Slayer - Angel of Death
Angel of death. Monarch to the kingdom of the dead.
Album: Reign in Blood [3rd album]
Recorded: Los Angeles, California
Genre: Metal, Thrash Metal
Album Release: October 20th 1986
Length: 4:51
Producer: Rick Rubin & Slayer
Vocalist: Tom Araya [age 25]
Label: Def Jam Records & Geffen Records
Official Audio
Live at Ozzfest 1996
Live in Maine from 2004
Charts, Streams & Sales
UK (albums): 1x silver
USA (albums): 1x gold
Spotify: 106,000,000 +
YouTube Music: 62,000,000 +
Credits
Bass, drums, guitar [x2]
Details
- Slayer guitarist Jeff Hanneman rates 'Reign in Blood' as hit favourite Slayer album.
- The angel of death referred to in the title is the infamous Nazi doctor Josef Mengele who conducted sickening experiments on prisoners at the Auschwitz concentration camp during the second world war. Some of the lyrics are from Mengele's point of view, "destroying without mercy to benefit the Aryan race" and as such drew condemnation from Holocaust survivors and accusations of racism.
The band denied the allegations on multiple occasions and even had two latino members in their group, Tom Araya and Dave Lombardo, so their advocacy for white supremacy would seem illogical, however, the song was written by their white guitarist Jeff Hanneman. To give the claims credence, Hanneman would be revealed as a collector of Nazi memorabilia and Slayer's promotional materials included the prevalent use of Nazi symbols.
The picture above shows Slayer's logo on the left, which is clearly inspired by the German coat of arms pictured next to it. Also, the 'S' in Slayer is stylised in the same way as as the 'S' in the logo for the SS, who were special forces sworn directly to Hitler. So it's evident that Slayer used Nazi symbolism in their promotional materials.
However, merely depicting a thing doesn't mean you approve of it and Nazi's are frequently featured in the media. It would be foolish to think Steven Spielberg a fascist because he made 'Saving Private Ryan'.
Slayer made extreme music with the intent to shock. Today, people get so tied down in the Nazi imagery they seem to forget about the Satanism also prevalent in the bands image. 'Altar of Sacrifice' became infamous in 1995 after a group of teenage boys killed a 15 year old girl, Elyse Pahler, in San Luis, California because they mistakenly thought sacrificing a virgin to the devil would make them better musicians.
The boys claimed to have been inspired by Slayer's 'Altar of Sacrifice', from the same record as 'Angel of Death', and the Pahler family unsuccessfully sued the band in 2001. The case was thrown out of court because if the plaintiff had won then any artist could be held liable for crimes similar to those present in their work. It would be the death of creativity.
The album art for 'Reign in Blood' is a picture of Lucifer, in the form of a goat, ruling over his agonised minions. The album moves beyond mere symbolism or allegory in 'Altar of Sacrifice', which includes lyrics like "spilling the pure virgin blood, Satan's slaughter, ceremonial death." Undeniably, Slayer's music focuses on negativity, covering topics like Satanism, the Third Reich, serial killers, tyranny and genocide.
Some people are attracted to dark things. True crime is one of the most popular genres on Netflix and horror films like 'Friday the 13th' were successful when 'Reign in Blood' was made in 1986. People would complain about Slayer corrupting the minds of the young and then go to the cinema and watch 'Aliens' or 'The Fly' and not notice the hypocrisy. Every year children dress up as monsters and knock on their neighbours doors to give them a little scare. We actively encourage our kids to embrace the macabre, at least on Halloween, which is to say that the fascination with the grotesque is a deeply embedded current in western culture that was around long before Slayer.
We familiarise ourselves with the feelings experienced in horror so we can be fortified against them in real life. In an emergency you don't want someone who scares easily. Slayer's music doesn't flinch from looking at the evil, the gruesome and the profane. Such things exist not because we want them to but simply because they are and by averting our eyes we only allow them to grow in the shadows unchecked.
When thinking about Slayer, you also have to consider the environment in which they made their music, namely the eighties glam metal scene of Los Angeles. Glam metal was radio-friendly music made by spandex-clad guys with perms. Slayer, and the burgeoning thrash metal bands, wanted to separate themselves stylistically as a more extreme form of metal and did so by using shocking imagery you would never see on a glam metal release.
Slayer didn't exist in a vacuum, creating all this shocking stuff for the sake of it. People wanted to hear what the band were playing and the image was an integral part of that. Vocalist Tom Araya is himself a Roman Catholic. It's not like the band were really sacrificing virgins in the name of the dark lord below or anything. It was a vibe. A vibe that suited their aggressive, brutal sound, connected with listeners, who were willing to pay good money to hear more and shocked their parents, which was part of the appeal for the young people involved. - Musically, the album is a technical masterclass in precision play. The length of the entire thing is just under 29 minutes, which shows how fast the band really were. They got through 10 tracks in under half an hour. Under normal circumstances, I'd consider a release with over 5 tracks and a length of under 30 minutes to be an EP, but 'Reign in Blood' is an exception as it's a complete piece of work tied together as only an album can be.
- Columbia Records refused to release the album because of its tone, artwork and lyrical content.
Artwork
