Slayer - South of Heaven (1988)Release ID: 63
South of Heaven was my first favorite album. The first one I ever listened to while thinking “god damn, this is music for me.” I had never heard sincerely dark or heavy music before that, and I never looked back.
It all started with my first videogame, DOOM. I played that game when I was just 2 years old – I worked the gun while my father did everything else, but it was still an incredibly memorable experience that was burned into my memory. I didn’t play the game for a long span of time because we had to get rid of it after Columbine happened, and then it became kind of a pipe dream to be able to play it again.
It was actually right as I was entering public school in 8th grade (I was homeschooled prior) that we managed to get the game again. Man that was a triumphant moment, and the game was just as great as I remembered. However, one thing that struck me was the music – holy hell, that music kicked ass.
I wasn’t even into music yet at this age. I listened to The Beatles, I listened to whatever the parents had, and I didn’t really listen too intently. I didn’t even know what metal really was, other than hearsay. But I LOVED this game’s music. I went to shady websites to download mp3s of the game tracks, and naturally, I started reading up about it more. Well it turns out a ton of the tracks are based on real songs by real bands – all metal bands I had never heard of save Metallica. I had to get this stuff.
I actually downloaded all of the original songs without listening to any of them first, bought my first mp3 player, and then listened to them all at once. It was a rite of passage of sorts. I loved everything I heard, even the gruff stuff like Pantera, who’s vocals were too much for me but the riffs were good enough to get through it. This new form of dark, aggressive music was striking all my chords, even though I had no experience with it. But at the end of the list – as the bands were in alphabetical order and there were only 10 or so – was Slayer.
Slayer hit different.
The three songs from DOOM were “South of Heaven” “Silent Scream” and “Behind the Crooked Cross” and they instantly became my favorite songs (barring “The Long and Winding Road", which will never not be one of the most beautiful songs ever). Such condensed aggression and evil had never struck me in aural form like that before. I mean, even Pantera, who were just as heavy, didn’t sound nearly as dark and evil as this. And the lyrics! Holy hell, they were actually disturbing at that age. A song about abortion – what the hell was that. And I loved them.
Finding that the songs were all from the same album, I got it immediately – digitally, physically, everything. I didn’t even know what riffs were before this! This was insane to me. The whole album was just as good as the few songs I’d heard. I easily listened to it at least once everyday for probably the rest of that school semester. And it ended up being really important in me finding my identity in a crucial period of life – I now knew that metal was my passion. I knew what kind of music I liked, I could talk about it, I met people through it, and I searched for more.
The funny thing is, though Slayer remains my favorite band, their other material didn’t click with me at first. Turns out this album was Slayer at their slowest and most melodic; if I started with any other album, I may not have been infected so easily. But yes, it was South of Heaven that turned me into a full-time metalhead, and it was the first album I could confidently say was my favorite. Listening to it while writing this review, I’m not surprised in the slightest that it gives me the same feeling of intense bliss as it did nearly 10 years ago, still comfortably sitting among my favorite albums of all time.
Smartly changing direction to avoid comparisons to Reign in Blood, this harshly judged album contains numerous Slayer classics.
How exactly do you follow up one of the most extreme and critically praised albums in the history of metal? That was the challenge facing Slayer after the success of their infamous Reign in Blood release in 1986. While it was not the Slayer way to sit down prior to writing an album and discuss what direction the band should take, that’s exactly what they did in this instance. Sensibly, the band was smart enough to realise that trying to outdo their previous outing was likely to end in failure, as they’d squeezed every drop of intensity and velocity out of their collective awesomeness for that recording. The only way to avoid endless comparisons to Reign in Blood was to slow the tempo down and create a completely different album without alienating their fans. No easy task and it looked like it was going to get a heck of a lot harder when Dave Lombardo quit the band one month into the band’s US tour at the end of 1986. He has since stated “I wasn't making any money. I figured if we were gonna be doing this professionally, on a major label, I wanted my rent and utilities paid” which shows just how hard it is to make a living out of playing metal music, even when you belong to one of the very elite bands in the scene. Thankfully, Lombardo’s wife was able to convince him to return to Slayer in 1987, resulting in an unchanged line-up when it came time to record the bands fourth full length studio album.
On the 5th of July 1988, impatient Slayer fans were finally given the opportunity to experience South of Heaven and make their judgements. While shifting gears would require slightly different writing processes, it didn’t necessitate changing everything that made Reign in Blood so special. Rick Rubin once again produced the album after being hugely responsible for the successful development of the band’s sound. The crystal-clear clarity of the production remains with the only noticeable difference being that Lombardo’s drums have been given far greater emphasis, which works perfectly well given the more measured tempo of the new material. Larry Carroll was also asked to design the cover artwork for a second time after his controversial yet striking effort for Reign in Blood. He evidently relished the opportunity to paint another morbid vision of satanic horror, this time surrounding a skull and inverted cross centrepiece with a collection of bizarre devils and tormented souls. The lyrics continue to alternate between war, satanic imagery and the darker side of humanity, but this time King took a step back while Araya got involved in the writing for the first time. This switch resulted in less focus on immature evil subject matter and more on the human psychology and studies of warfare that would become more prevalent in Slayer albums over the next two decades.
