Interview with Kerry King about the new album
From Kerrang!, January 6th 2001 Issue

KERRANG!: What does the new album sound like?

KERRY KING: "Well, we've obviously taken a lot of notice of all the boybands lately, so we decided to take that route. We've got four part harmonies and shit. Nah, everyone asks shit like that. It sounds like Slayer in 2001. It doesn't sound like 'Reign In Blood', it doesn't sound like 'Show No Mercy', but it's got a little bit of all that."

KERRANG! So you still feel any pressure to come up with another 'Reign In Blood'?

KERRY KING: "The truth is, if you released 'Reign In Blood' today, noone would give a shit. It was timing, it was a change in sound. In thrash metal at that time, noone had ever heard good production on a record like that. It was just a bunch of things that came together at once."

KERRANG!: Do Slayer still aspire to a greater lever of success?

KERRY KING: "We did this song for the movie 'Dracula 2000' and we get to incorporate that into our new record too, which is cool. It's a really good song and I think, believe it or not, that somebody on the radio might fuckin play it. There's a couple of songs like that on there and there's a few pissed off, mad-as-hell ones on there too. It's kind of what you'd expect Slayer to be. We've been around for a few fuckin years now and we've always done it without the radio. It's just been about people digging the music and coming to see us play."

KERRANG!: Who has done the writting on the new album?

KERRY KING: "It's funny because on 'Divine Intervention', I wrote most of the music, and on 'Diabolus In Musica', Jeff wrote most of the music, but this one's pretty much straight down the middle. It always depends on what we're into at the time you know? With 'Diabolus', I was pretty anti-music at the time and Jeff had so many songs written, I just thought I'd write the lyrics for them. I wrote 80 per cent of the lyrics on this one too. When we did the song for 'Dracula 2000', we went in to do another song for the WWF album. For a change, they didn't want just an intro, they wanted a song with 'war' in the title, so we just did one called 'Warzone' and I based it on their Monday night show. So that song's going to end up on our album, which is really cool. It's a song which hits you right between the eyes. We've got that, we've got 'Bloodline', the Dracula song, and then there's 'Here Comes The Pain' which we played at the Iron Maiden shows. There's a few that noone's heard yet. We're working on 13 or 14 songs for this album."

KERRANG!: What sort of things have influenced the lyrics on the new album?

KERRY KING: "The thing that has set it apart from how I usually write is that I've put down the synonym finder and wrote how I talk. So the things that I'm writing about aren't like 'satan this' or 'satan that', you know? I think it's more about things that people can relate to. 'Exile' is about what you'd like to do to the one person that gets under your skin, anyone can relate to that. It's a cool Slayer topic, the way it's presented. It's still Slayer's realm. I mean, they're all angry albums but this one is really pissed off."

KERRANG!: How has the lawsuit that was recently brought against the band affected the new songs?

KERRY KING: "Not at all, really. I don't even know what's going on with that. All I know is it's a big money pit. It just shows what you can get away with in America. You wake up, and it's cloudy, so you've got to go and sue somebody for it. Look at our fuckin election. They're suing each other, for what?"

KERRANG!: Which bands have influenced you since the last album?

KERRY KING: "Well, the CD that seems to be in my CD player 90 per cent of the time is the Slipknot album, 'Slipknot'. Because, the rapping aside, when they get angry and pissed off it's great, I love it. I could live without some of the tracks but overall it's the first fresh, heavy, in-your-face, angry thing I've heard in years. I was hoping the Pantera album would be that way ('Reinventing The Steel'), but to me it's just okay. When that came out I was looking to get inspired big-time, but I didn't. It just sounds like they're going through the motions. I'm not listening to a whole lot of music right now, because theoretically I'm supposed to have my Slayer head on."

KERRANG!: How did you decide on Matt Hyde as producer?

KERRY KING: "Earlier in the year we were talking about a number of people and his name kept coming up so he did 'Bloodline' and 'Warzone' with us. We figured, if he did a good job on them we'd use him on the record. He's got a handle on regular recording boards, and he's a handle on Pro-Tools, so we;ve got the best of both worlds. He's been really enthused by the stuff. In fact, he's more excited than I am!"

KERRANG!: Was Ross Robinson ever a likely choice?

KERRY KING: "Well, we met with Ross. I remember seeing it in Kerrang!, that we'd already picked him, but I thought, 'That's not really how it went down!'. The thing is, is you have Ross Robinson you need an engineer as well, because he focuses on performance, which is fine, but if it sounds like shit there's no point. Matt is big on sound and performance, so he's the right man."

KERRANG!: Has the rap-metal scene influenced you at all?

KERRY KING: "Well, our bus driver drove for Papa Roach and I checked them out. It's kinda nifty, I guess, but certainly nothing new. It's just the sound of today. The big test for them, and a lot of other bands, is going to be their second and third albums because people might like them today, but tomorrow they might move on to someone else. I mean, that kind of music to me is really aimed at that kind of crowd, and they're not the fans you want because when you come back around, you're old news. Bands don't seem to go in for dynasties anymore. We've always hovered around the same level of success. We don't get bigger, we don't get smaller. We just keep the machine going. The key is to make a record that your fans will like, but to make it relevant to what's going on at the time."

KERRANG!: Will there be any guest appearances on the new album?

KERRY KING: "I don't think so. There's really no point. Why would we want another vocalist on the record anyway man? Shit, we've got Tom! He's got to be in the top five in this genre of music. You hear his voice and it's like, shit, that's Slayer! What would you need beyond that? I mean, I've done guest things Pantera. We did one backstage at Ozzfest in like 10 minutes. It was just a quirky thing, but it worked. But if anyone guests in a Pantera record, Dimebag Darrell could do what they do anyway. He's probably the best there is, you know?"

KERRANG!: Is the old Slayer logo making a comeback on the new artwork?

KERRY KING: "We got so much flak for the logo on the last album. People said, 'Why did you get rid of the old logo', and we said, 'Well, we didn't, but it really doesn't go with that picture', you know? On tour we were still selling the traditional logo on shirts, but still people gave us shit about it. We probably weeded out the 'Diabolus' shirt quicker than anything because people just freaked out. I'm sure there'll be some incarnation of the old logo on this record."

KERRANG!: Is playing live still the most important thing to Slayer?

KERRY KING: "I think so. I just want to get out there and start playing. I certainly don't do this to sit in the studio. It's like pulling teeth bro!"

KERRANG!: What do you hope to achieve in 2001?

KERRY KING: "I just want to get out and play this stuff to people. I'm tired of fuckin practising. We've got, like, four songs that haven't been finished lyrically and that's all we're waiting on. Even now we're playing five days a week. We've been playing some of these songs since before Ozzfest in '99, so I'm close to being tired of playing 'em already. Maybe we'll do a headline tour. Either that or we'll see what's on the horizon, you know? I mean, I've got no problem supporting someone if it's on a kick-ass tour. I wouldn't be surprised if we come to Europe, because the last couple of times we came over it was for festivals. We haven't done our own tour in Europe since the Slayer/Sepultura on and that was a couple of years ago now. But it's going to be totall cool man. I'm just so stoked with this new stuff."