Reviews list for Slayer - Decade of Aggression: Live (1991)

One of the very elite live albums in metal, Decade of Aggression is one Slayer classic after another, in awesome form.

Some bands release a live album way before they’re due. How many times have you listened to a live album by a band that’s only released one or two full length albums, thinking how insufficient the whole thing is? Then there are those occasions where a band waits far too long to produce a live record and are forced to mix recent misadventures into their otherwise classic set list, or even worse, when the band contains almost no members from the golden era that made them popular to begin with. Slayer’s Live Undead album was a perfect example of the former problem, containing only seven tracks in total, all of which were taken from their debut album and a three track EP. The result was a forgettable and pointless album, which only the most dedicated Slayer fans would really need. With their second attempt, Decade of Aggression, they got the timing exactly right! Slayer had just released a string of masterpieces starting with Reign in Blood and finishing with Seasons in the Abyss, assembling enough brilliant tracks along the way to fill a ninety-minute set with no filler material whatsoever. This was also the last opportunity to produce such a recording with their classic line-up intact, as Dave Lombardo departed soon afterwards. Finally, I think it’s safe to say that Slayer’s output declined from this point onward, making Decade of Aggression the most ultimately timed live album I can think of. None of this would matter however if the guys put in a bad performance on the night, or if the recording quality wasn’t ideal.

Thankfully, these legends of thrash metal put in near flawless performances (there are some minor stuff-ups but nothing worth mentioning) when cranking out these tunes at the peak of their career. Having recently experienced Slayer live in concert in Sydney, I know firsthand just how good they really are, and how difficult it would be to capture the energy they create in purely audio form. Decade of Aggression does a damn fine job of it and is rightfully considered one of the very elite live albums in metal, right up there with Live After Death, No Sleep 'til Hammersmith and Unleashed in the East. While you wouldn’t know it when listening to it, the tracks were recorded at three separate concerts between October 1990 and July 1991. The whole first disc was performed at the Lakeland Coliseum in Lakeland, Florida on July the 13th, 1991, and there’s no doubt that this opening disc is the better of the two, containing most of Slayer’s absolute classics one after the other, with no drop off in intensity or quality. Hell Awaits is a perfect way to get things rolling with its extended intro followed by numerous mosh-worthy riffs, and when the next fifty minutes include gems such as War Ensemble, South of Heaven, Raining Blood, Dead Skin Mask, Seasons in the Abyss and Angel of Death, you’ve got one strong and consistently awe-inspiring disc of thrash metal. On its own, disc one would have satisfied most Slayer fans, but there’s a whole second disc to delve into, making Decade of Aggression both tremendous value and a comprehensive package all up.

The second disc contains material from two separate concerts, seamlessly combined with very similar (great) sound quality. Seven out of the ten tracks were recorded at the Orange Pavilion, San Bernardino, California on the 8th of March 1991, whereas the other three were performed at the Wembley Arena in London on October the 14th, 1990. There’s no doubt that the second disc struggles to hold the stupendously high quality of the first one, and just starts to scrape the bottom of an abundantly plentiful barrel. Most bands would kill to have a set list anything like this second disc alone though, so it’s hard to complain about it all that much. When your less demanded tracks contain the quality of Captor of Sin, Expendable Youth and Born of Fire, you’ve got to be a seriously top-class band, and then there’s that little track called Chemical Warfare that brings Decade of Aggression to a crushing close in fine style, wiping any minor stumbles from memory entirely. Honestly, I’m not a huge fan of live albums, which is likely the only reason I won’t give Decade of Aggression a full five stars. It’s probably as close as a live album will get though, and I find nothing to complain about from production, performance or track selection point of views. The only noticeable absence would be that the Hell Awaits album is only represented by the title track, but this little oversight can be corrected by tracking down the limited edition which contains At Dawn They Sleep (as well as Skeletons of Society) as a bonus track. Essential Slayer!