¶ Intro / Opening
🎵 Music
¶ Welcome and Episode Preview
What's up, Debating Metal Heads? Welcome back for another episode of Debating Metal with me, Kenneth Dean, the Dean of Metal, and my co-host Chris K. This week we're going a little south of heaven and into the abyss as we give you our take on Slayer's greatest hit.
Kenneth and I will pick fifteen of our favorite Slayer songs, creating our own greatest hits. Then we're gonna go head to head to determine which of these songs makes it onto our ultimate greatest hits compilation.
We've done Metallica, Megadeth, and most recently Anthrax, so we're finishing off the Big Four with Slayer, which might prove to be the most difficult yet. I'll also have another rusty metal pick for you as usual and this one goes back thirty six years but still kicks ass today.
Then I have my freshly forged pick of the week where I offer my opinion on a new release I think you should get in. You'll want to stick around until the end to hear which albums we chose.
And if you missed what we picked or want to check out any of our other previous shows, download us on your favorite podcast platform and click subscribe so you can get our newest episode every week.
We also want to interact with you guys and read your opinions, so if you like what we had to say or just want to rip us a new one, send us an email to debatingmetal at gmail.com or DM us on our Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter. Pretty soon we'll be posting our episodes to YouTube, so keep a lookout for that. It there's been a bit little bit of a delay on that, but we'll definitely have them up soon.
And while you're on our social media pages, be sure to check out Kenneth Dean with Rusty Metal Plus, where he gives you more details about his Rusty Metal Pick. So Kenneth, what is your rusty metal pick this week?
¶ Rusty Metal: Celtic Frost's Emperor's Return
Alright, like I said, this week we go back thirty six years to nineteen eighty five and I'm picking another EP and this EP is Celtic Frost Emperor's Return. Um it was released on Noise Records in Europe, Enigma Metal Blade in the United States. It was produced by Horst Muller, Rick Litz, Tom Warrior, Martin Ain, and Carl Walterbach.
Or Walterbach, however you want to say his last name. It was recorded at I want to say this at Kayette Studios in Berlin, Germany, and Line in recording studios in Zurich, Switzerland. This EP was my first taste of Celtic frost. Now Growing up in the New York area like I did, we didn't call it Celtic Frost. Um We were so used to playing the Boston Celtics that we always called them Celtic Frost.
Uh but it took years for me to get used to calling them Celtic Frost. And I know that's how you pronounce the band'cause I've heard them say it. You know, when you're an eighteen year old, fifteen year old kid, you don't give a shit what they tell you. You just say Celtic frost.
Ha ha ha.
Um, and I fell in love with the riffs. Um, the sound, the clean and powerful production that that that this EP had. It was incredible. The bass was so deep and and it was so in your face, but yet it was so clean. that it it you know, there was only three instruments and and Tom singing. So everything just cut right through the and the mixing was so good. These these EPs uh the early Celtic frost stuff was really recorded well. And so it it comes across so so good and so
powerful that it it's it's hard to argue with, you know, how good this stuff really sounded back in nineteen eighty four or nineteen eighty five. I in comparison to the stuff when
Hell Hammer did apocalyptic raids. I mean, those were demos and this was just high end production for that time period. So it was really cool. So it that is one of the first things that really sucked me into the C P. Um, the EP contains five songs: Circle of the Tyrants, Dethroned Emperor, Morbid Tales, Visual Aggression, and Suicidal Wind.
And the EP combined with m the Morbid Tails EP that came out the year before established Celtic Frost as players in the European thrash scene. And what ended up getting them into the or not getting them into it, but what attracted people that that would eventually form the black metal community was how Celtic Frost's um publicity photos were so bleak, they just wore black
They just were very sad looking all the time and and you know, their hair straight down. It was I mean early, early black metal type promotional material and to the point where even Tom G. Warrior sometimes would wear corpse paint. Um so he was one of the early adopters of that, but yet they weren't playing uh black metal
they were playing their form of thrash metal, which would eventually become like very avant garde. That's eventually what the genre was called for their kind of music was avant garde metal. But essentially it was a combination of Several different things, but it was you know very heady musical, you know, space kind of sounds combined with the thrash and combined with the the hard and heavy metal stuff that's out there. And so it it they made their own
way about them. So that was one of the things that was really cool about Celtic Frost, but at this time, eighty four, eighty five, eighty six, eighty seven, they were just straight up thrash for the most part. Um the artwork on the album is very typical of the time, of the era. Uh it has, you know, a beast on the front and he's surrounded with scantily clad women in Uh and I wouldn't even say scantily clad. It was you know, they're they're basically naked with a couple of you know,
lingerie strings around th their parts. So it's really a a weird cover, but, you know, when you're a fourteen, thirteen year old kid, like this is cool stuff.
