Ex-Judas Priest Guitarist K.K. Downing to Perform Live for First Time in Ten Years with Ross the Boss (ex-Manowar)

The past few years have brought sad times for the legendary Judas Priest guitar duo of K.K. Downing and Glenn Tipton. Downing quit Priest in 2011 and has remained mostly quiet since, save some sour grapes he aired publicly when he bemoaned the fact that Priest didn’t invite him back to fill in for Tipton, who himself had to step down from touring last year due to Parkinson’s Disease. The whole situation is just shitty all around, even if the pair’s replacement, Richie Faulkner and Andy Sneap, are more than serviceable.

Good news for fans of Downing today: the pioneering axeman will join Ross the Boss (ex-Manowar) for a few songs on stage at this year’s Bloodstock Open Air festival, set to take place on August 11th, almost ten years since he last performed on stage with Priest (October 17th, 2009).

K.K. offered the following on the collaboration:

“I’m really delighted and really looking forward to sharing the stage with Ross The Boss and saying hello to all our fans together. For me, as you know, it’s been far too long, so I sincerely hope to see as many familiar faces as possible at this truly unique event. True metal for true metal fans at the UK’s truest metal festival. United we stand!”

Mr. The Boss and his band are equally excited:

“We the Ross The Boss Band are SO FUCKING EXCITED and honoured to have KK Downing, an immortal Metal legend, joining us onstage in front of some of the greatest metal fans in the world at BLOODSTOCK UK”

So that should be neat, although I’d imagine Downing will be feeling some serious jitters prior to taking the stage after laying idle for so long. If any MetalSucks readers are gong to Bloodstock, please send us some cell phone footage of Downing’s cameo.