TIM 'RIPPER' OWENS: 'When People Say I Can't Sing, They Need To Open Their F***ing Ears'

In a new interview with the "Heavy Metal Mayhem" radio show, former JUDAS PRIEST singer Tim "Ripper" Owens addressed the fact that he is a often a magnet for controversy with some of the things he says or posts on social media. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "I think the problem is I use a lot of humor [when I do interviews or post things on social media]. It's funny, you say something 10 years ago or five years ago, and people still talk about it.

"Nobody knows me. They don't really know me politically," Tim continued. "They don't know me personally. They don't know what I do [or] who I am. They just know the Tim 'Ripper' Owens who does these interviews.

"What gets me in trouble is I kind of like to use a lot of humor, so I'm always saying something funny, and the next thing you know it's taken out of context.

"It is what it is. And that's what you have to deal with," Owens added. "You post something — even if it's a positive thing… Listen, I've lost a lot of weight [and I posted something about it on social media]. It's a positive thing, and I'm really healthy and taking care of myself. And then people even knock that. You read headlines… And it was a nice, positive thing. Blabbermouth took it off my Instagram and posted it and said I lost 50 pounds and blah, blah, blah. And it was nice; it wasn't like they took it and made something bad out of it. I don't ever read comments — ever — but this one I thought I would, to see how people can actually make this a bad thing. And, of course, they did. And that's just what they do. And you deal with that."

Tim went on to say that he is "definitely" more careful about what he says publicly nowadays. "I've watched what I've said now for probably the past three or four years," he said. "I still get in trouble; I still say something [that gets people riled up].

"Contrary to popular belief, I'm not a guy that talks [publicly] about politics," Owens clarified. "I used to like posts or say a few things in the past, but I don't talk [publicly] about politics, just because it doesn't matter if you're left or right or middle, whatever you say, the left, the right or the middle is gonna attack you. So it's kind of a silly thing. But whatever you say, that's just the way it is nowadays. People, they like to hate; they're never positive. But with that being said, that's five to 10 percent of the people. I mean, it depends on the headline on social media, because that might be more, but a lot of times, what happens is you happen to gravitate toward the negative stuff that people say about you more than the positive stuff, and I think that's the bad thing.

"When people say to me, 'I don't like you. You suck. You can't sing. You have a bad stage presence,' this and that. But that's not true. That's not true," Tim said. "If you just said, 'I don't like it. I don't like his singing,' okay, I can live with that. That's fine — I can live with that. You don't like me. That's fine. There's a lot of singers I don't like either. But I wouldn't say that, though. The difference is I don't go on somebody's page and go, 'Jesus, look at you.' Or, 'Man, that's a terrible record.' I don't do that. I'm not that stupid. But when people say I can't sing, they need to open their fucking ears, because I can sing just about anything."

Owens recently released a solo EP, "Return To Death Row". The effort was produced by Jamey Jasta (HATEBREED) and Nick Bellmore (JASTA, DEE SNIDER). Players on the EP, which contain Owens's "heaviest songs yet," include Nick Bellmore, Charlie Bellmore (DEE SNIDER, ex-TOXIC HOLOCAUST) on guitar, and Chris Beaudette (JASTA, ENTEIRRO) on bass.

Owens is currently the frontman of KK'S PRIEST, featuring fellow former JUDAS PRIEST member K.K. Downing.

Owens joined PRIEST after being discovered when the band's drummer, Scott Travis, was given a videotape of him performing with the PRIEST cover act BRITISH STEEL. JUDAS PRIEST at the time was seeking a replacement for Rob Halford.

Owens recorded two studio albums with JUDAS PRIEST — 1997's "Jugulator" and 2001's "Demolition" — before the band reunited with Halford in 2003.

"Demolition" and "Jugulator" are included on "50 Heavy Metal Years Of Music", JUDAS PRIEST's 2021 limited-edition box set which contains every official live and studio album to date plus 13 unreleased discs.