Picture this: you're Slayer. You've just released Reign in Blood. It is an extreme metal classic and is recognised as such on release. It is commercially successful, too, and has attracted tons of controversy. It is fast and lean, under half an hour long, and contains instantly iconic and recognisable songs. How the hell do you follow that up?
The answer, of course, was to slow down. After pushing thrash to such limits, Slayer had no choice, else suffer from making the same album twice (which they did end up doing, but that's for another time). Rick Rubin is back on the boards, Dave Lombardo is back after a very short absence, Jeff Hanneman has written most of the riffs due to Kerry King's absence - he moved house and got married - and Tom Araya steps up his lyrical game. Oh, and his vocals are still manic and crazed but in a more measured way.
Just to make this clear, South of Heaven is not doom metal. There are too many faster, thrashier moments for it to qualify. It does, though, have a sense of doom and dread running throughout which is arguably more potent than Reign in Blood. Whilst Reign is a blink and you'll miss it slideshow of atrocity, disease, murder, death and agony, South of Heaven is that same slideshow but with a crippling inevitability. As a result, it's pretty intense, as song by song you get the feeling that something horrifying is about to happen, and there is nothing you can do to stop it.
Compared to the anti-reverb machinery of Reign in Blood, the production of South of Heaven focuses heavily on Dave Lombardo's drumming. They're fucking huge on this album. They never sounded better on record. As a result, Tom Araya's vocals are a little buried in the mix which could put off listeners who love the more upfront approach on Hell Awaits or Reign. The guitars are a bit drier than previously, which again is an acquired taste, but one I have acquired.
Track by track, it might not have the seamless album flow that Reign in Blood does. It also may lack a bookends of classic songs. To me, though, South of Heaven works better as an album because individual songs stick out to me more than on Reign. And I defend that album from the usual "songs sound the same" criticism. What's more, South of Heaven contains personal favourites of mine, and all in one place.
The title track opens with an iconic riff, eventually building with the addition of divebombing harmonics, drum strikes and fills. When Araya's vocals come in, you can hear the bomb ticking, about to go off; "before you see the light, you must DIIIIEEEE!" And with that, the slowburning opener is off. The riffing, mostly courtesy of Hanneman, alternates between being doomy and ominous to outright attacking in the verses, whereby the drums come out of their mid-tempo groove and into more familiar thrash territory. The lyrics, intriguingly for Slayer, do not actually consider South of Heaven to be about Hell: it's about Earth.
Forgotten children confirm a new faith
Avidity and lust controlled by hate
The never ending search for your shattered sanity
Souls of damnation in their own reality
Chaos rampant in age of distrust
Confrontations impulsive habitat
The chorus is something of a great pay off, in my opinion. The pre-chorus - "CHAOS! RAMPANT!" etc - leads you to believe something is upcoming, only for the main riff to come back in and repeat the process. As per most Slayer songs, the solos are a trade off between Hanneman and King, with each bringing their distinctive styles together at various points. The closing of the song is nearly a minute long of sustained feedback, ringing in the ears. Yes, this is my favourite Slayer song, and the perfect way to open the album, spelling out that this will not be a retread of their 1986 classic.
Despite its reputation of being much slower than its predecessor, South of Heaven contains pretty aggressive and thrashing fast songs. The title track fades into the next song, Silent Scream, which is nonstop and break neck in its precision and its power. A song about back alley abortions - whether its pro-life or pro-choice I don't know and honestly don't want to go into - Silent Scream contains nightmarish vocals, flawless drumming (check out Lombardo's fills on the track and his double bass attack, borderline blast beasting!!!), and lyrics designed to both intrigue and horrify. Whatever side of the debate you sit on - pro choice myself - it leaves an impact.
Silent Scream
Crucify the bastard son
Beaten and torn
Sanctify lives of scorn
Innocence withdrawn in fear
Fires burning can you hear
Cries in the night
Other thrashier numbers include Ghosts of War, with its haunted opening couple of bars, leading right into the song. Also notable is its doomy mid-section. Like most of the album, the themes seem to concern duty over free will, as on the WWII inspired Behind the Crooked Cross. Like a lot of Slayer songs, it's related to the Nazis (don't even go there), but from the perspective of the average German man conscripted into the army. It's actually a very sympathetic song, reminding us that people died in the war regardless of the side.
