the lyrics very well). And that's what I like about Priest. They're always spot on in terms of the musical trends of their time without ever losing their originality - you can always hear it's pries. Albums like "Turbo", "Painkiller", "British Steel", and "Jugulator" - all of which are very different - show this. So, actually "Turbo" fits very well into the whole Priest discography."
"Apart from "You Say Yes", "PoE" doesn't really contain any interesting tunes, most of which become trivial and monotonous after a couple of listens. It's still a good album compared to many other contemporary artists, but by Priest standards, it's somewhat of a lackluster."
"Halford is back on what qualifies as a very good Priest album. "AoR" contains songs which are very varied, representing many different branches of the metal genre, but all characterized by the typical Priest sound. Some songs do not wear out from repeated listens, while others are admittedly not super memorable and only survive a good handful of listens."