With all the above still firmly in place, all that was left to be seen was whether a slower, more calculated Slayer could possibly match up to the exhilaratingly intense version we all worshipped. Many fans were not initially convinced, perhaps disappointed that the band had not attempted to take metal to even further extremities. The critical response was just as mixed, with some praising Slayer for not repeating themselves and still managing to create a disturbing and powerful album, while others labelled it a failure, suggesting the band had lost their edge. Over time, many of these naysayers would come to change their mind, as South of Heaven gradually dug its way under their skin, with numerous tracks including the title track and Mandatory Suicide becoming part of the staple live set. The band themselves have often suggested that South of Heaven is well down the list of highlights in the Slayer discography. King describes his performance as his “most lacklustre” and labels the album one of his least favourite Slayer releases. Lombardo was quoted as saying “there was a fire on all the records, but that started dimming when South of Heaven came into the picture”. It seems that it’s only Araya that thinks highly of the album today, saying “the album was a late bloomer. It wasn’t really received well, but it kind of grew on everybody later.”
All this negativity seems surprising to me. Personally, I think the first half of South of Heaven is absolutely on par with anything else the band has produced, with the title track, Silent Scream, Mandatory Suicide and Ghosts of War absolutely kicking ass. The extra weight given to Lombardo’s performance makes South of Heaven magnificent, and when combined with Araya’s slightly more melodic “singing” and King and Hanneman’s haunting riffs and characteristically insane leads, what’s not to love?! Slayer have a remarkable ability to write stunning, unforgettable opening riffs to their tracks that make the transitions from track to track immensely exciting, and South of Heaven is filled with them. I can’t help but feel that expectations are the main reason that so many fans have failed to embrace an album that for all intents and purposes, is classic Slayer. Sure, it’s slower, but it’s just as dark and potent. It’s not like they completely dropped the velocity either as plenty of these tracks hit top gear at various stages, with Silent Scream and Ghosts of War emitting towering levels of energy. South of Heaven contains the variety that Reign in Blood simply does not and while I won’t for a second suggest it’s the better of the two, my reasoning for this is more to do with consistency than quality.
The second half of the album is not quite as high-quality as the first, with Read Between the Lines beginning a late album lull that prevents me from considering a full five stars for the record. It lacks the immediately recognisable hooks that make the superior tracks so memorable and Cleanse the Soul just doesn’t do enough to recover lost ground. It’s not as bad however as King suggested when he claimed “that's one of the black marks in our history, in my book. I just fucking think it's horrible”, but it’s certainly no classic either. Then there’s Dissident Aggressor. Anyone that’s wondered why this track has a different feel to the rest of South of Heaven, may not realise that it’s a Judas Priest cover, originally from their classic 1977 Sin After Sin album. Slayer sure gave it a far nastier edge than the original and it’s not half bad, but its heavy metal guitar squeals and Black Sabbath-like riffs stand out like a sore thumb. Thankfully, Spill the Blood stops the rot and brings the album to a close in the most gloriously majestic way, utilising non-distorted guitar and Araya’s evocative voice to create an eerie, ominous atmosphere. It’s a fine finale to yet another enjoyable Slayer album that’s perhaps a bit underrated. South of Heaven has the unfortunate position of being sandwiched between the band’s most loved albums, but despite the second phase stutters, contains enough quality material to not be overshadowed. Ignore it at your peril!
When it comes to the “big four” of thrash metal, I’ve always been a huge fan of Metallica, Megadeth and Anthrax, yet, for reasons unexplainable, I’ve never been able to get into Slayer. 1986’s ‘Reign in Blood’ is often hailed as one of the all-time greatest metal albums, though, other than it’s absolutely killer opening and closing tracks, I find the record to be mindless drivel (ooh, controversial...).
Yet here we are; 1988’s ‘South of Heaven’, the album where the band infamously “slowed down”. Admittedly, the songs are a bit more polished here, and the riffs are more than just open-string chugging away. Although the album as a whole is still pretty repetitive, and doesn’t sound any different than anything the band have done before.
Still, I’ll give Slayer their due. ‘South of Heaven’ is better than anything they had released beforehand, and if vocalist Tom Ayara could somehow implement just a little bit of melody in his singing, they could really be onto something. Instead, as always, while the musicianship is of a high standard, I find the vocals tend to just sit on top of the riffs, without really fitting in too well.
If I had to pick any highlights out, I’d say the title track, as well as ‘Silent Scream’, ‘Live Undead’ and ‘Mandatory Suicide’ are all decent enough, and there’s ‘Behind the Crooked Cross’, which I instantly recognized due to its use in 8-bit midi glory in the video game ‘Doom’ (a game I played religiously in my childhood, years before I should have been allowed to). But as is always the case with Slayer, I’m just not that big a fan, and would much rather listen to any other member of the big four.
