Review: "Ram It Down" (1988) by heavy metal legends Judas Priest

Judas Priest finished off the decade of the 1980’s in excellent fashion with their 1988 album called Ram It Down. If intensity is any indication, from the start of the album with the title track, you know that these British heavy metal legends were determined to make a very strong statement through their music. Ram It Down is a song about bringing an army of people that will provide action, intensity, and life to an otherwise isolated place. My favorite song from this album has always been the song called Monsters of Rock. That is the most memorable moment I have from listening to this album. This writer has listened to enough Judas Priest albums to consider them metal legends.

Heavy Metal is a song about the positive effects that heavy metal music can have on music fans. The song is trying to say that heavy metal stimulates and regenerates people. It also helps them get their feet off the ground. What kind of heavy metal do you want to listen to today? Rob Halford keeps singing the words heavy metal and you can hear his constant shouts as the song ends. Love Zone is a good hard rock song about love. You can even get love for money if that’s what you desire. Ram It Down is the last album to have Dave Holland playing the drums. He would leave the band in 1989 to be replaced by Scott Travis. Heavy metal exists in various genres and lives forever as its power and influence continues to excite fans over the world.

The faster song called Hard as Iron has speed which the band would use in 1990 with songs such as Leather Rebel and Metal Meltdown. They were beginning to make a transition from the slower or mid-tempo rock songs and using thrash in their songs instead. Is Ram It Down as good of an album as Painkiller? I would tend to say no but it is a great album nonetheless. Hard as Iron also uses lead interludes that are melodic enough to have influenced Jason Becker as well. The song Blood Red Skies uses a sort of electronic sound, something that the band had not used before this album. The song I’m a Rocker describes the life of a musician who has done all he can to excite audiences. He has traveled a million miles to do what he loves. When he does concerts at night, that’s when he is at his most passionate levels of joy. There is also a cover song on this album. Judas Priest covers the Chuck Berry song called Johnny B. Goode. The famous singing of “go Johnny go, go!” is present in this song so the band has created some that oldies feel in their version.

Overall, Ram It Down is a very good album by one of the pioneers of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. The strongest songs in the album are the mentioned Monsters of Rock, Ram It Down, Heavy Metal, and Hard as Iron.

Note: drummer Dave Holland passed away in a Spanish hospital. It was reported by Spanish newspaper El Progreso that he had actually died on January 16, 2018 and that no cause of death was given. But since Ram It Down was the last musical collaboration that he had with Judas Priest, he would have felt proud to know that he had been a member of the band when the band released one of its best albums of the 1980's.