Judas Priest "Sad Wings Of Destiny"

Sad Wings of Destiny is the second album by the English heavy metal group Judas Priest, released in 1976. It is considered the album on which Judas Priest consolidated their sound and image, and songs from it such as "Victim of Changes" and "The Ripper" have since become live standards. It is the only album to feature drummer Alan Moore.

Noted for its riff-driven heavy metal sound and the wide range of Rob Halford's vocals, the album displays a wide variety of styles, moods, and textures, inspired by an array of groups such as Queen, Deep Purple, and Black Sabbath. The centrepiece "Victim of Changes" is an eight-minute track featuring heavy riffing trading off with high-pitched vocals, extended guitar leads, and a slow, moody breakdown toward the end. "Tyrant" and "The Ripper" are short, dense, high-powered rockers with many parts and changes. Riffs and solos dominate "Genocide", "Island of Domination", and "Deceiver", and the band finds more laid-back moments in the crooning piano-backed "Epitaph" and the moody "Dreamer Deceiver".

Sad Wings of Destiny had a positive reception but weak sales as it was released just as punk rock was dominating the spotlight in the UK. The band recorded their first two albums with the independent Gull label under tight budgets; after living off a single meal per day while working side jobs to support themselves, the group grew frustrated with the financial situation and signed with CBS Records for their next album, Sin After Sin (1977). Breaking their contract resulted in the rights to Sad Wings of Destiny and its demo recordings falling into Gull's hands.

Judas Priest formed in 1969 in industrial West Bromwich, Birmingham. Co-founder Al Atkins chose the band's name, wanting one similar to Black Sabbath's. The bands were contemporaries and were both from Birmingham, though Judas Priest failed to find a significant audience until Black Sabbath began to fade from the spotlight. The band's guitarists Glenn Tipton and K. K. Downing have said the heavy riffing and complexity of the song arrangements were inspired by the factories of Birmingham.

By the time Judas Priest's first album, Rocka Rolla, was released in 1974, there had been so many lineup changes that no original member remained. The first album displayed a mix of styles from a wide variety of influences; the band found the performance and production disappointing. The band gigged occasionally through 1975, at times sharing the stage with bands such as Pink Fairies and UFO. Drummer John Hinch left the band for reasons that are disputed and was replaced with Alan Moore in October 1975, who had drummed in an early incarnation of the band.

The band performed the "Dreamer Deceiver"–"Deceiver" pair on BBC Two's The Old Grey Whistle Test the year before the songs appeared on Sad Wings of Destiny. The band had yet to develop the studs-and-leather image that was to become their trademark; instead, they wore contemporary mid-1970s fashions, including high-heeled boots and frilled shirts, and a long-haired Halford donned a pink satin top which he later said he borrowed from his sister. By 1976, the band's singer Rob Halford joked that fans should burn their copies of Rocka Rolla.

Finances were tight: the record label Gull provided a recording budget of £2000 for each of the band's first two albums. During the recording of Sad Wings of Destiny, band members restricted themselves to one meal a day, and several took on part-time work: Tipton as a gardener, Downing in a factory, and Hill driving a delivery van. The group went into the studio with the intention of making an album that mixed straight-ahead rock with a progressive edge.

Recording took place over two weeks in November and December 1975 at Rockfield Studios in Wales with producers Jeffrey Calvert and Gereint "Max West" Hughes, and Chris Tsangarides as co-engineer. Calvert and Hughes were the main members of the pop group Typically Tropical who topped the UK charts in 1975 with "Barbados", Gull's first hit. The band stayed sober during the recording sessions, which lasted from 3:00 pm until 3:00 am. Mixing took a week at Morgan Studios in London.

David Howells of Gull records commissioned Patrick Woodroffe to provide the cover art, a piece called Fallen Angel depicting a struggling, grounded angel surrounded by flames and wearing a devil's three-pronged cross, which was the band's symbol. Halford posed Christ-like on the reverse, and Gothic fonts adorned the front and back.

Track list:

Track listing

Side A

1. "Victim of Changes" Al Atkins, Glenn Tipton, Rob Halford, K. K. Downing 7:47
2. "The Ripper" Tipton 2:50
3. "Dreamer Deceiver" Halford, Downing, Tipton, Atkins 5:51
4. "Deceiver" Halford, Downing, Tipton 2:40

Side B

1. "Prelude" Tipton 2:02
2. "Tyrant" Halford, Tipton 4:28
3. "Genocide" Halford, Downing, Tipton 5:51
4. "Epitaph" Tipton 3:08
5. "Island of Domination" Halford, Downing, Tipton 4:32

The Sad Wings of Destiny disc of the seventeen-disc Complete Albums Collection from 2012 puts the Side B tracks before those from "Side A". "Prelude" did not appear on some pressings.