Sin After Sin

After releasing their first two albums on the small Gull label, Judas Priest grew dissatisfied with what they saw as a lack of financial support from their record company.[1] Their previous album, Sad Wings of Destiny, caught the attention of CBS Records, and with the help of new manager David Hemmings, the band signed with CBS and received a £60,000 budget for the follow-up album,[1] which was to draw its title phrase "sin after sin" from the lyrics to the song "Genocide" from the Sad Wings album.[2] The move to CBS required breaking their contract with Gull, and once the legal dust had settled the band had forfeited the rights to those first two albums and all related recordings to Gull.[1]

Rehearsals for the Sin After Sin sessions took place at Pinewood Studios in London, with recording commencing in January 1977 at The Who's Rampart Studios in the Battersea district of London. Deep Purple bassist Roger Glover was hired to produce the album with Mark Dodson serving as engineer.[3] The band's studio experiences while with Gull were less than satisfying, particularly during the mixing of Rocka Rolla, and they were initially quite keen to produce Sin After Sin themselves. CBS, however, insisted on an experienced producer. Deep Purple bassist Roger Glover was suggested and the band agreed,[4] but after one session the band fired Glover, informing him that they would continue on their own.[5] After a few weeks of struggling with unsatisfactory recordings, the band recalled Glover and the sessions began anew, with only six allotted days remaining. It was also during this period that the band parted ways with drummer Alan Moore, feeling that his technique was too limited for their evolving sound. Session drummer Simon Phillips was brought in to finish the sessions.[6]

The album includes a cover of the Joan Baez song "Diamonds & Rust", a decision which was encouraged by producer Roger Glover in the interest of adding a track with commercial potential. Indeed, "Diamonds & Rust" was the first song by Judas Priest to receive radio play, and Baez herself reportedly enjoyed the cover. This was the band's second attempt to cover the track, and the earlier version from the Gull Records era was only released later on compilations and as a bonus track on reissues of Rocka Rolla.

The "brazenly homoerotic"[7] song "Raw Deal" has been described as vocalist Rob Halford's coming-out song, and a "heavy metal gay rights song".[8] Halford officially came out as a gay man in 1998.

As session drummer Simon Phillips had commitments to another band, he declined to join Judas Priest as a permanent member. As a result, former Fancy drummer Les Binks was hired for the subsequent tour. An acquaintance of producer Glover, Binks was able to play double bass, and was one of the few drummers who could replicate Phillips' drum parts live.

A live tape from their headlining show in Croydon on May 1, 1977 shows that all songs except one, "Last Rose of Summer" were played on the 1977 tour. "Raw Deal" and "Here Come the Tears" were only played at headlining shows and permanently retired after this tour, "Let Us Prey/Call for the Priest" was also played a few times in 1978, "Sinner" and "Diamonds and Rust" became regulars on future setlists while "Starbreaker" and "Dissident Aggressor" returned to the band's setlists after a lengthy absence, in 2011 and 2008 respectively.

With major label support, Sin After Sin marked Judas Priest's first-ever opportunity to tour the United States, where they served as the opening act for REO Speedwagon and Foreigner.

Sin After Sin was Judas Priest's most commercially successful release to date, reaching number 23 in the UK Albums Chart. That success was difficult to duplicate in the US where Sin After Sin failed to chart. At home, they also faced a somewhat hostile reception or were outright ignored by a music press which was at that time heavily focused on the new genre of punk rock which swept Britain in the late 1970s.[9] Though it would take several years, Sin After Sin is the first of eleven consecutive Judas Priest albums to be certified gold or higher by the RIAA.[10]

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[11]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[12]
Record Collector	[13]

Sin After Sin introduced the combination of the double bass drumming and rapid sixteenth-note bass rhythms combined with rapid sixteenth-note guitar rhythms that would come to define heavy metal in later years, particularly the thrash metal sub-genre which emerged in the 1980s.[14] The track "Dissident Aggressor" was an early example of the tempo and aggression which would soon become synonymous with the New Wave of British Heavy Metal.[14]

Author Andrew L. Cope has described Sin After Sin as a key album in the development of heavy metal technique, in particular for its use of double kick drumming.[15]

Anthrax guitarist Scott Ian has been quoted as saying that Mark Dodson's engineering work on this album (and later on 1984's Defenders of the Faith) inspired the band to hire him to produce their 1988 album State of Euphoria.[16]

Sin After Sin would be the final Judas Priest album prior to the band adopting its new, now well known logo (pictured)

Sin After Sin was the final Judas Priest album to feature their original "gothic cursive font" logo, though it would be used on later Gull Records reissues of their pre-Sin After Sin material.

The mausoleum depicted on the Sin After Sin album cover is based on a photograph of the Egyptianate mausoleum built in 1910 for Colonel Alexander Gordon, located on the grounds of Putney Vale Cemetery in London.[17]

This was the first (in order of release) of Judas Priest's main albums to be remastered in 2001, which included all of the albums between this and their 1990 Painkiller album. The remaster corrected an error in the track listing; "Call for the Priest", which forms one track with "Let Us Prey", had erroneously been listed as forming one track with "Raw Deal" until then.

The band Starbreaker, formed in 2005 and led by TNT vocalist Tony Harnell, whose singing style was heavily influenced by Rob Halford in his formative years, named themselves after the song "Starbreaker". Germany's Sinner and its vocalist/bassist Mat Sinner, born Matthias Lasch, both derive their names from the song "Sinner". In 1997, Mat Sinner formed Judas Priest soundalikes Primal Fear whose lead vocalist Ralf Scheepers had been on a list of singers under consideration as the replacement for Rob Halford.[18]

In 1988, Slayer covered "Dissident Aggressor" on their album South of Heaven. Forbidden also covered it for A Tribute to Judas Priest: Legends of Metal, Vol. II (1997), as did Halestorm on their 2013 EP ReAniMate 2.0.

In 1997 Therion recorded a cover of "Here Comes the Tears" on their 10-year anniversary release A'arab Zaraq – Lucid Dreaming.

Arch Enemy covered "Starbreaker", which was eventually released on a bonus disc with their Wages of Sin album. "This track was never intended for Century Media's Judas Priest tribute album", wrote guitarist Michael Amott in the Wages of Sin liner notes. "Originally we got a request from the label in Japan to record a cover – any cover for some sort of compilation they were planning. We decided to try out another studio in 1998 and our choice fell on a local facility where Daniel had worked with his previous band, Eucharist. The recording turned out really cool: the best out of the three covers we've done, in my opinion. The Japanese compilation never materialized and [this] was never released – until now that is."

Devin Townsend covered "Sinner" for Volume 1 of A Tribute to Judas Priest: Legends of Metal.

Judas Priest

• Rob Halford – vocals
• K. K. Downing – guitars
• Glenn Tipton – guitars, piano
• Ian Hill – bass

Additional Musicians

• Simon Phillips - drums

Production

• Produced by Roger Glover and Judas Priest
• Engineered by Mark Dodson
• Art direction by Rosław Szaybo
• Design and photography by Bob Carlos Clarke