Last year marked 50 years since Judas Priest ushered in a new era of British heavy metal. With hits like “Breaking the Law” and “You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’,” the band has undeniably left their mark on the genre. The current lineup consists of lead singer Rob Halford, bassist Ian Hill, guitarists Richie Faulkner and Glenn Tipton, and drummer Scott Travis. With Tipton already taking a step back from touring due to Parkinson’s disease, Faulkner recently revealed he is still contending with the aftereffects of a 2021 stroke.
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Richie Faulkner Collapsed Onstage During a Judas Priest Show
Richie Faulkner was in the middle of an epic “Painkiller” solo during Judas Priest’s Louder Than Life 2021 performance in Kentucky when his aorta ruptured.
With blood spilling into his chest cavity, Faulkner, now 45, was rushed to the University of Louisville’s Rudd Heart & Lung Center nearby. There, he would undergo emergency open heart surgery for the next 10 and a half hours. The London-born guitarist later learned he had suffered an aortic aneurysm and complete aortic dissection—a combination that is often fatal.
Richie Faulkner Reveals Ongoing Health Struggles: “I Felt Like a Fraud”
About a month after his operation, Faulkner tells Premier Guitar that he was back in the hospital with what he thought was a transient ischaemic attack, or a mini-stroke. That led to a second TIA a year later, followed by yet another heart surgery.
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By this point, Richie Faulkner had returned to the road with the rest of Judas Priest. However, something was definitely off. After even further testing, he learned that what he had experienced wasn’t just a mini-stroke.
“They said that the fact that it hasn’t gone away means that it’s not a TIA; it’s a stroke,” Faulkner said. “TIA damage can go away. Stroke—that’s it; it’s damaged. You got damage in your brain now.”
While Faulkner was still able to play, he feared the quality would fall short of what Judas Priest fans have come to expect.
“I felt that, in a band like Priest it’s got to be world-class stuff, and I don’t feel world-class,” he confessed. “I went out there every night, I feel like a fraud because people don’t know — maybe. But one day they’re gonna find out. Someone’s gonna find out, someone’s gonna say he’s not playing that the same.”
Featured image by Harmony Gerber/Getty Images
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