Former Judas Priest guitarist K.K. Downing has released a new version of the band’s “Never Satisfied,” which you can listen to below.
The song, which also features former Priest vocalist Tim “Ripper” Owens, originally appeared on the Birmingham heavy metal legends’ 1974 debut, Rocka Rolla, but its history goes back even further than that. “We just had fun in a spare bedroom, trying to create something different,” Downing tells UCR, recalling the experience of co-writing the song with the band’s original lead vocalist, Al Atkins. “We wrote quite a lot of stuff and then we went on the road. In my memory, ‘Never Satisfied’ was always in the set. When Al left and Rob [Halford] joined, then we were on the road for at least a couple of years. We had the song in the set [at that time] with Rob singing it as well.”
Last year’s 50th anniversary reissue of Rocka Rolla, which featured a full remix of the entire album, brought the Judas Priest cofounder back to the music and the idea of recording a fresh version of “Never Satisfied” emerged organically. “I thought, ‘I’m just going to plug the guitar in and have a go at jamming along to a couple of these songs,'” he remembers. “I just had fun doing it and I thought I would put the track down and ask Ripper if he’d do the courtesy of throwing a vocal on there. It came about really quickly and it was fun.”
For Owens, he appreciates the “different vibe” of Rocka Rolla as an album, captured at a time when there were a lot of different elements, including progressive music and blues helping to form the sound they were putting down on record. “It’s really cool,” he confirms to UCR in a separate interview, noting that he wanted to honor the spirit of how “Never Satisfied” was originally recorded. “It’s me singing it, but staying true to the melodies. I changed a little bit, added a little bit of rasp [and] some high notes.”
He hopes that it will lead to more. “I said, ‘Ken, let’s record the whole damn thing. I don’t care, let’s have fun,'” he laughs. “You want to do ‘Rocka Rolla,’ okay. ‘Run of the Mill’ [would be fun]. I’ve always wanted to do ‘Cheater,’ beause I felt the guitar with more balls [would be good]. I think he’s just having some fun and there’ll be some more coming, I hope.”
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As fans will know, Rocka Rolla and its follow-up, 1976’s Sad Wings of Destiny were outside of the band’s control for decades. In 2022, Gull Records, the original record label, sold the masters and publishing to Reach Music and Exciter Records, in partnership with Judas Priest. Appropriately, the group’s longtime producer, Tom Allom, subsequently oversaw the remix of Rocka Rolla and is presently working on a similar 50th anniversary remix for Sad Wings of Destiny.
Downing, like the rest of the members of the group, is happy to be reunited with these formative pieces of his past work. “We’re all so pleased now to feel that the albums have come home to us,” he says. “Now I think it’s time to catch up a little bit and re-record some of these songs. I said to the guys, ‘Obviously, you’ve totally kept the integrity of the original recordings with the new mixes and masters, but let me just plug in the guitar. [I want to] just put it down and do it how I would if I was going out on the road [with KK’s Priest] and that may well happen.”
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Listen to K.K. Downing and Tim “Ripper” Owens’ ‘Never Satisfied’
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Gallery Credit: Martin Kielty
