They've existed since 1981. The metal community scene has witnessed some of the heaviest, gut-wrenching, mind-bending artists of all time, yet this band's name still has the ability to send chills down the spines of even the most seasoned metal community veterans. Their unabashed ability to speak about everything from murderers, religion, and everything that's wrong with the world has garnered the attention of millions of fans worldwide, millions of albums sold, and countless sold out world tours.
This Tuesday and Wednesday, metal legends Slayer will be taking the stage for two sold-out nights at The Warfield Theater in San Francisco, touring in support of their twelfth-studio album, Repentless. To celebrate this, we've taken a look back at each of Slayer's twelve studio albums. Below you'll find facts about the recording process, differences between each record, and much more.
Show No Mercy
Release: December 1983
Label: Metal Blade Records
Producer: Brian Slagel
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Dave Lombardo - drums
Slayer's first studio album, and our first introduction to the metal behemoth that would soon reign supreme over the thrash community. The album was self-funded by both Tom Araya (who was working at the time as a respiratory therapist), and a loan from guitarist Kerry King's father. A straight up thrash metal release, it was just a taste of what was to come from the band. It was recorded in Los Angeles, and released through Metal Blade Records after label founder Brian Slagel saw the band perform several covers at a show in the Los Angeles area. According to Slagel, the album has sold at least 15,000-20,000 copies in the U.S,, and 15,000 overseas since its release. The music and lyrics were primarily written by Jeff Hanneman and Kerry King, a pattern that would follow on every future Slayer record. The band's controversy had already begun to follow them as well; due to the imagery on the album cover and the lyrical content, the band received mail from the Parents Resource Music Center which demanded the band stop releasing their music to the general public. It seems that Slayer's notoriety began all the way with Show No Mercy.
Hell Awaits
Released: 1985
Label: Metal Blade Records
Producer: Brian Slagel
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Dave Lombardo - drums
This time around, the band had a label with some financial support. Rather than going the self-funding route, Brian Slagel and Metal Blade Records financed the band so that they could record Hell Awaits. Having a budget allowed the band to bring in some professional assistance, including Bernie Grandman (who mastered the album) and Bill Metoyer (who engineered the album). Lyrical themes abound on Hell Awaits referred to none other than Hell and Satan. The intro track to the record, if played in reverse, reveals the phrase "Join Us". But even though the band had a budget, Araya still thought that the record ended up with poor production. Lombardo thought the opposite. To promote the record, the band embarked on a tour with Venom and Exodus. According to Slagel, the album has sold over one million copies worldwide, and at the time, it was hailed as the band's most progressive record thus far.
Reign In Blood
Released: October 1986
Label: Def Jam Recordings
Producer: Rick Rubin
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - vocals/bass
Dave Lombardo - drums
For every artist, no matter how big or small, there is always one album that is a game changer for them. For Slayer, it was Reign In Blood. It was the band's third studio album, the one that brought them to the attention of a mainstream audience, and one of the albums that helped define the sound of the emerging 1980s thrash metal scene. The success of Hell Awaits attracted the attention of several labels and producers, and one of them was none other than Rick Rubin. Jeff Hanneman was surprised by the interest of Rubin, since Rubin worked with Def Jam Recordings, a primarily hip-hop label. After speaking with the band, Slagel stated that Rubin was by far the most passionate of all the label reps that the band were negotiating with. While it was the band's first release on a major label, it was only one of two releases on Def Jam (the second being South of Heaven) as Rubin ended his partnership with Russel Simmons and went on to head American Recordings. It was also one of only two Def Jam titles to be distributed by Geffen through Warner Brothers Records, due to the original distributor's (Columbia Records) refusal to release work by the band. The refusal stemmed from the label's aversion to the controversial lyrics, themes and artwork. It should be noted that while it was eventually released through Geffen, the album never appeared on the label's official release schedule.
The album was recorded and produced in Los Angeles with Rick Rubin, marking his first professional experience with a metal band. His fresh perspective and experience with primarily hip-hop led to a drastic (but necessary) overhaul of the band's sound. They sounded like Slayer, but it was clearer for the listener to understand who they were as a band. The songs were tighter, faster, and the production was cleaner, leading to an album that clocked in at under 30 minutes.
