Louder Than Hell: The Definitive Oral History of Metal (36 page)

Metallica persevered with Jason Newsted and started working on its most progressive album up to that point, the schizophrenic . . .
And Justice for All
. At the same time, Slayer was injecting thrash with a new degree of intensity and malice, thanks to the blinding ferocity of
Reign in Blood
, which was released October 7, 1986. It was Slayer’s fastest, most lyrically vicious and controversial album. Produced by Rick Rubin,
Reign in Blood
featured graphic cover art and ultraviolent lyrics—especially those in “Angel of Death,” a song about the grisly human experiments performed in concentration camps by Nazi doctor Josef Mengele during World War II. Largely because of the song, Def Jam’s distributor, Columbia Records, refused to release the album.
Reign in Blood
ultimately came out on Geffen Records, a more daring label. It became Slayer’s first gold album.

DIMEBAG DARRELL:
Slayer’s
Reign in Blood
was groundbreaking. They did shit that was unorthodox. They did shit that was out of the books, but somehow it wasn’t out of place. There were two wild-ass crazy guitars, and you’re going, “What key are they in and what kind of lead playing are they doing?” But it’s just so
bad
, dude. Nobody can play it because nobody can figure it out.

SCOTT IAN:
Reign in Blood
defines thrash metal. If anyone ever has a question of what thrash metal sounds like, just put on
Reign in Blood
. The songs are amazing, the riffs are sick, and it’s heavy as hell from start to finish.

TOM ARAYA:
At the time we did
Reign in Blood
, everyone was all about being politically correct. We got accused of being neo-Nazis because of “Angel of Death.” If you look at it, the song just tells a story. It doesn’t glorify anything. Anyone who thinks we’re Nazis isn’t paying close attention because I’m originally from Chile, so I’m a minority, and that would have to mean I hate myself.

KERRY KING:
We like being the bad guys. We branded ourselves as that years ago because we write about shit no one else will. It’s better than singing about posies. When I go to movies, I always cheer for the bad guys. The thing that pisses me off is the bad guys always get killed in the end of the movies. I just like to ignore that part.

JEFF HANNEMAN:
We’re not praising Mengele or terrorists or serial killers. We just write from their perspective. I’ve got some German war artifacts, and a lot of people don’t understand it. They say, “Why would you have that in your house?” But it’s cool. It’s evil. It’s part of what being in Slayer is. And it’s a major part of history. It doesn’t mean I’m a Nazi, because I’m not and I don’t want to be one. Since we did “Angel of Death” I’ve had three occasions where somebody will go, “Psst, hey. I’m part of this Aryan world nation group and we’re thinking of having you speak.” I’m like, “Why?” And they’ll go, “
You
know.” I’ll be like, “No, why?” And they’ll go, “Aren’t you . . . ?” I’m like, “What? No. Go away. You don’t get me at all.”

LEMMY KILMISTER:
I collect German war memorabilia because the Nazis made the best shit. I’ve often said if Israel made the best stuff I’d collect that, but they didn’t. The Germans had the best uniforms. The bad guys always have the best stuff—the Confederates, Napoleon. I’ve been collecting ever since I first came to America because this is where all the stuff is. GIs were allowed to ship anything home. And now it’s worth plenty. It isn’t skinheads who are collecting this shit, it’s dentists and doctors.

DAVID DRAIMAN (Disturbed):
That’s super-duper taboo and offensive to me. It’s the most provocative imagery, and that’s why people utilize it. If that’s their goal, I guess they’re achieving it, but just know there are going to be repercussions. I don’t give a fuck who you are. If you’re going to brandish Nazi symbolism, I’m going to have a problem with you because I don’t understand how anybody could think it’s okay to wear something on their body that symbolizes the annihilation and genocide of my people. There is no excuse for that and there is no explanation.

Numerous German thrash bands were greatly inspired by Slayer, but they stayed away from any sort of nationalistic imagery because it hit too close to home, instead embracing tried-and-true tales of death, dismemberment, monsters, and demons. The main players in the Kraut metal kingdom were Sodom, Kreator, and Destruction.

