There is no doubt that Slayer was instrumental in creating the thrash metal scene in the 80’s, along with Metallica and the Bay Area bands Exodus and Testament. In their 3 decade long career they have gone on to influence so many bands, in and out of the scene. I’ve seen Slayer play live a couple of times, as it is truly a rite of passage for metalheads, and have my favorite line up (see below) but I don’t own any of their albums*. So as a respectful but casual fan, I found this book to be interesting but a bit of a slog.
Joel McIver is a music journalist and uber fan. This book is exhaustively researched and must have required hundreds of hours of interviews. These direct and often candid quotes were one of the enjoyable parts of the book. The history of the scene and it’s growth especially held my interest, particularly Brian Slagel’s fan zine and eventual formation of Metal Blade Records. One of the things I that excites me about metal and punk of the day was
the whole DIY ethic, and not just in the bands themselves but amongst the fans as well.
But I digress. This book covers a little of the core bands early life, the inception of the band and their career up to 2008-ish, before the death of Jeff Hanneman. Where the book lost me were the long passages where McIver extolls his favorite songs/albums/riffs etc. Entire chapters of how and why this song was better and that one was shitty. It’s great he has his own opinion about stuff but wow, after a while it just sounded like the drunk guy in the back at the show belligerently restating his point over and over and over again. Also, towards the end, the book was more like The Kerry Fucking King Show and that got a bit old for me. For the true diehard fan, though, I’m sure it will be just the ticket.
*while I don’t own any Slayer, my husband has the entire catalogue so I have heard plenty and even enjoyed going back and listening to Reign in Blood, South of Heaven and God Hates Us All while reading this.
