Album of the week, episode 134: Slayer - Reign In Blood(1985)

"Reign In Blood" is very fast, straight-in-your-face metal. Yeah, that sentence might sound cheesy, but it is how it is. In opposition to other metal acts in the 80ies like Metallica whose "Master of Puppets" durated almost an hour, Slayer took all their hardcore punk influences and made a hell of an album. Goddamn, its so short - I could play it 4 times in 2 hours. But I will tell more about the length later.

The most of the lyrics deal with brutal themes such as (ritualized) murder, the nazi doctor Josef Mengele, insane killers etc.. But instead of just "being br00tal" and writing "cool" lyrics with lots of blood and death in it, Jeff Hanneman's and Kerry King's songwriting seems almost poetic because of its unique word choices. In fact, the band used some theasauri to update their vocabulary
because they didn't want to use the same word twice. Tom Araya's voice is very clear(and very diabolic of course) and even if he sings really fast, you can understand every word. Even if it seems not really cool to sing about the nazis in that (neutral) way, I think it's a good idea to show the listener the insane facts about Auschwitz like this instead of saying "omg that was really bad". Nevermind, just read the lyrics:

"Auschwitz, the meaning of pain
The way that I want you to die
Slow death, immense decay
Showers that cleanse you of your life
Forced in
Like cattle
You run
Stripped of
Your life's worth
Human mice, for the angel of death
Four hundred thousand more to die"

I kinda remember what Danko Jones said about "Reign In Blood". He told the interviewer that he used to listen this album via his walkman on his way from home to school and vice versa. The album has a "punkrock length" of 29 minutes. Well, I thought I should try it out.

And yes it worked - this thrash metal classic lasted almost exactly from the moment i left my home to the moment i reached my classroom. It is a perfect soundtrack for a cold winter morning(yeah, yeah, I know +3° Celsius are not cold). There is nothing better than some songs about human misery, murder, debauchery, death and despair that make your head nod and your foot imitating the drum pedal. In other words: wow such slayer very metal holy fuck.

10/10 deposit bottles