The world is one big Slayer song. At Louder Than Life 2025, we find there’s no better time to have them back…
The very moment Kerrang! crosses the threshold and puts boots on the ground at Kentucky’s massive Louder Than Life festival, someone yells “Slayeeeeeeeer!” Proud, unapologetic, unforgiving. Like the wind in the pines or birds on a bough, tune in through the day and you’ll hear it screamed with an affirmation and throat-hurting tang that still no other band can muster.
After a day of killer showings of extreme aggression from Lamb Of God, Lorna Shore, Carcass, Kublai Khan TX, Cannibal Corpse and Guilt Trip, among others, it’s reassuring that even the raising of Slayer’s curtain as they set incites frenzy. This is what would happen normally for Slayer. Throw in their reunion, and the fact that last year’s assault here was defeated by Hurricane Helene, and you have the sort of atmosphere you normally get from someone lobbing a grenade into a petrol station.
Not age, not a split and curious return without Dave Lombardo smashing the kit, not anything you might bring up is capable of denting the old Slayer magic. As with their banter-free showing at Back To The Beginning, there’s a middle-finger energy as they stroll on, perfectly as it should be, but not showily so. It’s just that, after 40 years and change, Slayer’s bag marked ‘fucks’ remains completely empty. It’s fucking brilliant.
Almost everything is wreathed in fire. More fire than necessary. The sort that makes grown men stare at it like six-year-olds getting a sparkler on a birthday cake, shooting all over the place and forming inverted crosses. And the violent, psychotic, snarling energy is still there. Hello, Chemical Warfare. Hi there, South Of Heaven. Good to see you, lesser-spotted banger Black Magic. Welcome back, Mandatory Suicide, complete with Tom Araya singing the chorus’ ‘Suicide’ with his usual warm, cheeky smile. With the world once again turning into a Slayer song – a brutal reflection of the horror of reality delivered with equal parts malevolence and ‘whaddayagonnado?’ shrug – it all still bites deep.
“Everyone’s rock lobster-ing,” grins Tom. “It’s a beautiful day, eh? You shouldn’t be afraid to use the word ‘beautiful’. Everything is beautiful. Even war…”
Therefore, War Ensemble, and its almighty, cathartic scream of ‘Waaaaaaaaaaaaar’ which sounds absolutely nuclear in 2025 (more so). Along with everything else, Slayer’s biscuit-dry, almost British and League Of Gentlemen-like sense of sarcastic dark humour, remains gallows hilarious.
“This is where we get to the love hour,” announces Tom, before dedicating the next song to his beloved wife of 35 years. “It’s a love song.”
Awwww.
“A very sick love song about a mother and son.”
It’s Dead Skin Mask. Brilliant. What could be better? Watching the sign language interpreter giving it large to the sinister words. Again, fucking brilliant.
Look, Slayer are Slayer. The horrible magnetism at their core is still potent as the Hell they recreate onstage. Wherever you stand, the world just needs Slayer. As it goes completely Tonto, they and their anger, their catharsis, their fuck-off demeanour, still make a lot of sense. Do that, everyone else.