Yeah.
Um and you just want to kind of get every band to do that, you know, sort of like uh uh was it was the other band? Witchfinder General that had cool covers. But um anyhow, the band would end up remastering this EP along with the Morbid Tails EP from the year before, and they combined it into one package in nineteen ninety-nine and remastered it, and then again they remastered it. kept a combination package in two in twenty seventeen.
Um
And finally, the Emperor's Return contains some of their most popular songs, such as Circle of the Tyrants, Morbid Tales, and Dethroned Empire. and all of which have been covered countless times by heavy metal bands, um, and black metal bands and some of the most popular being um Anthrax, they did a cover of Dethroned Emperor, uh, and from the Morbid Tales EP
Sepulture did a cover of Procreation of the Wicked. So you know, some big names have done some covers there of their songs, so that's pretty Um the album is still available on streaming or the s the EP. You can still stream it on Spotify and all the other streaming networks. And it is still available for purchase out there, so get it if you can. It's really cool. You'll enjoy it.
Awesome. Yeah, I'm I'm a fan of that era of uh of the band, so I definitely uh will give that another listen.
¶ Freshly Forged: Hannes Grossmann Solo Album
Alright, so my freshly forged this week actually Somewhat relates to yours in that um it's a member of Tom G Warrior or Tom Fisher's current band Tripticon. Um it is the drummer Hannes Grossman's new solo album to Where the Light Retreats. Um 2021 just came out. Uh there's two tracks that I've heard off of it that I just absolutely love, and that's In the Glacier's Eye and The Sun Eaters.
Um the band consists of Hannes Grossman on drums, who he also writes the music, all of it. Um Linus Klin Klausenitzer, who I mentioned just recently was with uh Obsidious. He previously was with or Obscura. Um I believe he actually joined Obscura after Hannes left the band, which is kinda interesting that they all have this connection. Um but d uh Danny Tunker on guitars and uh V Santura on vocals. Um
I had listened to Hannah's stuff before, which it's funny he's evolved so much over releasing all these solo albums. I really wasn't expecting what I heard here, which is kind of a c combination of technical death metal with some black at black metal elements. and I was just blown away. I've loved every track so far. Um, I'm gonna keep listening to it as as the week goes on and really get more into it. Um
But if you're not familiar with Hannes, um he was in Necrophagist, uh Obscura, like I mentioned. He played on two of my favorite albums from that band. He kind of came onto my radar because of that band with Cosmogenesis. Um he played with Christian Moinsner who was also in uh Obscura with him on his solo album. uh Alkaloid and like I mentioned Tripticon. He hasn't r recorded anything with them other than a live album yet, so um that's the only way to hear him playing with that base.
Uh but the guy is an amazing drummer. He teaches online drum lessons as well. Even if you're not a dr a a drummer y and you're just interested in in music like like like me. Um I've watched a couple of his his drum lessons and I'm just blown away by this guy. So definitely check out this album. Like I said, it's to where the light retreats.
And definitely look back at his his uh entire catalog'cause I think y it's a real treat if you like anything like uh technical death metal or even just are a big fan of of uh instrumentals or or uh Just drumming in general.
Is is he the drummer that's on the obsidious song that you had um no. Previous okay,'cause that drummer is just freaky fast.
Oh yeah. All these guys they're just extremely w uh talented musicians, all all very well trained and and somehow they've all you know, they cross over, they play on this album together, but they're friends and they ha invite each other over to their solo albums and there's just this connection of these really tightly um well trained musicians in in this this region, which is so impressive. They're all German guys and I I don't know what they're doing, but man, I'm I'm so impressed.
I I I've always said since I was uh a teenager that metal musicians uh specifically uh the the harder heavy metal ones, uh and nowadays it's even more so, are are more talented than some of the most talented, you know, uh orchestral musicians. Um, because it is just fascinating to see how fast they play.
