Judas Prit's Rob Halford looks back on g out as gay on MTV

Contents:

• WHY THE ONLY OPENLY GAY HEAVY METAL SUPERSTAR, JUDAS PRIT'S ROB HALFORD, HID HIS SEXUALY
• ROB HALFORD LOOKS BACK ON G OUT AS GAY ON MTV: “IT’S A GLOR MOMENT”
• JUDAS PRIT ALWAYS KNEW ROB HALFORD WAS GAY, EX-MEMBER SPILLS

WHY THE ONLY OPENLY GAY HEAVY METAL SUPERSTAR, JUDAS PRIT'S ROB HALFORD, HID HIS SEXUALY

Judas Prit ontman Rob Halford has always lived a loud and proud heavy metal life, but only 1998 durg an MTV terview did he bee the first metal in to announce he is gay. “I thk that every gay person has a bigger story to tell than jt, 'Hello, I'm out, 's me, '” Halford, who turned 69 last month, told me a phone terview ahead of the book’s publitn on Tuday. He wanted to sce Iron Main sger Pl Di’Anno, and he sported bandanas onstage that were a lor-d ve to gay amid the lorful stori are darker moments, both terms of dtry algs and pecially keepg himself closeted for so long.

Halford was born 1951, and homosexualy was illegal the U. While a few mastream metal ontwomen like Otep and Lzzy Hale have been open recent years about beg gay or bisexual, Halford remas the only major gay male metal fans are often attracted to the aggrsive and theraptic nature of the genre — ’s a great way to let out pent-up tratn and feel empowered — and many skew more to the right than some of their ins.

Wh Rob out of the closet, the band’s leather biker athetic took on an explicly gay dimensn, g shocked fans to claim that they had no ia. But there’s much more nuance to the way which Judas Prit’s songs are about queerns; ias that go far beyond the not-so-subtle nods towards gay sex. Even one of Prit’s most ‘obvly queer’ songs, Hell Bent For Leather, had this extra dimensn to l like ‘Seek him here, seek him on the highway / Never knowg when he’ll appear’ evoke cisg, and beg followed directly by ‘Hear the roar as they sense the fear’ brgs to md the dangero anticipatn of lookg for love as a gay man the 1980s.

ROB HALFORD LOOKS BACK ON G OUT AS GAY ON MTV: “IT’S A GLOR MOMENT”

Beg ught has a specific ronance when nsirg the fact that, spe of the Sexual Offenc Act of 1967 crimalisg gay sex to an extent, liberatn was a long way off. Defenrs Of The Fah self was released agast a backdrop of anti-homosexual Conservative ernment rhetoric, wh Prime Mister Margaret Thatcher argug agast the fact that people have an “alienable right to be gay” her 1987 nference speech.

In fact, one of the strongt queer elements of Defenrs Of The Fah is the qut for a kd of personal liberatn; as if what’s beg fend is the right to be gay as much as anythg else. Judas Prit‘s Rob Halford has marked Pri month by reflectg on the moment he me out as gay on televisn.

JUDAS PRIT ALWAYS KNEW ROB HALFORD WAS GAY, EX-MEMBER SPILLS

“And I said somethg to the effect of, ‘Well, speakg as a gay man, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It was one of those gay sharp tak, ‘Oh my God, he’s e out. I thk if I’d…I still say today, if I’d have really thought this through, like today’s the day I’m gog to e out, maybe I even wouldn’t… maybe I may not have e out per se, bee ’s still a big moment for so many of , wh a close iend, wh someone at school, wh Mum and Dad, wh whomever, to actually say, ‘Hey, I’m a gay guy or I’m a gay girl.