In a new interview with Mike Hsu of Boston’s WAAF, Heavy Metal legend Rob Halford said that Judas Priest will begin writing their new album early in 2020. The band will be following the world-wide smash hit album and acclaimed by the music press Firepower (Epic Records). Speaking about his plans for the upcoming year, Rob said (hear audio below): “I’ll be heading back to the U.K. for the holidays, see my family and friends. And then we’re gonna start… There are two things happening. We’re gonna go into writing sessions in the early New Year, because we’re still buzzing from the ‘Firepower’ record and we’re raring to go, to see what else what we can come up with musically, through writing. So we’ve got that in planning. And then we go into the big production for the 50th anniversary [of JUDAS PRIEST], which, I believe, kicks off in Finland in June, I think it is. And then that’s it there. We’re off around the world for the rest of 2020 and some of 2021, celebrating 50 years of JUDAS PRIEST.”

This past October, Halford told Consequence Of Sound that Priest guitarist Glenn Tipton has spent the last few months compiling ideas for the band’s next record.

“Glenn is always noodling away, even though he doesn’t tour that much now,” the singer said. “He’s always noodling away in the studio in the U.K. He’s always putting riffs down. We have vaults of so many rifts. It’s just incredible. So it all starts with the riff, mostly, in what we do. We start with the riff and a melody, some hooks and we build it, as most bands do. ‘Firepower’ is going to be quite difficult to top, but we’ll do everything we can to cut another great record and that’ll happen at some point.”

Tipton announced his retirement from touring in February 2018 after revealing his unfortunate diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease. He passed on the torch to the producer of the Firepower album, Andy Sneap.

Judas Priest will spend part of 2020 on their 50 Years of Heavy Metal tour of headline dates and festivals, including a European tour opening for Ozzy Osbourne on his rescheduled No More Tours 2 tour. The band is currently nominated for the upcoming class for the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame.