JUDAS PRIEST's ROB HALFORD: We're 'Trying To Go To Places, Musically, That We Haven't Done Yet'

Last month, Shawn SixX of Boston's WZLX radio station conducted an interview with JUDAS PRIEST singer Rob Halford. You can now listen to the chat using the widget below. A couple of excerps follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On JUDAS PRIEST's biggest hurdle going forward:

Rob: "Well, putting the notes in a different order. [Laughs] Because, let's face it, I've been doing this now for over forty years of my life, and I know that's what it's all about. This is about trying to display an idea from a different perspective, a different angle that has not yet been done before. And it's extremely challenging, particularly when you're as microscopic as PRIEST are. We've never kind of thrown things together. Sometimes we've got lucky, you know — 'Living After Midnight', 'Breaking The Law'. I would say the bulk of the work that we've made over the years has been a labor of love. So that's where we're at now — really trying to touch places, go to places, musically, that we haven't done yet."

On whether he still feels writing the best songs is the most important thing for a new hard rock and heavy metal band:

Rob: "Yeah, I do. I think that particularly in today's really kind of hustling and bustling metal world, you've just really gotta work hard, you've really gotta try and find an edge, find a direction, find something that makes people go, 'Hey, what is that? What is that riff? What is that melody? What is that hook? That's pretty cool.' And it's easier said than done, but that's the tenacity, that's the determination, that's the real power that you've gotta try and find within yourself to make a spark that nobody else has made."

JUDAS PRIEST is preparing to enter the studio to begin recording its long-awaited follow-up to 2014's "Redeemer Of Souls" album.

Halford said last year that JUDAS PRIEST wasn't interested in making "a 'Redeemer Of Souls Part Two'." He explained: "I think it's very important that we make another stand-alone record again, a heavy metal record that's going to have its own legs and just be as different as all of them have been so far."

"Redeemer Of Souls" was released in July 2014. The follow-up to 2008's double-disc concept album "Nostradamus" was billed as a return to JUDAS PRIEST's heavy-metal roots.

"Redeemer Of Souls" sold around 32,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to land at position No. 6 on The Billboard 200 chart.

JUDAS PRIEST's tenth studio album, "Turbo", was recently remastered and was released via Sony Music on February 3 on three CDs (the original album and two bonus discs) as well as one-LP 150-gram vinyl. Included on disc 2 and 3 of the CD reissue is, previously unreleased, "Live in Kansas City", a live recording from the band's 1986 "Fuel For Life" tour in support of "Turbo".