Stained Class
| Stained Class | ||||
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| Studio album by Judas Priest | ||||
| Released | 10 February 1978 | |||
| Recorded | October–November 1977, Chipping Norton Recording Studios, Oxfordshire and Utopia Studios, London (track 3) | |||
| Genre | Heavy metal | |||
| Length | 43:40 | |||
| Label | CBS, Inc. (UK) Columbia Records (US) |
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| Producer | Dennis Mackay, Judas Priest, James Guthrie (track 3) | |||
| Judas Priest chronology | ||||
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| Professional ratings | |
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| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic |   |
Stained Class is the fourth album by British heavy metal group Judas Priest, released in February 1978. It is the first of three albums to feature drummer Les Binks. It gained notoriety for its dark lyrics and themes, as well as 1990 civil action trial where the band were accused of backmasking that led to the suicide attempts of two teenagers. Stained Class was ranked as the greatest Judas Priest album on Stereogum.com, and was described by Steve Huey on Allmusic.com as “Judas Priest’s greatest achievement.”
Stained Class is the only Judas Priest album to feature songwriting by all five members of the band. It was at this point, however, where Glenn Tipton became the band’s primary lead guitarist; from this point forward, he would mostly share songwriting duties with Rob Halford. K.K. Downing’s only standalone performances on Stained Class are “Savage” and the second solo on “Beyond the Realms of Death” and "Heroes End", with the rest of the album either featuring Tipton exclusively or duets between the two. Newly added drummer Les Binks earned a songwriting credit on “Beyond The Realms Of Death” for composing the acoustic intro.
The sleeve artwork, by Rosław Szaybo at CBS Records, introduced the now-classic Judas Priest logo, replacing the Gothic Script logo which appeared on all of the band's prior albums. Stained Class was the first Judas Priest album to dent the Billboard 200 chart and was eventually certified gold in the US.
Dennis MacKay was brought in by CBS Records to produce the album. His resume at the time consisted mainly of jazz fusion artists, plus David Bowie, Supertramp, and others. He set himself to the task of cleaning up the band’s unwieldy songwriting style and making their material shorter, tighter, and more direct. The recording sessions for Stained Class took place in October and November 1977 at Chipping Norton Recording Studios in Oxfordshire.
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