I thing defenders is their [judas priest] best album... I don't count them as a sellout because in order for them to be one their first couple of albums would have had to be metal in my opinion. Seeing as they had already hugely changed their sound I think it is acceptable.
There's a difference between a dramatic change in sound in general and a sellout. The evolution from
Rocka Rolla to
Stained Class was not in any way making their sound more mainstream. On the other hand, the transition from
Stained Class to
British Steel, with their ridiculous new image, the dumbing-down of the guitars, Rob Halford abandoning most of his high range (in the '80s he had the occasional screams, but he was constantly redlining the high end on
Stained Class), and Les Binks being replaced by a drummer (Dave Holland) who is even worse than Lars Ulrich becasue Les didn't want to play simple backbeats, is a calculated attempt to break into the mainstream and create "rebellion music", superficially edgy but not actually challenging, for teenagers, set a precedent for all sellouts to follow and helped sow the seeds for glam metal. Not to mention the way the media seized on their new image and lyrical style, fueling the hair metal movement and providing 90% of the ammunition the record industry and grunge movement used to murder the metal scene in the early '90s.
And
Sad Wings of Destiny was
definitely metal and together with
Stained Class pretty much nailed down the formula for classic heavy metal and purged most of Black Sabbath's blues baggage. Even
Rocka Rolla had as much metal as it did hard and prog rock.
