"Slayer is about the dark cloud that hangs over the world"
Tom Araya
Despite their dark lyrics, Slayer are actually a couple of pretty funny
guys. They never seem to take an interview too seriously, and constantly joke around...
Here is a small collection of some of the funniest and most thoughtful things they've
said.
Personal
- Q: Is it weird being the first member of Slayer having a kid?
Tom: I'm not the first. Kerry is the first. I'm sure there will be more to follow.
Unless you are well protected.
- Q: What kind of bass guitar do you have?
Tom: It's made out of wood and it has four strings. Some electrical stuff in it.
(laughing)
- Q: Tom, Do you have a personal E-mail adress?
Tom: Yeah. Dial -- no -- yeah - dial, what is it AOL, what's that? How does it
usually go? AOL.com.pce.oshit, Did I spell it right? Piece of shit? (laughing)
- Tom: "Whenever I see something, I've got this little Slayer
chip in the back of my mind that tries to Slayer-ize everything I do. This chip's
like a little circle with a pentagram in it! It goes into overdrive and it means that
everything gets translated into the Slayer way."
- Q: Would you grow your back hair for charity?
Kerry: I don 't know if there's enough left to grow back for charity!
(laughs) I've got a wrestler's haircut right now but will probably cut it off again before
we head out.
- Q: Do you see similarities between yourself and Homer Simpson?
Kerry: We're both bald, but I'm not yellow or anything. But yeah,
doughnuts rule! And yeah, it would be me that you'd be carrying out of Moe's Tavern every
night.
Their image
- Q: Do your kids ever listen to Slayer?
Tom: (laughing) Well, the kids, huh? You know, yeah, when she gets old enough I
will let her listen to it. Why not? She won't go kill anybody. Because I will. (laughing)
- Q: "Did you want to be notorious from the outset?"
Tom: "I think we just wanted to be the fastest and heaviest band in
the world. All the controversy was solely designed to make people shit in their pants! We
were dark as fuck, fast as fuck and nobody liked us. And I guess we kinda went out of our
way to have that 'manly' look."
Kerry: "To me, the make-up represented rebellion from fucking LA
'pretty' make-up. It was like, 'What can I do to distance myself from Mötley Crüe and
Poison as much as possible?'. That had a lot to do with out motivation."
Tom: "After that, everyone and their fucking mother came out wearing
that shit..."
- About the spikes that Kerry wore on his arm:
Kerry: "Well, I got in the magazines a lot because people associated
Slayer with me and my 'nails'. So it kinda helped the band, even though they were a pain
in the ass to play with..."
Tom: "Yeah, I've got the scars!"
- Q: "In the hindsight, what do you think about the old promo
photos you had done, with the bloodsplattered girl?"
Kerry: "Cool as hell!"
Tom: "Fuck it, we totally set that picture up."
Kerry: "That girl is now Jeff's wife, too. That's why he's holding
her 'fun bags'!"
Music & lyrics
- Q: On the next studio album, what serial killer is there gonna be a song
about?
Tom: About Tom Araya, I'm going to kill the guy that asked the question.
- Q: The other night I had this weird dream that I was at a Slayer concert and
suddenly the music stopped and you said to me something like: "When your life ends
your expired soul goes on" or something, any comments on that?
Tom: Wake up. Maybe you should lay off the beans before you go to bed. (laughing)
- Tom: "As far as thinking about death and murder and various ways
of killing people and how people die... I probably have the most twisted mind in Slayer.
But I'm not going to confess anything. (smiling) Can I see myself doing such things? Not
to that extent. I could see myself doing other things..."
The band
- Q: Have you ever thought about doing an acoustic thrash song?
John: Well, somebody asked Slayer, this is John talking by the way. Somebody asked
Slayer to do an unplugged set and Slayer said when we are unplugged that means we are
walking off the stage.
- Q: How did you get the name Slayer?
Tom: [...] the name DragonSlayer came up, we thought it was corny, we took dragon
off, we thought why don't we leave it Slayer? We took off the first part of that and left
it Slayer because we thought it was cool, easy to chant (laughing). That's what you want,
you want them to chant so you can set your spells and all that stuff, you know.
- Metal Hammer, 1988:
[About making a video with off-stage shootage.]
Tom: I think that would be interesting, because people would understand our
attitudes better. We're basically just silly kids that wanna have a good time.
Tom: "Lyrics is a major fuck-up of mine. Sometimes
I'll sing the same verse through the entire song, because the other verses aren't
clicking. And when they do come to me, I'm in the middle of that same verse! The kids
don't notice, and when I'm singing the wrong verse I'm looking at them all giggling and
they don't realise it, ha ha."
- Q: Do You Think GREEN DAY Should Be Considered Punk?
Tom: They shouldn't even be considered. I don't know, man, they got a couple of hit
songs, a catchy groove, great beat, I give them a 0.
- Q: Do you know Billy Corgan or anyone from Smashing Pumpkins...Or from
Metallica or anything?
Tom: No, we don't know anybody. No one gives us the opportunity to get to know
them.
- Kerry: I don't listen to any death metal bands; they
sound all the same to me. You've got a singer fucking growling! Tom has identity. When you
hear Tom sing, you know it's him. When you hear these guys sing, it sounds like 10 other
bands.
- Q: Who would you prefer to do a cover version of "Dead Skin Mask":
Offspring, Marilyn Manson or Bush?
Kerry: Marilyn Manson, because they are sick enough to do it justice. It's
gotta be up there among our sickest songs.
- Q: Do you have nightmares about Jeffrey Dahmer (deceased US killer)?
Kerry: I have nightmares about Metallica!
- Q: When I was listening to you guys when I was a teenager in the early
nineties, there was a rumor that you guys were into Satanism. True or false?
Tom: There was a rumor what? The rumor, it's true, yeah, that was a rumor. But
whether that's actually true, I don't think so. I think we would have been dead by now or
we would have killed some guy in some band that was bigger than ours and we wanted to be
bigger than them.
- Q: Do you guys goto church?
Tom: Sometimes. Sometimes when I've gone out and murdered somebody I go and confess
and stuff. And then God loves me again.
- Tom when asked about the difference between American and
European audiences:
"You know what my difference is between these two? European communities and American
kids here. In Europe there's more culture, their parents talk to them and bring them up
and understand them. Here, it's 'here's the key to the house, I got to go to work, your
dinner is in the freezer' then leave little notes saying 'see ya later, g'bye'. There is
often no communication at all. Over there in Europe, kids respect their parents cause
their parents respect the and respect their privacy. These kids can do whatever they want
in Europe, as long as their parents know what's going on, and the parents have more
understanding of the kids there than they do here. Here, America is like one for all and
one for one person. That's it."
- Interview in 1985:
Q: Could Slayer be as big as Journey?
Kerry: Possibly...
- Interview in Metal Hammer, 1988:
[About thrash and speed metal getting more and more popular]
Jeff: Look at Metallica: They're playing the biggest venues you can imagine at
the moment!
Interviewer: Could you imagine a similar developement happening with Slayer?
Tom: Basically, yes. Hopefully one day we'll get the chance to play the really
massive halls. We've got some really faithful fans. People keep on predicting our death,
but we just become more successful.
- There is nothing in all modern pop like the moment Slayer takes a stage.
Mikal (?) Gilmore in Rolling Stone (1991) about the "Clash of the Titans" tour.
- I think that Slayer is, without a doubt, probably one of the best live bands in
the world - I can't overstate that.
Dave Mustaine (Megadeth) during the Titans tour.
The Abyss
Maintainer: Janek Hellqvist
Feedback to janek@slaytanic.com