Judas Priest: Firepower review – toned-down riffs never lower the tone

(Columbia)What do you do when you made your name hitting notes high enough to summon all dogs within a 40-mile radius, but age takes your pitch down and puts the screech out of reach? It’s an issue particular to metal, and particularly relevant to Rob Halford of Judas Priest, who has responded to age by taking his smoke-alarm voice down an octave or two, into a stentorian baritone. Given that his voice helped define Priest, one needs to treat the assertions that this 18th album is a return