And and the technical guys, you know, technical death metal, progressive metal, those guys, they they are so proficient in the instrument. It is absolutely amazing. I mean t when you think about the fact that they do all that stuff And it's it's it's learned, it's in their head, it's not something that they go and they they they read music like the orchestral musicians. These guys know it off the top of the head and they have to play concerts anywhere from thirty minutes to two hours long.
And to know all this stuff just by heart. You know, it that's that's absolutely amazing. And so...
Oh and and even more so that they do riff and they do um it's not like it's all a hundred percent accurate all the time. Like they know the scales. So say somebody goes off and and and messes up. Like they have to be talented enough and and skilled enough to be able to
to match what somebody else is doing. Like that's that's the thing that blows my mind is say somebody um gets off or something happens, they they are able to recover so quickly and it's so technical and so quick and it it it seems like something that you wouldn't be able to me uh like recover from if there was a mistake.
No, it's I I've I've seen those things live and it's it's crazy. I mean it's it's it's awe inspiring, really. um to and you know, absolutely jaw dropping to see some of these musicians play. I mean, yeah, they play heavy metal, they play this really hard stuff. For a lot of people it's not their thing. It's not mainstream. But the the fact that these musicians can do that is absolutely incredible to me. So I love that stuff.
Um
¶ Megadeth's Dave Ellefson Controversy
And speaking of a very technical person, and I wanna I wanna go ahead and talk about this real quick but before we go into the to the rest of the show, um, I wanna address the issue that's going on right now with Megadeth. Um, as many of you've already heard. Dave Ellison is no longer in the band for reasons that we're not gonna get into. Everyone kinda knows what's happened already. Um, I made a comment to you last week when we were talking about this when it when it kind of first broke.
Um and I kind of almost want to retract my statement because I l I I read an interview with their with their former producer Max Norman. It kind of gave a different perspective because it was like a third party outsider perspective. And um I kinda there's some parts of it that I agree with and some parts of it I don't. Essentially it it's
You know, what I didn't agree with was why Megadeth would go ahead, or Dave Mustaine specifically, would go ahead and fire Dave Ellison. They've been together since nineteen eighty four. you know, uh on and off.'Cause you know, obviously Dave, you know, Junior uh sued Miss Stain for for for money at a period of time. They've put that behind them.
Um they they started working with each other again and they've done a bunch of albums recently. Uh especially in on the most recently Dystopia. They were in the middle of recording their latest album and done. Um then this internet incident happened. Um and basically Ellison was was embarrassed and and um a lot of things came to light. What I found shocking was not only that they let him go.
But then the statement said that with an already strained relationship we had no choice but to go ahead and make this move. And that that is more telling than anything else, that there was already a strained relationship. So we don't know what was going on in the background with Dave and Dave and the rest of the band, but obviously there was something else there. This triggered
the move that needed to to happen in in Mustaine's eyes. I was in a I was in disagreement with it. I didn't think it needed to happen or it should have happened. But after reading Max Norman's comment I kind of realized, you know what? He was right. He's Megadeth is a brand and Dave Mustaine is protecting the brand. And Max had mentioned, hey, you know, when they're gonna be on stage, you know, everyone was gonna be pointing at this guy. So yeah, that's the dude.
That's the guy who, you know, did what he did and got exposed the way he did. And so it was going to become an embarrassment. And Dave is, you know, Mustaine is far from being that type of person who's going to be ridiculed. So, you know, I I the statement that I made to you I kind of retract because I was way against them firing him, but I understand it now that it was something that had to happen for a variety of reasons.
Yeah, it's it's one of those situations that I think they tried to play it off like we're gonna you know, we're gonna investigate this more, we're gonna pay attention to it but it reaches a point where um If there's already an issue going on. Is it is it worth fighting and and having that i you know, that be the focus and take away from what they're doing, what they're the the music they're doing. So I can understand that from that perspective.
If there was no issues ahead of time, then you know, you s you need to stick by your friends and and It's just one of those things, like we don't know all the ins and outs. We don't y we can't. Um we kinda have to leave it to them to figure out and it I can't I can't imagine it's just day. You know, or Dave Mustaine. Th I there has to be other people involved saying, This is I'm not comfortable with this, etcetera. So
Right. I I totally get that. And You know, the other thing too that that Max brought up in his interview was that Junior never really apologized. He he just said that he was gonna look into it and now you've heard that he's gonna, you know, look for revenge porn charges against the person who released the video.
