Rob Halford Grants Dying Judas Priest Fan’s Final Wish

In interviews, Rob Halford has often displayed a sense of humanity that runs contrary to his onstage persona of the self-proclaimed "Metal God." On a recent episode of VH1 Classic's new Rock Icons show, the Judas Priest frontman broke down as he told a story of a conversation he had with a fan who was dying of cancer.

The final segment of the episode (embedded above) centers on the bonds that Halford has made with his fans over the years. Beginning at the 17:25 mark, he becomes overwhelmed with emotion as he tells the following story. "You'll hear many, many, many stories of how metal music has helped people through difficulties in life," he says. "I don't know whether this is the right time to say this — we may have to cut this out — but just recently I was contacted by someone to speak to somebody that was about to pass from cancer. So I was able to speak to him, and he was really, really weak, but he was saying that he was a huge Priest fan and that that side of his life was so important to him, that metal was a really, really important way that he got through this horrible cancer that was eating him away."

The conversation between Halford and the fan was set up by Eddie Trunk. As Trunk wrote on his website, "This happened about a year ago [...] I was asked by a friend who works at SiriusXM if I would reach out to Rob. It was his best friend who was a huge Priest fan and sadly had days to live. A call from Halford was something he could have only dreamed about [...] I reached out to Rob and told him about it. I didn’t want to put him on the spot and knew how incredibly difficult it would be for him to call someone he didn’t know at all who was dying, so I didn’t pressure at all and just told him the story. Rob said to me to set a date and time and to send him the number and he would call. Sure enough at the appointed day and time Rob called this man in the hospital and had a nice chat with him [...] Sadly he lost his battle with cancer a few days later."

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