00:12I'm Glen Tipton, and we're at Donington in Downright.
00:16I think Donington's always been a bit of a landmark festival, you know,
00:21and whether it's Monsters of Rock or Donington, I think it's carried a lot of weight
00:26and a lot of bands have got fond memories of it.
00:29There's been some great shows here, great concerts here.
00:31So it's great to be back, really.
00:33There's a lot of new bands.
00:35To be honest, I'm not very good at names, and I usually forget the names.
00:38My son turns me onto lots of bands, and I've always got my ear to the ground,
00:42but I can't pronounce half the names.
00:44I've got a bad memory, anyway, at my age.
00:46As you know, we're just about to release Nostradamus,
00:48which is a concept album, which has taken two years to put together.
00:52Not solidly, but we've done it over a two-year period.
00:55We're very proud of it, and that'll be out next week, I believe.
00:59He's got 13 primary tracks, but 24 tracks overall.
01:02A lot of interconnection pieces and preludes, etc.
01:07And it's an album really about his life as opposed to his prophecies.
01:10You know, we touch on his prophecies, and we do a track called Visions,
01:15and the four horsemen that used to come to him and bring him these visions.
01:18But it's really about his life, you know.
01:20He was an interesting character.
01:21He suffered a lot of tragedy.
01:22He lost his wife and daughter in the plague,
01:26and then the church came after him and exiled him because of the prophecies,
01:29and he was very outspoken.
01:30And then he found a new life and a new beginning,
01:34and that coupled with the mystery that surrounds him.
01:38I mean, he was a very, if you believe in prophecies or not,
01:41he was a very intelligent guy that made his mark on history
01:44because his name's still banding around today, you know, 500 years on.
01:47So we just found a very inspiring story.
01:51And before we knew it, we got a double album.
01:53We didn't really mean to write a double album,
01:55but to tell the story properly, that's what we felt we needed.
01:59It was a bit chaotic this time out.
02:01I mean, I wouldn't say we were totally prepared for that first week of gigs
02:05because we went straight from recording the album to mixing it, to mastering it,
02:09went straight from there to promotion,
02:11and then we went in and straight from there into rehearsals
02:15and probably shortchanged ourselves on rehearsals.
02:17But that's the way we always are.
02:18We need an audience to feed off, so I think people will accept
02:22a few little mistakes on stage.
02:24And the very first show we did,
02:25our stage manager wasn't allowed into the country either,
02:28so that was a lot of fun, you know.
02:30But that's the way it is when you first start the tour.
02:32We haven't been on the road for two years,
02:33two and a half, really.
02:34We've had some close shaves on stage, you know,
02:36lighting trusses, collapsing, things like that without injury.
02:39And in the early days when we got some people working for us
02:42that weren't particularly qualified, you know.
02:45We had a few wing and a prayer dates,
02:47and Rob obviously had accidents bringing the bike on stage
02:50in one or two things.
02:51But we've come through it unscathed.
02:54It's always difficult to please everybody
02:56because everybody's got their own favourite Priest song,
02:58but I think, you know, tonight's set should satisfy
03:00most Priest fans.