But never at any point did he say, I'm sorry, I'm sorry I embarrassed the band. I'm sorry I embarrassed my family. I'm sorry to my wife, to my family. Nothing like that. There was a press release that was written by him or or whatever publicist he may have. that was, you know, kind of trying to ease it and say that he didn't do some of the things that he's accused of, but
There was never really an official apology. I mean, I'm sure, you know, I'm sure he's apologized to his wife in private. I would like to think so. You know, and I'm sure he's apologized to Dave in private, you know, it's mistaken.
Yeah.
Right, it's none of our business. But sometimes just because you are a public figure and you do have that kind of connection, a lot of times it is best to do something like that. And he never did so I I'm assuming that's part of what happened. You know, and you know, assumptions can fly all you know, all over the place and we're we're never gonna know the truth behind it. But the bottom line is is that
Dave Ellison is out of Megadeth. Jason Newstead will not be joining Megadeth as their new bass player, and we will see a new album and a new bass player from Megadeth pretty soon.
I didn't even know Jason Newstead was was on the table.
No, he isn't on the table, but there was people clamoring for it because, you know, he's an ex Metallica guitar player uh bass player. He's available, you know, and at one point he was trying to get back into heavy metal. Okay. You know, so a lot of people tried to put two and two together and didn't realize that it just wasn't adding up to four, you know.
Son of a
So it his wife uh Jason's wife came out and made a statement on Instagram that he would not be.
Joining me.
Mm, okay.
¶ Setting Up Slayer's Greatest Hits Debate
Um, so that brings us to another band that's had some internal conflict over the years. That's Slayer, and we're doing their greatest hit. So uh we're going to pick 15 songs each of what we think are Slayer's greatest hits. Um we're gonna keep the ones that we've duplicated, and then we're going to see what's left over, and then debate which ones we want to keep out of those.
Come up with fifteen awesome songs and then put them into some sort of concert set list. And that'll be our Slayer's greatest hits. Um
Um I mean I can go first this time. It's no big deal.
¶ Slayer Song Picks: Chris's Perspective
Okay, then go for it.
All right, so if you've listened to our previous Slayer episodes, which you sh definitely should, um, you probably know that both of us are kind of uh more interested in a certain era of the band. So I there's a couple albums that aren't gonna be represented here for me. Um I like the early era, you know, the
Uh from pretty much from Helawaits to uh Seasons in the Abyss, I do like a couple tracks off of Divine Intervention. And then I like the last three albums that they released uh you know, before the band broke up. So I'm I'm gonna start it off with Hellawaites off of Hello Waits.
Um Chemical Warfare off of Haunting the Chapel, uh Angel of Death from Rain and Blood, uh Postmortem, uh and Rain and Blood also from Rain and Blood. Um South of Heaven, Silent Scream and Mandatory Suicide from South of Heaven, War Ensemble, Seasons in the Abyss, and Dead Skin Mask from Seasons in the Abyss. uh killing fields from divine intervention, hate worldwide from world painted blood, and repentless and vices from
¶ Slayer Song Picks: Kenneth's Perspective
Yeah, my my uh list is a little different than yours. There's some crossover as expected. Um my era of the band is the classic Dave Lombardo era from show no mercy all the way through uh seasons in the abyss. Um from the point at which they made um the live album uh that came out after seasons in the abyss f um From that point forward, I was never really into Slayer. Although I have most of the album.
I always kept a a cursory eye on the band. I liked one or two songs here and there. I definitely around the the year two thousand lost complete touch with what was going on with Slayer. I know that they were being featured. You know, they were trying to become, you know, a a new metal thrash band for a little bit or, you know, they it was a blink in the eye or blink of an eye b if you missed it. Um they were, you know, had songs on the WWE Attitude Era.
You know, they had songs in in you know, video games. I just I paid zero attention to anything that wasn't an on the popular scene. And I was just that just a lot of things going on in my life at the time. And then, you know, as things went on I would see when the new albums came out and, you know, Diablo S and Musica and Christ Illusion and all those albums then and I was just never I never really got into it. To me, a lot of those albums didn't have that it factor that the early albums had.
