SLAYER - DIVINE INTERVENTION ALBUM REVIEW

 

Over-mixed and overlooked, but brilliant

By MercianMan, October 10th, 2020

After five superb albums in reasonably quick succession we’d then have to wait the better part of four years to see whether Slayer could match their pioneering delivery that helped drive metal from 1983 to 1990 – and I want to show why it’s really important to see this album with some context. Clearly there had been a peak in the U.S. thrash metal genre in 1990 with releases like “Rust in Peace,” “Persistence of Time” and Slayer’s very own “Seasons in the Abyss” but new dynamics were also coming into play. Death metal was exploding into the scene and thrash was all of a sudden not sounding necessarily as heavy as it had been in the mid-to-late 80s, and other young entrants to rock music in general were subjected to grunge and alternative rock bands. By the time we got to 1994 it was clear that Metallica had moved from the heavier and faster side of metal to their highly accessible form of hard rock, Megadeth were never going to make another proper thrash metal album, Anthrax just weren’t Anthrax anymore, the formidable Pantera were strikingly powerful but just weren’t dark enough to take Slayer’s place, and Sepultura had clearly had their proper thrash peak by 1991. Given Slayer’s position (at least in part) as godfathers of death metal, with the other key thrashers dwindling, and newbies to the scene drawn into trendier teenage sounds from Seattle you might have thought that Slayer would have had a clear run. For battery there'd been a worrying personnel change but new recruit Paul Bostaph had shown himself as Lombardo’s great replacement at the Donington Monsters of Rock in ’92 – he was the man among many to take Slayer forward.

So why does “Divine Intervention” not stand as proud as its predecessors? It’d be an easy answer if there were one or more unmistakably inferior tracks on the album, if the whole release was slower than “Seasons” or “South of Heaven,” or if the lyrical themes showed the betrayal of a band who had gone mainstream – but none of these things are true. Simply put the problems with this album are in the mixing and production. The band had more time to plan and produce this record and somewhere along the line some spontaneity and decisiveness seems to have dropped off. For me this was the first Slayer album that I just cannot play quietly and still enjoy. The superb introductory drum fill that throws ‘Killing Fields’ at us – and this is one of Slayer’s best songs – sadly says it all about how this album was made. And it matters because if this release had the engineering of the previous three albums we would have seen another Slayer high point. Bar the occasional unintended slowing down of the drums, mildly evident on ‘Circle of Beliefs for example,’ Bostaph’s performance on the album is superb. He knew he had boots to fill and his efforts shine through on every song, it’s just such a shame that his craft is blurred by the mix. The guitars and bass suffer the same fate. Instead of the crisp and crushing crunches and chugs we love so much it all feels just a little liquidy, and a tad cloudy, almost as though the album was recorded in multiple layers (and it certainly was). This is why this sterling effort in song-writing and musicianship still yields a record that doesn’t quite make the grade. Araya himself said he thought it was one of their very best releases but it was recorded in more than one studio and the final output shows us that too many cooks do indeed spoil the broth.

Looking at how the tracks came together in 1994 all of a sudden we see that Hanneman and King for the first time weren’t writing as much together. For me whilst both Hanneman and King are both fantastic writers it’s the popular belief that Hanneman had been the lead songwriter until this point. On “Divine Intervention” the music for the first half is entirely a King affair and for the whole release it is Araya’s lyrical input making up for Hanneman’s lesser contributions. Despite this the song-writing is still very much there and each track has its own individual character. The heaviest and most archetypal Slayer songs are ‘Killing Fields’ with its changing tempos (even 5/4 for a while?) and warlike aggression, and ‘Sex, Murder, Art’ with its ice cold and murderous freneticism. The climactic mid-song instrumental break in ‘Fictional Reality’ features tones to chill the spine before unleashing triumphant blows – relentlessly heavy, and though it’s the one of the slower tracks on the album speed lovers will note that Slayer’s “Seasons” from 1990 is, in all, actually a slower affair. If there’s a filler or obvious hit-single for the record then ‘Serenity in Murder’ fits the bill but that’s not to say it’s in any way such a disappointing compromise to let the release down – all the songs are quality Slayer. You’ll just need to turn “Divine Intervention” up to 11 to give it what it deserves, and following the demise of Slayer if any of their records needed re-engineering it’s this one. A superb effort but with too much interference. Re-master please.

Track List  :

1. Killing Fields

2. Sex. Murder. Art.

3. Fictional Reality

4. Dittohead

5. Divine Intervention

6. Circle of Beliefs

7. SS-3

8. Serenity in Murder

9. 213

10. Mind Control

Line Up  :

Tom Araya Vocals, Bass, Lyrics (tracks 1, 2, 5, 8-10)

Jeff Hanneman (R.I.P. 2013) Guitars, Songwriting (tracks 5, 7-10), Lyrics (tracks 5, 7)

Kerry King Guitars, Songwriting (tracks 1-8, 10), Lyrics (tracks 3-6, 10)

Paul Bostaph Drums, Lyrics (track 5)

***Disclaimer*** 

I do not own any copyright for any of this material!

Copyright belongs to Slayer and American Recordings! 

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SLAYER - DIVINE INTERVENTION FULL ALBUM

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