For this record, the band abandoned its usual Satanic themes to write about different topics, including the exploration of death, insanity, murderers, and anti-religion. Perhaps one of the most controversial tracks was the opener, "Angel of Death", a song that talked about the human experiments conducted at the Auschwitz concentration camp during the Holocaust by Josef Mengele, a man dubbed "the Angel of Death" by prison inmates subject to his experiments. This led the band to be accused of supporting Nazism and racism. Hanneman later went on record to talk about how he was actually inspired to write the song after reading several books about the doctor on tour, and he was interested in exploring the topic more. The band used the controversy to generate more publicity as time went on.
Reign In Blood was the band's first album to enter the Billboard 200, peaking at #94 in its sixth week on the charts. In order to support the record, the band toured extensively through the U.S. and Europe to promote the album. Before the tour could even get underway, drummer Dave Lombardo left the band in November 1986. To fill in, the band recruited Whiplash drummer Tony Scaglione. The band toured with Overkill in the United States, Malice in Europe, and was the opener for W.A.S.P. on their U.S. headlining tour. After pleading, Rubin got Lombardo to come back to the band in 1987. However, this would not be the first time that the band would deal with Lombardo departing and returning to the band.
South of Heaven
Released: July 5, 1988
Label: Def Jam Recordings
Producer: Rick Rubin
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Dave Lombardo - drums
The band's fourth studio album, and a clear sign that the band were starting to rebel against what others wanted them to do. South of Heaven was recorded in Los Angeles with Rubin. It was their last album on Def Jam, as Rubin transitioned as head of American Recordings after ending his partnership with Russel Simmons. It was a rebellion against what everyone expected of them in the sense that for this record, the band deliberately slowed down the tempo on the tracks, a stark contrast to their generally fast-paced, aggressive, in your face blast-beat thrashers. The band also incorporated elements such as clean guitars and clean vocals in order to mix things up. It is also the only Slayer studio album to feature a cover of another heavy metal band: "Dissident Aggressor" by Judas Priest. The track was chosen due to its war-themed lyrics. The album peaked at #157 on the Billboard 200, and Kerry King has gone on to state that he felt his performance was lackluster, in addition to the idea that Tom Araya should have screamed more instead of incorporating clean vocals.
Seasons in the Abyss
Released: October 9, 1990
Label: Def American Recordings
Producers: Rick Rubin, Andy Vallace
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Dave Lombardo - drums
The band's fifth studio album. After four successful records and encountering mainstream success, Slayer had seemed to finally hit their stride and know who they were as a band. With that being said, this was the last album of the band to feature Dave Lombardo, until his return on 2006's Christ Illusion.
Seasons In The Abyss was recorded over a period of six months, from January to June 1990 in two different Southern California studios: Hit City West at Hollywood Sound, and the Record Plant in Los Angeles, California. Reception to the album was generally positive, and it peaked at #140 on the Billboard 200.
Upon doing research, I discovered an interesting fact about the recording of track eight, "Temptation". The song features an overdub of Tom Araya singing. When recording, he sang the song twice: the first take was the track that he thought was the best one, while the second take was the way that Kerry King thought it should initially sound. The producer, Andy Vallace, suggested that both tracks should be played simultaneously, after they were accidentally played back at the same time in a session.
Divine Intervention
Released: October 3, 1994
Label: American Recordings
Producers: Rick Rubin, Toby Wright
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Paul Bostaph - drums
It had been four years since the release of Seasons In The Abyss before Slayer brought their sixth studio album, Divine Intervention, to the masses. Things had changed slightly, as it was the first album to not feature Dave Lombardo. The band recruited drummer Paul Bostaph to fill Lombardo's position.
With four years to complete the album, King stated that while a lot of time was spent on the production, he felt that more time should have gone into the mixing and mastering stages of the record. Tom Araya stated that the band had gone into the studio with more written material than in the past, expediting the pre-production process a bit more than usual (three of the songs were already completely written before entering the studio).
Additionally, the marketing team created conflicts between the band and label over the explicit content of the album: themes addressed included the serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer ("213"), criticizing the American criminal justice system for being too lenient to killers ("Dittohead"), and Nazism references ("SS-3"). The album ended up being banned in Germany due to the lyrics and content on "SS-3", "Circle of Beliefs", "Serenity in Murder", "213", and "Mind Control".