And then Repentless came out and and it wasn't supposed to be their last album. Carrie King said that they he had a bunch of material ready to go for another album, but I think there was a lot of things that really came down to it in terms of business decisions. And they finally decided.
And Jeff Hanneman passing away.
Yeah, with with Jeff passing away. I mean, like I said, this that was their first album, Repentless, without Jeff. Mm-hmm. Um, and they were ready to do another album and they were gonna actually give Gary Holt a little bit more input. But I think there's there's a little rift between Tom Mariah and and Carrie King that kind of grew during that last tour. And I think it was just they finally just said, let's put this to bed.
and and move on. And so which is fine because, you know, I'd rather than put out shit music, you know, end it on a high note. I mean they toured for a couple of years and and they did great. So Um but anyway, um so that's that's where my era of Slayer is. Uh early Dave Lombardo classic stuff. So my list, one through fifteen. is gonna be Die by the Sword from Show No Mercy, The Antichrist from Show No Mercy, Chemical Warfare from the Haunting the Chapel EP.
Uh Hello Waits from Hello Waits, Angel of Death from or actually Angel of Death and Raining Blood from Rain and Blood. South of Heaven Mandatory Suicide and Behind the Crooked Cross from South of Heaven, War Ensemble, Seasons in the Abyss and Expendable Youth from Seasons in the Abyss. World Painted Blood from World Painted Blood, Skeleton Christ from Christ Illusion, and Repentless from the Repentless album. So that's my 15 Slayer songs.
More songs from certain albums that I that I didn't expect to have, um, but that's because R I like Raining Blood so much. I I there was just certain songs like the middle the middle songs between Angel of Death or so the the eight songs between Angel of Death and Raining Blood. They're all good. together as a package. But independently I I I think they they lack.
¶ Finalizing Slayer's Greatest Hits List
Whereas on these other songs that are on South of Heaven and Seasons of the Abyss kind of stand out as their own. So anyway, that's that was my list. So what do we have that's duplicated? We got Hello Eight.
We've got Hello Eight's chemical warfare. Angel of Death Raining Blood South of Heaven Mandatory Suicide. War Ensemble, Seasons in the Abyss, and Repentless.
Mm-hmm.
So we have six that we have different. Okay, so mine that I have that you do not have are postmortem, silent scream, dead skin mask, killing fields, hate worldwide, and vice.
Okay, so we have six spots. Twelve songs for six spots. Just looking at the list, um, I can tell the first two songs I have on my list, Die by the Sword and Antichrist, are Off of Show No Mercy, you don't have anything off of Show No Mercy. So we can at least pick one song from there. I I would say for me, my song is going to be Die by the Sword. Um that song i it's one of those where it's not the first song in the album, but it's probably to me the best song on that album.
I would agree it's the best song on the album. Like I've said to you before, I have a hard time listening to Show No Mercy because of the production. Um I there are good songs on it that are that are enjoyable, but it's just like if I'm going to pick something that I honestly like
You know, if I say Is Diet by the Sword a good song? Yes. Is the recording terrible? Yes. Do I like this other song better because of that reason yes. So I just I mean I just had a hard time putting anything from show no mercy.
Yeah, it's it's tough because yeah, the production is is is terrible. I mean the budget was minimal. You know. I mean it makes you think you hear all the albums from the big four Right. And it's like Metal you know, like Metallica stood out. W even with their first album, both Slayer's album and Metallica's album came out the same year.
Um they were you know, Metallica came out earlier, Slayer a little bit later, but the production is just drastically different. And y you you can't tell me has anything to do with, you know, listening to it now that it has anything to do with remastering because I've listened to that old the original Mega Force that I own and it sounds so much better. I mean now mind you, is it
what they sound like now or is it is it got the the the superior quality to it? No, but it still sounds a hell of a lot better. than anything the other three bands put out. And Anthrax to me would be the close second because Megadeth's album Just sounds like shit. They they they spent all their money on drugs and then they had to scrap everything together at the last minute. You know?
Yeah, I mean definitely Metallica was was heads above the others when it came to the debut album. The the sophomore albums definitely a huge improvement even though Hello Wates still has to me pretty bad production. Um, but it was, you know, that third album from every band.
Yes.
Where they hit their stride.
