Judas Priest frontman Rob Halford got married to his longtime partner, Thomas Pence, in 2024, and in a new interview he shares that it’s something he’s been wanting to do for years.
During part two of Halford’s appearance on Jake Shear’s Queer the Music podcast, Halford reveals that he would often ask Thomas to get married but would always get turned down. It wasn’t until Thomas asked that they finally wed.
“I stopped asking … just sort of, ‘Let’s get married.’ ‘No, I don’t wanna get married.’ ‘Oh, let’s just get married. We’ve been together forever.’ ‘No, I don’t wanna get married,"” Halford says of his proposals. “And then suddenly on one of our night walks, he goes, ‘I think we should get married."” Halford says after that he went “straight home” and called a pastor.
As for the wedding itself, Halford says, “It was obviously me and him and an officiant, as they call them, who are legalized to marry people,” noting they were also joined by their friend Jim Silvia, who is Judas Priest’s tour manager, and his wife.
“There was just four of us around the pool, around the cactus, the heavy metal cactus,” he says. “And it was over in an instant. But it was just a beautiful, simple ceremony.”
Halford says it’s up to people to decide for themselves whether marriage is important, but for him and his husband, it’s “just a nice thing.”
“It seems like you’ve completed something in your relationship, more than anything else,” he says. “The commitment goes to another level when you get married. It’s a great thing to do. And if it doesn’t work, that’s life. But I think after being together for 35 years, it’s working.”
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