Time melts away in this living inferno
Trapped by a cause that I once understood
Feeling a sickness building inside of me
Who will I really have to answer to
March on through the rivers of red
Souls drift, they fill the air
Forced to fight, behind
The crooked cross
Fuck what I said earlier about transitions. As soon as Crooked Cross ends, it jumps straight into one of Slayer's greatest songs, Mandatory Suicide. This song is fantastic, with its main riff at once descending and ascending thanks to the dual guitars. Again Lombardo shines on the song, guiding the band through mid-tempo grooves and irregular time signatures as the guitars all too calmly palm mute in the choruses. Araya's vocals are also great - "feel the heat/BURRRRN!" - because they are actually mostly restrained, as on the chorus ("suicide...suicide..."). After a killer drum fill, the outro of the song contains more double bass drum insanity, haunting guitar effects, and a spoken word monologue.
Lying, dying, screaming in pain
Begging, pleading, bullets drop like rain
Mines explode, pain sheers through your brain
Radical amputation, this is insane
Fly swatter stakes drive through your chest
Spikes impale you as you're forced off the crest
Soldier of misfortune
Hunting with bated breath
A vile smell, like tasting death
Dead bodies, dying and wounded
Litter the city streets
Shattered glass, bits of clothing and human deceit
Dying in terror
Blood's cheap, it's everywhere
Mandatory suicide, massacre on the front line
King's love/hate of religion comes to the fore with Read Between the Lies, slamming Televangelists. Araya's vocals are machine gun fire. Whilst the song may be one of my least favourites on the albums, it's still a banger, especially with how energetic it is. The same for the Judas Priest cover, Dissident Aggressor, which is pretty out of place and I welcome it as a detour.
Why does Kerry King hate Cleanse the Soul? It's awesome, with angular riff work not at all "happy", as he once described it. Well, read this lyrics, bro:
Body that rests before me
With every dying breath
Spellbound and gagged
I commence your flesh to dirt
Body that lay before me
In everlasting death
Entombed in abscess
To rot and lie stinking in the earth
Sounds like a laugh, dunnit?
Live Undead took a while to grow on me, with its borderline sludgy and lethargic feel and winding/unwinding drum work. It's the doomiest song on the album, and even contains Tom Araya's signature stepped-on-a-LEGO-scream ("the PAAAAIIIIIN!!!!"). I love it. I also dig the alternating solos between Hanneman and King, almost a gauntlet to see who can out do the other. On this one, Hanneman comes out on top.
Closer Spill the Blood is another slow-burner, which takes its time to truly develop but gets there. It boasts some of Araya's best vocals, an acoustic guitar (on a Slayer album?), and a killer riff with weird bends and dissonance. Lyrically, it depicts some sort of blood sacrifice. Either that or a deal with the Devil.
I'll show you sights that you would not believe
Experience pleasures thought unobtained
At one with evil that has ruled before
Now smell the stench of immortality
Whilst the song does not stand out immediately, after repeated listens it does. I love the fact it closes the album in the same doom-laden and creeping way as the opener. A more subtle bookends compared to Reign in Blood.
In terms of Slayer's legacy, this album has the unfortunate distinction of being sandwiched between their most popular album and their most well-rounded one, that being Seasons in the Abyss, which shows Slayer consciously writing faster material again to balance out the slower stuff. In my opinion, Slayer never made a better overall album than South of Heaven. Coming off the heels of Reign in Blood, though, the album received a more mixed reception, with some complaining about the fact the band slowed down. Maybe in terms of tempo, but certainly not in terms of work ethic and songwriting.
Thrash metal rarely gets any better than this. Long live Slayer.
Track List :1. South of Heaven
2. Silent Scream
3. Live Undead
4. Behind the Crooked Cross
5. Mandatory Suicide
6. Ghosts of War
7. Read Between the Lies
8. Cleanse the Soul
9. Dissident Aggressor (Judas Priest cover)
10. Spill the Blood
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