Regardless of the ban in Germany, the album sold 93,000 units in its first week and peaked at #8 on the Billboard 200. The artwork for the album was painted and designed by artist Wes Benscoter, as a re-imagining of the band's "Slayergram" logo.
Undisputed Attitude
Released: May 28, 1996
Label: American Recordings
Producers: Rick Rubin, Dave Sardy
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Paul Bostaph - drums
While South of Heaven features the only Slayer cover of a metal band, Undisputed Attitude is an album consisting primarily of punk rock and hardcore punk rock covers of artists that the band claims "made Slayer what it is." There are three original tracks on the record: two of them come from a side project Jeff Hanneman had been working on in 1984/85 entitled Pap Smear ("Ddamn [Drunk Drivers Against Mad Mothers]", "Can't Stand You"). The third original track is the only original Slayer track on the album, entitled "Gemini". The bands covered include Minor Threat, T.S.O.L., D.R.I., D.I., Dr Know, The Stooges, and Verbal Abuse. The album was originally going to consist of covers of bands such as Judas Priest, UFO and Deep Purple, but the band changed their mind and went with the punk route after a series of rehearsals that didn't work out.
Undisputed Attitude was recorded at Capital Studios in Los Angeles with Dave Sardy and Rick Rubin over a period of three to four weeks. The album peaked at #34 on the Billboard 200. While it did well, the band's Minor Threat cover raised certain questions about a possible message of white supremacy. Ian MacKaye, the lead vocalist of Minor Threat, even went as far as to state that he was offended by his own song. Kerry King later clarified that a certain lyric in the track was changed for tongue-in-cheek purposes, and it was made to emphasize how the band thought that racism was "ridiculous".
Diabolus in Musica
Released: June 9, 1998
Label: American Recordings
Producer: Rick Rubin
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Paul Bostaph - drums
Described by Jeff Hanneman as the band's "most experimental album", Diabolus In Musica marked the band's eighth studio album. The album title is a Latin term that means "The Devil In Music. This was a musical interval that was known for its dissonance, which the band played with quite a bit on this record. It allowed the band to experiment with sludgier, murkier, weirder chord structures, leading to more experimentation. It was also the first Slayer album to be played mostly in C# tuning. The album was recorded at Oceanway Studios in Los Angeles, California, exploring themes such as religion, cultural deviance, death, war, homicide, and insanity.
While the album did receive mixed reviews from music critics, it peaked at #31 on the Billboard 200, selling 46,000 copies in its first week. The band toured in support of the record from 1998 ti 1999 with bands such as Sepultura, System of a Down, Fear Factory, Kilgore, Clutch, Meshuggah, and Sick Of It All.
God Hates Us All
Released: September 11, 2001
Label: American Recordings
Producers Rick Rubin, Matt Hyde
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Paul Bostaph - drums
God Hates Us All is perhaps one of the most notoriously-known records in heavy metal, and it's for reasons completely beyond the band's control. The album was released on September 11, 2001, and the band was slated to fly to Europe that evening in order to being a tour. Due to the U.S. terrorist attacks, all flights were cancelled. The title of the album probably didn't help the band's case.
At this point in the band's career, they had opted to continue working with Rick Rubin, but Rubin stated that he felt too burned out to work with Slayer and "create intense music". While the band hired producer Matt Hyde to produce the record after giving him a trial run with the song "Bloodline" for the Dracula 2000 movie soundtrack, Rubin still played a role as an executive producer for the record.
While the band recorded all of their prior records in the Los Angeles area, the band opted to record for three months at The Warehouse Studio in Vancouver, Canada. Ironically, the studio was owned by Canadian pop-star Bryan Adams. In order to make the band "feel more at home", they altered the studio upon arrival. This included placing darker elements around the studio, such as burning candles, incense, pornography, and a flag with two middle fingers on it on the walls.
Pro Tools was used during the engineering, production, and mixing stages of God Hates Us All. However, the band were very adamant about making sure that the computer effects were kept to the bare minimum, using only a small amount of delay and distortion. In terms of guitars, King utilized seven-string guitars on "Warzone" and "Here Comes The Pain". Four songs used guitars that were tuned to drop-B tuning, while the other songs were in C# standard.
