Judas Priest - Freewheel Burning

While conventional wisdom does dictate that “Screaming For Vengeance” is Judas Priest’s best album, there does exist an ongoing comparison with it’s follow up album “Defenders of the Faith.” Like a lot of Judas Priest fans, I am torn between “Screaming For Vengeance” and “Defenders of the Faith” as to which I love more. The back to back rocking of “Screaming For Vengeance” does make it Judas Priest’s best single sitting listening album, so in theory with that “Screaming For Vengeance” wins, but only in theory. In truth there are more of my favorite Priest songs on “Defenders of the Faith” and that means a lot. I mean come on, “Defenders of the Faith” has, what is possibly Judas Priest’s best song, “Freewheel Burning.”

“Freewheel Burning!”

My second earliest memory of “Freewheel Burning” was being at the gym in my hometown, it was a small town, we only had one gym. My best friend got his hands on the cd player and put in his copy of Judas Priest’s greatest hits and some guys working out continued to shout out for “Freewheel Burning” until my friend put that song on. The fellow exercise enthusiast was in no way rude, he was very upbeat about the music choice and very enthusiastically request his, presumably, favorite track. My earliest memory of “Freewheel Burning” was hearing for the first time listening to that same friend’s copy of Priest’s greatest hits.

Enough about me and my memories, let’s focus on “Defenders of the Faith” and “Freewheel Burning.”

“Screaming For Vengeance” broke Judas Priest into the mainstream, sort of, more or less, so the follow up album needed to be very good to keep that momentum going, and “Defenders of the Faith” delivered. More than anything these two albums established Judas Priest as the rock gods there were, and Rob Halford as the metal god. The first single off of “Defenders of the Faith” is the first track on the album, “Freewheel Burning.” Ideal was both the first song and the first single. The fast and powerful intro that comes fighting out of the gate letting everyone know exactly what to expect from the album.

Right off from the start “Defenders of the Faith” starts like a raging rocket, the intro the is a rapid-fire guitar sending us off into the intro song and the album with all the power in the world. At the two-minute ten second mark, KK Downing hits us with the guitar solo to end all guitar solos. It runs for almost a full minute and despite everything being so amazing, this somehow proves to be the best part of the song. I do not consider myself an expert on Judas Priest, just a very big fan, but this has to be KK best work, what more could human do on lead guitar?

One of my greatest joys is singing along with songs and thinking about the lyrics, however, I never paid much attention to the lyrics of “Freewheel Burning;” I have always been too busy headbanging along and singing the only part I could, the hollowing yell of the song title.

Singing along with Halford on this song is impossible. I have no idea how Halford managed to sign “Freewheel Burning” the way he does, the pitch he reaches and the way he does it over and over is not something most can ever manage, even with infinite time to train, only a god like Halford can sing a song like “Freewheel Burning.” By the third verse Halford is singing so quickly, that I needed to look up the lyrics for any hope of discerning his words.

Looking over the lyrics now, I get the same driving force to live life to the maximum, not entirely dissimilar to “You’ve Got Another Thing Coming,” but I cannot help but project some cosmic machine science fiction metal onto “Freewheel Burning.” No longer is Judas Priest singing about just charging through life with confidence and vigour, but from the opening line we are led to believe the ambition has been increased to include the entire universe. It is not entirely clear but given Halford’s word choice, a sensation of battle is strongly presented. This brings me to another song I love from “Defenders of the Faith,” “The Sentinel.”

So yes. I really like “Freewheel Burning” possibly my favorite or at least one of my favorite Judas Priest songs. However, “The Sentinel” is also such a song.

The Sentinel:

Once again, I was too busy headbanging, to pay a great deal of attention to “The Sentinel’s” lyrics. I also had this weird indeed that he robot lion tank on the cover of the album was “The Sentinel,” not for any particular reason, I just always put those two things together.

Upon further inspection, “The Sentinel” is about a warrior in post apocalyptic world seeking revenge; which is awesome. Very Mad Max.

So yes. I really like “The Sentinel,” but I should also probably mention real quick how awesome “Some Heads are Gonna Roll.”

Some Heads are Gonna Role:

With these three songs, we have gone from inference of combat, to road warrior like character, to a full-on war song. What kind of war? A metal war I presume. It is a warzone in the wastelands. And what a call to arms, “some heads are gonna roll.” The opening rift is like a gunshot, and the whole song is just metal as hell. Great song.

So yeah, that is why me and everybody else are torn between “Screaming for Vengeance” and “Defenders of the Faith.” Two powerhouse albums that helped define metal music forever. I hold these two albums, and controversially, I also hold “Turbo,” as the three big Priest albums. Those three albums all came out back to back, and they changed everything.

- King of Braves