Oh yeah absolutely. You know and I yeah, I'm not gonna take anything away from from the second or third album from someone like Slayers was was a little iffy, you know. Um Anthrax m did a major jump with w with spreading the disease, you know. Um I think Megadeth with P cells was a huge jump, you know. So it was th that year, you know,'cause Megadeth since they were kind of a a year behind because Dave was still r you know, covering so his second album was the equivalent in terms of
time period as everyone else's third album, eighty six eighty seven. Yep. So it it it was that time period that eighty six eighty seven with with those four bands just lit it up. I mean everybody was was just on the top of their game. So yeah, so we're gonna put die by the sword in for me. What's your pick to step?
Um, let's see. I would like to include uh I gotta put Dead Skin Mask off of Seasons of the Abyss.
All right. All right, so with Dead Skin Mask being um You're keeping that one. Um, with with uh War Ensemble and Season the Abyss already on on the list as as duplicates that we had, then I think we're gonna need to remove expendable youth from the list. Um so that we don't have four songs from Seasons in the Abyss.
Gotcha.
So that one goes bye bye. All right. So what are you taking off?
Um so we have two s two tracks off of South of Heaven. Um I'm a big fan of Silent Scream, but I don't have to have it on there. I can remove that one.
Alright so now. I'm keeping... song out of the three I have left, I'm gonna go ahead and keep World Painted Blood. I was listening to that today again and and I I really for what it's worth for that time period I enjoyed that song.
Yeah, it's a great track. Alright, then I would like to keep vices off of Repentless.
Alright, so that leaves me with the Antichrist behind the crooked cross and skeleton cross. And that leaves you with postmortem, killing fields, and hate worldwide. So now I have to take something off. And I'm gonna go and I'm gonna remove Behind the crooked cross.
Alright, then I'm gonna remove Hate Worldwide since you've already got world painted blood.
So you got two songs left and I got two songs. Okay. between the Antichrist for me and Skeleton Christ, um, just so that we can have more representation from the newer stuff, I wanna go ahead and Skeleton Christ.
Okay. And for the same reason, um, as much as I love po postmortem and it is in my top four um songs by Slayer. Um I do want to keep killing fields so we have mo more representation as
Alright, so we're getting rid of postmortem. You're keeping killing fields. Alright, so this is definitely a spread across the spectrum. Alright, so this is this is what we got. We've got Die by the Sword, Chemical Warfare, Hellawait. Angel of Death Raining Blood South of Heaven Mandatory Suicide War Ensemble Seasons in the Abyss, Dead Skin Mask, Killing Fields, World Painted Blood, Skeleton Christ, Vices and Repentless.
¶ Building Slayer's Ultimate Concert Setlist
All right, so I think last episode you went first with your choice. So I'm gonna go first this time in terms of starting the show off. Yeah. It this is a tough one because all their songs are pretty fast except for a few. Um but I also know certain songs need to to hang out until the end. Um, I got two in mind. And it's a question of whether or not no, I'm gonna scrap that second one. My first my first choice for uh opening song is gonna be War Ensemble.
Okay. Yeah, I think that's a good choice, honestly. Alright, if you're going with that one, then let's see. Why don't we go kind of old school and go with chemical warfare?
I like that. This is where we slow it down, this is where they do their ballads. Right. How about it? Um I mean in terms of bringing things down to a different pace. Um What do you think about seasons in the abyss in this spot?
I was I was either gonna say s dead skin mask or seasons, so I'm good with either one.
All right. Your turn.
All right. Um So why don't we do Mandatory suicide here.
Okay. Just because we know there's a there's a this this is loaded with certain songs that are gonna expand the horizons. Uh what about World Painted Blood after Mandatory Suicide?
I'm good with that. I try to when I'm when I'm doing these I also try to kind of balance the you know, the the eras so that there is a good mix. Right. But at the same time pick the songs that go with the right pacing. Um So That's kind of new school. Um, towards the the end of their career. I think it would be kinda cool to go back to the beginning of the career now, um, with uh Die by the Sword.
Okay, cool. Um we have one veto or two vetoes each.
We have two uh well technically we've done two in the past. We've only used one in recent
Um I I almost want to try and keep Die by the Sword more towards the end.
Okay.
Um because it it is a big song off their first album, I almost think Hello Ways would probably be good in this spot. Okay. What do you think?