GENE HOGLAN:
We were all fans of Destruction, and we liked Sodom because they were so bad and could barely play their instruments—kind of like Venom. And Kreator were just trying to do the hyper-blur thing that was really cool.

MILAND “MILLE” PETROZZA (Kreator):
Being fifteen-year-old kids when we started the band, we were like, “Man, we gotta be Satanic like Venom.” So we got books and tried to celebrate the black mass. The Satanic thing was a gimmick to me that was really entertaining. Of course we thought for maybe a year or so that we were real Satanists, but then we were like, “Ah, this is all bullshit. It doesn’t work.”

TOM ANGELRIPPER (Sodom):
I read a lot of books by and about Aleister Crowley, like
The Beast: 666
and
Equinox
. I was really inspired by his lyrical writing, but by the time we did our 1986 debut
Obsessed by Cruelty
I realized that it gives me nothing. We never practiced any of the rituals. We had some black candles and skulls in the rehearsal room, but I think it was just funny. By 1987 we did
Persecution Mania
and I wanted to write more political songs that were heavier and faster than Venom.

While the German thrash bands Kreator, Sodom, and Destruction played an important role in building upon the sounds of Slayer and Venom, it was a group from Brazil, Sepultura, that ultimately became the most innovative and influential non-American thrash band.

IGOR CAVALERA (ex-Sepultura):
My father used to tell me that I didn’t pick drums, the drums picked me. Once we went to a restaurant and they had drums there for some old people to play jazz, and I couldn’t eat. I would just stare at the drums. I started playing right around that time. I was seven.

MAX CAVALERA (ex-Sepultura):
Igor never actually got a drum kit until after [Sepultura’s 1986 album]
Morbid Visions
. He used to practice on the sofa, and then he used pots and pans. I really wanted to be a drummer, too, man, but he was so much better than me. Guitar was my second choice, but I was never completely serious because I’m a drummer at heart. I only use the four lowest strings. One of the strings broke once, and I was like, fuck it, I don’t use it anyway, so I just got rid of the two high strings.

IGOR CAVALERA:
That’s something I look at in a very positive way. Max doesn’t treat the guitar like a lot of players do. He’s a lot more percussive.

MAX CAVALERA:
Our first jams were crazy. Igor’s drum kit was a broom with one cymbal, a snare from marching band, and a bass drum from school band. Our first bass player, [Roberto] “Gato” [Raffan], had a dad who was a missionary Canadian preacher. We had a guitar player, Julio [Cesar Vieira Franco], and he was a full-on doctor doing surgery. He was thirty-five and we were, like, fifteen. Then we had another guitarist Roberto [UFO] whose mom wouldn’t let him go out after ten. He missed one of our very first shows because it was too late.

At first, Sepultura’s ambition substituted for their lack of talent and experience, but it didn’t take long for front men Max and Igor Cavalera to hone their musical chops and songwriting skills. The band’s 1986 full-length debut,
Morbid Visions
, was brutal and primitive, and the more refined 1987 follow-up,
Schizophrenia
, set the stage for its deal with American indie label Roadrunner.

MAX CAVALERA:
I got a meeting with Roadrunner in New York, and a friend gave me an employee airline ticket. I had to travel with a tie and my hair pulled back and say I worked for Pan Am Airlines. It was the only way for me to get to America. And when we got there, they signed us.

STEFFAN CHIRAZI:
At first, Sepultura were a little messy, but when
Chaos AD
came out [in 1993] it brought everything into focus. Then, of course, there was
Roots
; it was percussive, it was conscientious. These guys weren’t just singing about darkness and violence. It was relevant shit. That’s one thing you can say about Max Cavalera. He’s one of those guys you would point a stranger to if you wanted to explain how this music can actually be a really positive and educational force.