Having just come off the backs of Seasons in the Abyss and Reign in Blood, I came to realize something: Seasons isn't just a less heavy album than Reign in Blood, but compared to Reign in Blood it feels so light! It's like sleeping in wool and then going back to a different blanket: you're just not as satisfied. Slayer themselves remained fast and heavy, but how could they lower the quality of their best skill over the course of two albums!? The best way to compare albums from the same genre is to first listen to several albums by one band at the same time and then compare those to each other first, and compare them to another band's catalog later. I remember having heard the first five Slayer albums in a single marathon, although I forget exactly which year I did that. But I had one strong opinion: Reign in Blood might've been the heaviest, but it was a bit monotonous. In fact, it reminded me of the Ramones debut for its length, sameyness and energy. This was better than the Ramones debut, but a contender for the greatest thrash metal album of all time? I look at things from VARIOUS angles, especially albums.
The way I see it, Reign in Blood and Seasons both make this mistake. And both are likely the most beloved of the five classic Slayer albums because they're arguably the fastest and most guitar-driven. But if Metallica ever proved anything, it's that you should NEVER be afraid of a change of pace, especially since there was no fucking way Slayer could recreate RiB, and the last thing they wanted was to go back to their speed metal days which had died out with the rest of whatever remnants of a scene there was. So what do we get? A slower tempo that's just as heavy as it needs to be. It might not be Reign in Blood heavy, but albums that focus on that before anything tend to ignore simple things like WRITING and CREATIVITY (looking at you, Pleasure to Kill). South of Heaven was all about changing that pace, and as a result it's not as fast throughout, and some would say that it's not as heavy. However, the album still has more power than Seasons.
I don't know about you, but if the band thought they could get away with the same song over and over again not just for one album but more, I would've lost respect for them. Instead, the took the approach I would've taken: take some time to fixate on melody. There's a reason Slayer's not selling the way Metallica is: Metallica knows melody like they were born and raised by it. And despite the slower tempo of the title track, there's a lot of punk attitude that we NEED in an early Slayer album, and fans of the old stuff still get what they want really early as the next track, "Silent Scream," is rooted deeply in that sound, but still there's a focus on rhythm. And the lyrics have to take over for the focus, and lemme tell you, this is fucking dark. Honestly, I don't know how they're comfortable singing this. At least they aren't Devourment. But they create the apocalyptic / ritualistic vibe perfectly with lyrics alone. Just from a critical viewpoint, this has to be one of their top five songs! And it's almost as heavy as anything from RiB. And speaking of the apocalyptic vibe, "Live Undead" handles that perfectly. The careful vibe may be slow for Slayer songs, and that's what makes it feel so apocalyptic. But the music is still brutal in every way imaginable, and it turns into a real thrash song with incredible speed in the second half, and the transition feels completely natural. "Behind the Crooked Cross" shows off the early groove sound that Slayer were going to take part in later on albums like God Hates Us All, but the thrash brutality is still perfectly healthy, hell even strong enough to tear a gorilla's arm off. "Mandatory Suicide" brings back that crossover attitude, but takes time to be catchy and jam for a while. The riffs at the end of the song sound like wailing monsters.
"Ghosts of War" goes right back to the classic thrashing, and it's probably the fastest song on the album. And it's so heavy that it sounds like it belongs on RiB, so as opposed to sounding like they're copying themselves, it's a piece of nostalgia. Even when the song slows down in the second half, it's still as brutal as ever. Afterwards is "Read Between the Lines" in which a careful balance between groove and thrash melodies aid Araya as he almost raps about his problems with preachy evangelists. I'm just gonna say it, I might be Christian, but I COMPLETELY understand why these guys are fed up with organized religion. And afterwards, we get another vicious and noisy work of thrash bombast: "Cleanse the Soul." It was at this point that I decided that "Ghosts of War" wasn't the heaviest song, it was "Cleanse the Soul," going at a whopping 200 bpm, and being the noisiest song so far. This was the true recreation of Reign in Blood without looking like they ran out of ideas. Next came "Dissident Aggressor," which more more about slow-building tension, but still took instrumental power and force into account. Despite the slow build, it's only two-and-a-half minutes, and it uses every second wisely with brute force still being present. Finally, we get "Spill the Blood," which isn't exactly the most proper song title to use in an episode of Sesame Street, right? This might be sluggish for them, but the way they handle the vicious atmosphere is flawless, and the focus on making an actual tune brings out a side of Slayer that hasn't quite been seen before, but feels in place for this album because there were hints of all of these albums strengths present in preceding songs on this album. But at the same time, I'm left wishing for more songs like this, and I didn't get a lot of songs like this all the way up to God Hates Us All.
Well, I'm fully convinced that from a creative standpopint, this is the best Slayer album. It's perfectly consistent while still being a thrash album first and foremost, boasting some strong groove and crossover elements, taking time to build a seriously apocalyptic mood through tempo and lyrics, and being filled to the brim with some of their best riffs. Reign in Blood is a little short and a bit too monotonous, and Seasons in the Abyss just isn't even heavy enough for me when compared to RiB, but South of Heaven carries songs perfectly fit for RiB and has a lot of its own identity at the same time. This is exactly what a thrash album needs to be, and I put this in the same league as Master of Puppets. ANd I feel like not only does this album fit my long-standing standards for perfection, but also taught me something about thrash.