All right then I'm gonna go ahead and pick vices for the next track.
Okay. All right, so then from what I have on my list. Um I would I would put in this spot south of heaven.
Yeah, I'm good with that.
Okay.
Okay. Um Then I think it'd probably be a good time to put dead skin mask.
I agree. All right, so we're down to the last six. Alright, so I have, or we have, uh Skeleton Christ, Repentless, Angel of Death, Reigning Blood, Die by the Sword, and Killing Field. Um I'm gonna go with Skeleton Christ in this spot.
Okay. Um
We got two spots before the closer or for the the the set closer.
I kinda wanna use a veto here. And that's to place something much earlier.
Okay.
Um And that's killing fields, I kinda wanna put put as the fourth track. So move everything down from there. And the the reason being is so you go from season seasons of the abyss, which is kind of a slower track. Mm-hmm. And then Killing Fields is like insane fast drumming, it's it's just it it blows things up. And then to go into mandatory suicide, which kinda takes it a little bit slower, um, but but just a step down, I think it's a really good position for it.
So I almost want to take that back and put it up into the foreslot instead of um ki kinda how we have it now.'Cause I feel like it's too fast for this late in the show.
No problem. I I I I like that idea. Um you're more familiar with killing fields than I am so so that helps out. Um And that's good because that kinda helps the flow of the of the end here.
Exactly.
That was what I was concerned about. Yeah. We're at song eleven. And we need to put in 12, 13, 14. So we got the last the encore and then song 12. So I kind of know what's already going to be in the encore. So I think what we should do is we should end the main set with Die by the Sword.
All right, then I think you gotta start off with Angel of Death.
I like that.
Yeah.
And then repentless at fourteen?
I think that's a good one.
And then closing out the show, Raining Blade. And then tha that's when all the blood spills from the scaling.
Yeah.
Did you ever see that video? The their concert when they did that? Oh yeah. That was that was pretty nuts.
Pretty wild.
Thank you.
Raining blood not to be confused with rain in blood. The album title.
Even though the the lyric in the song is Rain and Blood.
Yeah. All right, so that puts it, that gives us our final 15, and let me go over that. So song number one, starting off the show, is War Ensemble, and then number two, Chemical Warfare, and then we slide right into Seasons of the Abyss. And then we're going to go into killing fields and totally just thrash your neck out.
And then bring back the pace to normal to m with mandatory suicide at number four, number five, no, excuse me, at number s five, number six, world painted blood, number seven, hello eight. Number eight vices. Number nine South of Heaven. Number 10, Dead Skin Mask. Number 11, Skeleton Christ. And then closing out the main set is Die by the Sword at song number 12. And then the encore, we open it up with Angel of Death.
And then we go into Repentless and we close out the show with Raining Blood. I think that's pretty awesome list.
I would definitely agree. And I I think it shows a really good um spectrum of the band. Unfortunately, like I said, we we're not big fans of that kind of middle section in the early two thousands. So some of that wasn't represented here. Um but that also opens things up. If you disagree with our list, make sure to send us a note. You know, say, you know, this is my big or my my fifteen you know, top slayer songs and let us know if we're if we're wrong.
Yeah.
Wrong or right, you know, this is what we we came up with and and this is what we like. I mean I'm d you know, obviously much older than you, you but you still have a an affinity for the older Slayer stuff. And there's gonna be people out there that just really dig the stuff from 2010 on. you know, those or maybe two thousand five on those couple of albums in there. So, you know, no one's wrong, everyone's right, you know, we all have our opinions for this. You know, definitely send in
a direct message or a reply to something, I'm gonna be posting this list on Spotify. So you'll get our list on Spotify. You can download it. You can listen to it. You can jam out that playlist. Um, give us your playlist and maybe I'll I'll I'll put it in as a as a you know, listener based uh you know
what do they call that? Uh a listener based, you know, uh recommendation. So definitely, definitely do with that do that and interact with us. That'd be fun. Cool. So that is our Slayer's greatest hits, and that brings us to now the Big Four, where we will pick our Big Four Slayer album.