Lyrical content explored on this record by King took a different approach and explored topics like religion, murder, revenge, and self-control. Two tracks written by Hanneman, entitled "God Send Death" and "Deviance", talk about the dark subject matter of killing people for pleasure, heavily inspired by serial killers. Hanneman had read several books on serial killers prior to the record, going on record to state that he was writing the songs to try and understand those peoples' mindsets. Tom Araya also spent his free time between sessions reading factual books about serial killers, in order to seek inspiration and sound as authentic as possible on the record, not gimmicky.
The title of the record comes from lyrics in the track "Disciple", which are repeated over and over in the chorus. The lyrics were in reference to God's allowance of such acts as suicide and terrorism. The fact that the album ended up coming out on September 11, 2001 only further emphasized the band's point behind the lyrics. Despite the release date, the album entered the Billboard 200 at #28 and sold 51,000 copies in its first week. The band also received a Grammy Award nomination for "Disciple" as Best Metal Performance.
The original cover of the record showed a Holy Bible spiked with nails placed in the shape of a pentagram, covered in blood, complete with the Slayer logo burned into it. The liner notes featured the lyrics placed between passages from the Book of Job, a section of the Holy Bible. partially crossed out with black marker. King had a much darker concept for the album cover, however; the nails were to be in the shape of a pentagram, but they would miss key words in the Bible so it appeared to the viewer that only a sociopath who knew every word by heart created it. The record label's result didn't work out, and thus the band opted for the original cover we have now. However, in order to be able to sell the album in larger retailers, a new cover had to be created (see above).
Prior to December 2001, Paul Bostaph encountered a chronic elbow injury, hindering his ability to drum and soon after led to his departure from the band. Slayer then contacted Dave Lombardo and asked if he would be opening to helping finish up the remaining 21 shows of the tour. After the tour, the band auditioned many drummers, but to no avail. This led to asking Lombardo to return to Slayer, recording his first material with the band since Seasons in the Abyss.
Christ Illusion
Released: August 8, 2006
Label: American Recordings
Producer: Rick Rubin, Josh Abraham
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Dave Lombardo - drums
With drummer Dave Lombardo back into the picture, and plenty of material to fuel perhaps their most infuriated release, Slayer released in 2006, six years after the terrorist attacks that took place on September 11, 2001. While nine of the tracks were originally demoed in 2004, American Recordings was in the middle of switching distributors from Columbia Records to Warner Bros. Records. Had the band finished an album around that time, it would have been shelved until the distribution deal was officially sorted out in July 2005.
While the album was getting ready to get recording underway, Rick Rubin went into the studio with Metallica instead of Slayer to work on Death Magnetic. The band hired Josh Abraham to be the producer instead of Rubin, with Rubin staying on as an executive producer. Kerry King was critical of Rubin's involvement on Christ Illusion. He couldn't recall his presence in the studio, and stated that his main contribution was providing a few suggestions to the final mix. The album was recorded via computer between two different studios: NRG Studios in North Hollywood with assistant engineer Dave Colvin, and Westlake Studios in Los Angeles with assistant Brian Warwick.
For the recording process, all the rhythm guitar tracks were laid down by Kerry King, as on the previous two records. King used a Marshall JCM 800 as the main guitar sound throughout the record, and he wrote roughly eighty percent of his guitar solos prior to the band's sessions. This was also the first time since Divine Intervention that the band had recorded songs in D#.
Ten tracks made it onto the final album, but eleven were originally being considered. The eleventh was a track called "Final Six", penned by Hanneman, and revealed at the time by Araya to the be the album title to George Stroumboulopoulos of CBS' The Hour. Before recording the track, Araya took a weekend off for vacation, but ended up having to have emergency gall bladder surgery the following Monday. Because of this, he was unable to finish his vocals for the track on time for the release.
Christ Illusion came with a fair share of controversy. For starters, the lyrical themes surrounded terrorism, warfare, and religion. The United States was living in a post-9/11, war-torn, Bush-administration America, so it only made sense that the lyrics would deal with themes such as these. The track "Jihad" generated controversy as it talked about the 9/11 attacks from the perspective of a terrorist. This track alone enraged a Mumbai-based Christian group known as the Catholic Secular Forum. They demanded a recall of the album, which led to all stock of the album being recalled and destroyed by EMI India. "Eyes of the Insane" is a portrayal of a soldier's experience with PTSD. "Consfearacy" has been described as a government-hate song. "Cult" was based on King's perception of flaws in American religion.
