Scott Travis's Drum Setup on Judas Priest's Angel of Retribution (2005) | MetalForge

Frequently Asked Questions

What drum kit did Scott Travis use on Angel of Retribution?

For the 2005 Angel of Retribution sessions, Scott Travis played a Pearl Reference Series kit — Pearl's flagship hybrid-shell line that combines maple, birch, and mahogany plies tuned per drum. The configuration featured dual 22 inch by 18 inch bass drums, 10 and 12 inch rack toms, and 14 and 16 inch floor toms. A Pearl Masters MCX served as an all-maple alternate on some tracking dates. This rig represented a clear transition away from the Tama Artstar II setup he used on 1990's Painkiller and toward the modern Priest sound that would carry through Nostradamus and into the Firepower era.

Why did Scott Travis switch from Tama to Pearl by 2005?

Travis moved into the Pearl camp in the early-to-mid 2000s as part of an endorsement shift. The Pearl Reference Series, introduced in 2004, was Pearl's most ambitious shell design at the time — its hybrid construction tunes each drum for its role rather than using a single shell material throughout. For a drummer whose work spans the speed-metal extremes of Painkiller and the song-oriented material on Angel of Retribution, that flexibility was a meaningful upgrade. Travis would later transition back toward Tama by the Firepower era, but the mid-2000s through early 2010s are firmly his Pearl years.

What cymbals did Scott Travis use on Angel of Retribution?

Travis has been a long-running Sabian endorser, and his 2005 setup combined the hand-hammered HH series with the machine-hammered AA line. The rig included 14 inch HH Regular Hi-Hats, AA Medium Crashes from 16 to 20 inches, an HH 19 inch Thin Crash for darker accents, a 22 inch HH Raw Bell Dry Ride, and a 20 inch AA Chinese for trashy accents on tracks like Hellrider and the Lochness section of the closing epic. The HH/AA hybrid approach gave him both vintage warmth and modern cut.

How does Angel of Retribution fit between Painkiller and Firepower in Scott Travis's career?

Angel of Retribution closes a 15-year arc gap on the Judas Priest timeline: Painkiller in 1990, Angel of Retribution in 2005, Nostradamus in 2008, and Firepower in 2018. For Travis specifically, it's the album where he stops being purely the speed-metal phenom of Painkiller and becomes the long-arc Priest drummer. The Pearl Reference kit, the Sabian HH/AA hybrid setup, and the more restrained song-serving approach all point toward the mature drumming he'd bring to the band's later work. It's also Rob Halford's first studio album back with Judas Priest after a 13-year departure, making it as much a comeback record for the band as a transition record for Travis's gear.

What is significant about the 'Eulogy/Lochness' track for drum performance?

Eulogy/Lochness is a 13-minute closing epic that gives Travis more long-form space than almost any other Priest track. Eulogy opens as a slow, brooding ballad with minimal kit work, then Lochness detonates into a doom-paced epic that builds through tom pulses, china accents, and a climactic double-kick section. It's drumming as long-form arrangement, and it foreshadows the orchestral ambitions Priest would pursue on 2008's Nostradamus. For a 2005 reunion record that needed to prove the band still had reach, it's the showcase track.