¶ Debating Slayer's Big Four Albums
Alright, so I will be going this uh sorry, I will be going first this week. Um so let's see, my number four is gonna be repentance. I was really surprised that I liked Repentless as much as I did, uh, especially after Jeff had passed away. Um, but I think in a way it was it was a um it was an album that the band kinda worked through whatever feelings they had going on. Uh from what I understand, even though it's credited as Carrie King and Tom Mariah, um Tom Ariah has said
pretty much he wrote all the music. Um which I it's based on the stories that I've heard, I tend to kinda believe his his uh Tom O'Reilly.
Mm-hmm.
Um and I was I was really impressed. There's a lot of tracks off of this album that I really like. Uh it's very aggressive. I I I enjoyed it a lot, so v based on on you know that that level of aggression, et cetera, I think it's just it's a kick at Uh, number three, uh Seasons in the Abyss. This was a toss up between my number two, because I love both albums so much, and we talked about them uh before.
Um, but I think just right now, you know, based on what I've been listening to and the fact that I keep going back to my number two over and over and over again recently. Um, I kinda had to pick that one over seasons, even though I think Seasons is is the more mature of the two albums.
Um
My number two is South of Heaven. And like I said, I just keep going back to this album over and over again lately. Um I think just something about it just keeps appealing to me and I it's you know, it these three albums that my number one, two and three are really Slayer at their peak. And of course I think you can figure out what my number one is and that's Rain and Blood. And it's just it's just like a nearly perfect album in its entirety. When you when you listen to it from beginning to end
Um, there's not much that I find here that I don't like. And it's it's it's a quick album, you know, it doesn't take a tremendous amount of time to get through. Um, but it it has no dead weight. It's it's not like there's just a bunch of filler crap. It is good from beginning to end and and I have nothing bad to say about Rain and Blood.
I like your list. I like that. Um Repentless is is is uh a new is obviously their last album that they put out, but it was really, really good in terms of Just having to me better songs than they've had in the the past few albums. Um and then the production was pretty good. Strange that I I did not realize that that King says uh not King, uh that Tom Mariah said he wrote most of the music. That's interesting. Um and then the rest of the other three albums, of course, you know, those are classic
Um my list is almost the same as yours, three out of four. Um I had to choose one album, and it's my number four album, because of where it stands in the history of of Slayer. So my number four album is Show No Mercy. And as as for for all the faults it has in the production, you can't help but realize that this album has so much
Um
potential and and you realize what was about to what was to come from this band. Um they were so raw, so fresh and the whole scene between them and Metallica and then eventually, you know, anthrax and and the whole Bay Area metal, you know, Exodus was was there and and Slayer and Exodus very similar frame of mind when it came to the topics that they were they were addressing, although Slayer went a little more satanic straight up and um
Exodus kind of tried to be evil, but it just didn't come across that way. They were you know, they had too many goofy looking album covers.
And it didn't go along with we're trying to be evil, you know. It was it di they didn't play off each other correctly. So I think that's another reason why Exodus had a hard time breaking through. So Shuner Mercy to me had so much potential and so much there, you know, with a song like Die with a Sword and the Antichrist and and stuff like that, th you knew there was something awaiting
besides hell, uh that was that was becoming that was gonna come from the band. So um so that's my number four. My number three is South of Heaven. Um, you know, coming off of of Rain and Blood and you get this album, they had they they they go from this album that was just a speed metal, heavy metal, thrash album masterpiece to
You know, what do we do now? They literally went in the opposite direction and they they s they slowed everything down, they chugged it up a little bit. That was south of heaven. Um, so I like that album. Number two for me is Seasons in the Abyss. I think there was, you know, there was a good combination of the fast and the slow and the mid-pace.
So it had it had everything in that one album and I think that's the reason why I put it at number two. There was there there were to me there were better songs overall. So I I put that down as my number two. And of course number one, uh you can't help but put put the the ultimate classic, the peak of the the the band, and that was Rain and Blood. That album is absolutely their best album.
you know, in their entire career and it defined them, it defined the genre at the time, with everything else that came out in eighty six and eighty seven. So it is definitely a classic and is my number one.
That's definitely a good list.
All right.
¶ Listener Feedback and Episode Conclusion
Alright, well that brings us to the end of today's episode. Remember if you like what you heard today, be sure to check us out on social media and leave us a comment. Make sure to tune in to the next episode when we spark up another exciting metal debate. On behalf of Kenneth and myself, stay safe and remember always turn it up to eleven.
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