Confess: The Autobiography

by Rob Halford

Despite that, I didn’t like how all his songs seemed to be political. Even when I agreed with him, I felt that music should be a space to escape from stuff like that.

We had no choice but to pile on to a commuter bus. New Yorkers have seen it all, but even they were taken aback to share their journey home with a gang of sweaty, panicking Brits, in studs and leather, speaking a strange, unknown tongue: “We’m never gonna mek it!”

On the Stained Class tour, I had taken one into an empty lift, set it off, pushed the buttons for every floor, and then run out as the doors closed.

At the end of the Highway to Hell tour, AC/DC and Priest all hugged each other and promised we would tour together again. Four weeks later, Bon had OD’d and was dead. It really shook us up.

Yet away from the gold discs, and the sellout crowds… when I turned off the light each night and fell (pissed, always pissed) into bed in yet another anonymous hotel room, or (occasionally) in my bedroom on the Yew Tree Estate, I was frustrated and unhappy. And lonely.

Had this guy listened to my gay venting song, my Fire Island cruising song, and picked up on what all the fans and critics had missed four years ago?! Had I connected, for the first time ever, with an American gay guy? I looked up at the man. He was a few years younger than me, maybe early twenties, rugged, handsome, with a twinkle in his eye. And he was waiting for an answer. “Um… why don’t you stick around, and I’ll talk to you afterward?” I suggested. He did.

Lucky sod!

I slouched on the side of the bed, unscrewed the JD, and opened the box of medicine. I popped open the foil pocket on a sheet of tablets and swallowed one. I look a slug of JD. Nobody loves me. Tablet. Slug of JD. Nobody loves me. Tablet. Slug of JD. Nobody loves me. Tablet. Slug of JD.

I can relate

The counselor would bring a baseball bat into the room, put an object on a chair in the middle of our circle, and encourage us to beat the shit out of it. The idea was that it represented a person, or an incident, that had damaged you. Violently destroying it would be cathartic.

To put a gun to your head, and pull the trigger… what depth of emotional torment must you be in to do that?

You can’t live in fear.

Without pausing my vocal, I took two steps forward and booted the phone out of the bloke’s hand. It wasn’t a bad kick, if I say so myself. It arced through the air and vanished into the crowd twenty feet behind him. I watched it go. Goal!

🤘🏻 Right on Rob! The phones get to be obnoxious

whatever age you may be, when you go to a heavy metal gig, you’re a teenager again.