MAX CAVALERA:
The music is angry and pissed off, but it’s also very personal and passionate. I don’t want to write songs about serial killers, and I get really angry when people think we’re a negative influence or blame us for something violent. We played this big show in São Paulo and one of our fans got killed with an axe by some skinheads. I realized, “Fuck, we were the soundtrack of that brutality.” The next day every newspaper was blaming us, and we had nothing to do with it. We just did a show. That was so upsetting to me. Our fan took a fucking axe to the chest.

While Anthrax launched around the same time as Metallica, it took them a few more years to reach a serious level of critical and commercial acclaim. That era began with their groundbreaking 1987 album,
Among the Living
, which featured speed-freak tempos, propulsive yet memorable riffs, and plenty of sing-along vocals.

SCOTT IAN:
We were really on a roll in every way business-wise, creative-wise, emotionally. We played London and Lemmy from Motörhead came to our show. Every little thing was a huge fucking deal. I remember [drummer] Charlie [Benante] coming in with the riff to “I Am the Law,” and I was like, “Oh, my god. Fucking huge.” That and “Indians” were the first two songs we wrote for
Among the Living
, which a lot of people consider our best album. We were already playing them on the
Spreading the Disease
tour. Our confidence was so high. It’s almost like we were being guided by the power of metal. It was out of our hands. We were being used as the tool to make the record that needed to be made.

DAN SPITZ (ex-Anthrax):
That record was Anthrax to a tee. Charlie and Scott come from a hardcore background and they’re bringing that to the music, and me and Joey are connecting musically, inflicting a lot of melody into the band, and [bassist] Frankie [Bello] is barreling right down the middle filling every gap.

SCOTT IAN:
In 1986, we were suddenly the big kids on the block in New York. We had a record on a major label; we were all-original. Coming up, you could never get gigs unless you were a Van Halen cover band. But here we were in ’86, we almost had a hundred thousand records sold, and we could sell out the Ritz. It was kind of a big “fuck you” to a lot of people who stood in our way for years.

For all the tragedy, turmoil, controversy, scuffles, addiction, and shake-ups that plagued the thrash metal community, there were plenty of good times; many, many memorable moments; and the kind of sexual misadventures non-glam bands had once only dreamed about—thanks in part to the coverage of the music by MTV’s
Headbangers Ball
.

GARY HOLT:
When we did the MTV Headbangers Ball tour [with Anthrax and Helloween in 1989], it was about as close to a Mötley Crüe kind of scene as we were ever gonna know. We’d roll into town every day and there’d be thirty or forty women hanging outside. The real beauty of it was the other bands on the tour weren’t debauched like us. We were fuckin’ chicks every day, all day, multiple amounts, and really thinking it was ridiculous because we’re not a hair band. “Why is this happening? Who cares? Just enjoy it!” The really crazy stuff usually involved the road crews. You look at some of these guys and go, “Okay, he has never been laid in his life.” And all of a sudden he has the power of the backstage pass. I’ve seen chicks with flashlights up their pussy drinking beer out of dog dishes and girls blowing, like, twenty guys just to get that fuckin’ pass. Everybody in the band knows what she did to get it and no one’s gonna touch her! No one wants to give her a hug. She blew all these dirty old guys instead of the dirty young guys.

KIRK HAMMETT:
I couldn’t figure out why all of a sudden I was handsome. A fat bank account will make you look handsome. No one had ever treated me like that before in my life.

LARS ULRICH:
We all had some pretty slutty moments. I don’t think there’s anybody in this band who hasn’t had crabs a couple times or the occasional drip-dick.

LEMMY KILMISTER:
I don’t care what people say. They’re in it for the pussy, you know? The music’s important too, but it’s more about the pussy.

DAVE MUSTAINE:
I think that heavy metal is obviously very sexual. Rock and roll itself is Negro slang for having sex. But there was a time before I got married when I couldn’t fuck just one girl. I had to have two fucking each other for me to even get excited. That’s when I started to think, “Man, I’m losing my perspective on things because pretty soon I’m gonna have to get a whole girl scout troop in there just to get an erection.”