Hi and welcome to this
Slayer review, this album is called
God Hates Us All and this album is a bit different from the other
Slayer albums that I have heard. The things I noticed pretty quick about this album was that the overall sound was thicker and heavier, Tom's vocals was much more stronger and louder and the songs were more aggressive than in the bands previous albums. But when I listen to this album I just dislike it more and more I'm afriad and I will tell you why in a moment, just keep on reading if want to found out more about my opinions about this album.
We move on the the crew who made this album. We begin with frontman Tom Araya (vocals and bass), well what can I say, I think that Tom's performance in this album was decent. The things that I didn't like about his performance was that the vocals was to loud, my ears hurt when I listen to this album. I think though he does a good attempt to sound powerful but he sounds just ''obsessed'' and the vocals seems to be bit overdone. And then we have his bass, of all Slayer albums that I have heard yet I have not been able to detect any clear bass lines, solos or even filler sections. The bass is almost totally non-existent in this album, the only things which are heavy is the guitars and the drums. We take a look at Kerry King and Jeff Hanneman, in my opinion these guys does a better work than Tom. The guitars are now more thicker and solid, the riffing is heavier but the guitar solos are horrible to me. After nearly 20 years they still can't deliver any bone breaking solos, the solos here are most of the times high-pitched, disoriented and chaotic. There is no sign of melody or speed, though there are a few solos that might grab your attention but there are no true hgihlight solos here. Paul Bostaph in other hand does a pretty good performance with his drumming. The patterns has good variety, both slow and fast paces but, I thought that Slayer had more speed in their newer material than this.
Let's have a closer look at the main material of this album. The album opens with a intro track called
Darkness Of Crist, it is just 1:30 minutes of distorted sound effects, both instruments and a female who is speaking plus Araya's screaming in the end, boring intro. The album contines with
Disciple, the intro begins great with fast drumming and somewhat haunting guitars, the tempo in the song is though pretty fast. Araya enters with his screaming, the verses are fast but the song slows down in pace during the chorus which weakens the song in my opinion. The guitar solo in this song is quite good but to short, decent song except for Araya's vocals.
God Send Death enters with souring guitars and heavy drumbeats later kicks in, the tempo is turned up to classic thrashing tempo. But the song suddenly slows down in the chorus which was once more a disappointment for me, the riffing is though quite heavy but the screaming guitar effects in the background also makes the song less enjoyable, skilled but yet uninteresting guitar solos.
New Faith begins with catchy intro shredding along with fast and heavy drumbeats, the song is though very catchy and is one of my few favorite tracks. The song has a bit melody in it and it sounds like a classic thrash-metal song, heavy, fast and catchy.
Cast Down also begins with quite fast and catchy shredding, the song as a swifting pace which was less good, some of the drum patterns does not really fits in the song at some moments. Not a good song, if the tempo was more simplistic and not so changing it would been a better song.
Threshold begins with catchy intro riffing and fast drumbeats, the pace slows down again when Araya kicks in with his screaming. The song is heavy and the tempo is quite medium, nor fast or slow. This song is also no highlight because of the vocals and the tempo in my opinion.
Exile delivers bursts of fast riffing and fast drumbeats, the tempo is increased short after when Araya enters. I can't understand why the song must slow down when Araya starts to sings, the instruments sounds fast but the tempo feels slow. Once again the solos fail to grab my attention, screaming and high-pithced distorted notes that just hurt my ears.
Seven Faces starts with slow and haunting guitar notes, the song bursts and Araya delivers a high and loud scream. The tempo is not fast except for the fast drum work, non-catchy song with a boring guitar solo.
Bloodline is my only real favorite trackin this album, the song starts off very slow but the that's about to change. After a slow start the guitar are playing very catchy and heavy triplet riffing, the song in genral is catchy and heavy but the loud vocals is just annoying to me, great song though.
Deviance starts with what seems to be a cop or something talking in a radio, a woman is screaming in the background for some reason. Spooky guitars is playing along and the later the songs gets more serious, Araya's vocals are finally for a short moment lower and more quiet. But not for long, the tempo is slow and the song is not catchy to me. The whole song in general is bugging me because of the slow pace, loud screaming and wierd guitar solo.
War Zone enters with a fast and heavy intro, great drumming and finally some speed in the guitars. The song has a good tempo and thats because of the great drum work, the song is prett catchy but I can't stand these vocals! Great song but the vocals is the only problem though.
Here Comes The Pain starts off heavy with spooky guitar effects and heavy drum beats, the song feels quite heavy, the tempo is good and I can endure the vocals pretty good. But the tempo in this song also goes up and down and that makes the song boring with time plus more bad but skilled soloing.
Payback goes out hard with fast and heavy riffing, the drums has the classic thrashing pattern and the tempo is finally on the right track. The pace is fast and the song is quite catchy and heavy, a pretty good song to end this album.
Finally, its over. This is how I feel about this album and I thought that it sounded almost horrible. I may have upset quite many
Slayer fans but I don't care, this is my opinion and you just have to accept it. The songs were bad except for a few stand-outs, the major things that bugged me was Araya's loud screaming, the sluggish tempos and the chaotic, non-melodic and screaming guitar soloing. I would only recommend this album to dedicated
Slayer fans and/or death-metal fans, this is nothing for a beginner who wants to hear how Slayer sounds like. I hope this review was enjoying and I hope it has been a good guidance.
PROS
+ The overall sound is heavier and thicker
+ Pretty cool album cover (yes, the blood-stained bible)
CONS
- Some melody wouldn't hurt
- Why have a bassist when you can't hear the bass!
- The true evil and sinister Slayer sound is almost gone here
- Shut it Araya! Your loud screaming is too loud here
- The tracks had almost serious problems with their tempos
RECOMMENDED TRACKS
-- Bloodline
-- New Faith
-- Payback
Sorry but this album was nothing to me and the overall album rating will be:
2/5
