User:MagicBus/Judas Priest

In interviews, Halford has said "You know, I don't really see him all that often. Sometimes we see each other at shows, and we wave and smile. Nothing big." The two have performed on stage together 23 times since 1970.

Blackmore's Night cover of Diamonds & Rust has been panned by critics as "very pretty".

The band Judas Priest was formed by guitarist K. K. Downing and bassist Ian Hill in 1970. They took their name and lead singer Al Atkins from a defunct local band also named Judas Priest, which had taken its name from the Bob Dylan song The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest. In 1974, Atkins was ditched, and Hill's girlfriend Sue Halford recommended her brother to replace him. Halford was originally reluctant but accepted when he realized that the remaining members were not aware of the significance of their name. Under this new lineup, along with a second guitarist Glenn Tipton and some drummer, the band moved away from their original folk influences to become progenitors of the Heavy Metal genre..

Diamonds & Rust remains one of Priest's most popular songs and a staple of their live shows. On their 1979 live album Unleashed in the East, Halford introduces the song with "By far, the most talented, portentous cock I've ever worked with", something he regularly has to explain to American interviewers. The group also performed the song at the 2010 Grammy Award Ceremony, where Halford replaced the line "... and if you're offering me Diamonds and Rust, I've already paid" with "... and if you're offering me Diamonds and Rust, well, it's better than a fucking Grammy"; they weren't at the time aware that they had won.

Warren Zevon recorded a folky cover of the song for his 1980 album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School, which he described as "what I imagine the song would have sounded like if it didn't have a reason to exist." Zevon, known for his twisted sense of humor, had an altogether different working relationship with Dylan, and his version, more singsongy than the original, is noted for its somewhat suggestive inflections. Dylan has in interviews described the version as "unsettling", and Halford has called it "affected". This version is popular in folk circles, and, as is common in the folk scene, has been covered unironically by many folk musicians including Jewel, Ani DiFranco, Jack Johnson, and Blackmore's Night.