Beyond Fear

Although he deputized as well as anyone could have expected for the absent Rob Halford on two late-'90s Judas Priest albums, vocalist Tim "Ripper" Owens was quite brusquely discarded when the metal gods' reunion plans started falling into place circa 2003. And though his unlikely rags-to-riches story (he'd been plucked from a Priest cover band in the depths of Ohio) had even inspired a terribly kitschy (and not all that accurate) motion picture in the Mark Wahlberg-starring Rock Star, chances were slim that anyone would stick around for the "...and back to rags" portion of Rip...