To top it off, the album artwork generated outrage from many. It was constructed by longtime Slayer artwork collaborator Larry Carroll, depicting a mutilated, stoned Jesus Christ. The band described to Carroll that they wanted a photo of Christ in some type of "sea of despair". The final rendering can be seen above, and it pissed a lot of people off. Namely, the city Fullerton, California, whose city officials demanded that the artwork be removed. They felt the band's name was likened to a murderer, and they took great offense to the antichrist and skull logos that adorned the benches around the city. The advertisements for the album were eventually removed, but some remained on benches around the Orange County area.
Despite artwork and lyrical controversy, the album sold 62,000 copies in its first week and entered the Billboard 200 at #5. The band ended up winning a Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance for "Eyes of the Insane", and another for "Final Six" (which was eventually released at a later date).
World Painted Blood
Released: November 2, 2009
Label: American Recordings
Producers: Rick Rubin, Greg Fidelman
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Jeff Hanneman - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Dave Lombardo - drums
World Painted Blood is a bittersweet release in Slayer's catalogue. While it received great critical reception from both critics and fans, it would be the last album to ever feature the band's original lineup. Dave Lombardo was fired a few years after the release of the record, and Jeff Hanneman would pass away in 2013 due to liver failure. Regardless, Slayer hits hard with their eleventh studio record.
The album was recorded in Los Angeles in October 2008, and then again in January and March 2009. It was the first time the band had entered the studio to write rather than having material already prepared. Lombardo went on to state that he loved how Hanneman's writing started to go back to "this great punk energy". Lyrical themes dealt with death, destruction, serial killers, war, and the apocalypse, so there was nothing too new here. "Public Display of Dismemberment" dealt with the consequences that countries outside of the United States gave to citizens for their crimes. "Playing With Dolls" was about a child witnessing a serial killer, while "Beauty Through Order" was about Elizabeth Bathory, the most prolific female serial killer.
The album was the last release on Rick Rubin's American Recordings. It went on to sell 41,000 copies in its first week, and it peaked at #12 on the Billboard 200. "World Painted Blood" and "Hate Worldwide" were both nominated for Best Metal Performance at the Grammy Awards over the next two years.
Repentless
Released: September 11, 2015
Label: Nuclear Blast
Producer: Terry Date
Lineup:
Kerry King - guitar
Gary Holt - guitar
Tom Araya - bass/vocals
Paul Bostaph - drums
The first new Slayer album since 2009 brought about some changes for the band's camp. Jeff Hanneman had passed away in 2013 due to liver failure, making it the first record without his recording presence. The band had fired Dave Lombardo due to contractual issues earlier on. The band was no longer working with Rick Rubin, their longtime producer, and had to find a new person to take on the role.
After careful consideration as to who could fill in for Hanneman on tour and on the record, and with a blessing from Hanneman himself, longtime friend Gary Holt of Exodus stepped up. He recorded some of the material on the album, with King recording the majority. Holt had no part in the writing process, and it is undecided at this time if he ever will on a future Slayer release. Former drummer Paul Bostaph returned to the band and took Lombardo's place behind the kit. Finally, the band decided to recruit Terry Date to produce the new record.
Prior to his death, Hanneman had submitted two songs to the band. The first was an outtake from "World Painted Blood". The second track, entitled "Piano Wire", ended up on the album. It is the last Slayer track to date that was penned by Jeff Hanneman and recorded for a Slayer release.
For the writing process on this record, Kerry King took over the writing, with the exception of "Piano Wire" (Hanneman's track) and "Atrocity Vendor", which was written in collaboration with Tom Araya.
With this being the band's first release on Nuclear Blast, Slayer sold 49,000 copies in Repentless's first week, charting at #4 on the Billboard 200. The band have been touring extensively in support of the record, with their current tour featuring opening slots from Testament and Carcass.
Regardless of what you think of them, Slayer are a major force to be reckoned with not just within the metal community, but within the music industry. This is a band that has stood the test of time, earned itself a spot among the Big Four (alongside Metallica, Anthrax, and Megadeth), and is continually releasing new music and pushing the boundaries of thrash metal. It's only a matter of time before we're graced with album number thirteen, a release that I can guarantee will showcase what Slayer does best: create pulsating, heavy thrash metal that generates controversy in the most stunning ways possible.
For more information, music, and tour dates from Slayer, visit www.slayer.net.
This has been another Shameless Promotion.