Slayer is one the world’s most popular and influential heavy metal bands, so it’s a little surprising that their home video material has been so unimpressive. 1995’s concert video Live Intrusion showcased a lackluster performance, and 2003’s War at the Warfield was similarly underwhelming. If you’ve ever seen Slayer in concert, you know that when the band is firing on all cylinders, they are absolutely devastating. For a band known for its amazing concerts as well as a truly awesome live album Decade of Aggression, the substandard home videos have been very frustrating. However, Still Reigning goes a long way to fixing the problem. It’s still not a perfect DVD, but it is by far the best home video release Slayer has ever done.
The DVD was filmed on one of the band’s recent tours, in which their played their classic Reign in Blood album in its entirety. Although I don’t have any real quarrel with Slayer’s recent concert set lists (except for the stubborn insistence on playing “Stain of Mind”, even though it’s easily one of the weakest songs they’ve ever done), it’s nice to be able to hear the band play forgotten classics like “Piece by Piece” and “Epidemic”. For the finale, the band is showered with a rain of fake blood, which looks kind of cool, although not worth the amount of hype that it’s received. Yes, blood actually rains on Slayer. So what? The music is the real draw here.
What is really nice about this DVD is that unlike Live Intrusion and War at the Warfield, the band puts on a great show. On previous releases they sounded kind of sloppy and tired; here, they’re actually putting forth some effort. There’s nothing like actually seeing Slayer live, but not since Decade of Aggression have they released something that comes close to reproducing the experience.
To top things off, a documentary about the band has also been included on the DVD. All four members get a chance to talk abut the band, and we get to see the preparations for the show. It’s nothing spectacular, although it is much, much better than the idiotic “Fans Rule” documentary on War at the Warfield.
Although I like the DVD, I still a few complaints. For one thing, it’s missing part of the show. The live rendition of Reign in Blood was the encore of the show; why not include the rest of it. Five other songs from the show are included as “bonus tracks”, but it simply doesn’t make any sense to not include the rest of them. Or why not just throw in an old concert from the Reign in Blood tour; I’m sure they could scrounge something up. With all the material that could have gone on this DVD, there’s no excuse for the band not to include it.
After War at the Warfield and last year’s rather pathetic excuse for a box set, it’s difficult to get excited about any new releases from Slayer. However, Still Reigning is the first quality release from the band in some time. It’s not perfect, but at only 15 dollars, it’s definitely a DVD any Slayer fan should consider purchasing.
Article comments
1 - Temple Stark
Chris,
I threw this up on Advance.net.
If you are committed to good "first draft" you might want to look over the copy on Advance.net and see the small changes - and sometimes big changes. The big changes are almost always done for space, however. NB: I'm posting this message to all reviews, not singling you out at all. :-)
2 - Arnold
WTF, you're talking sh*t dude, Stain of Mind is a f*cking great song!
It's indeed a pity they didn't capture the aggression of a concert on a dvd yet, but this comes closer than War @ The Warfield, wich is also a great dvd!
3 - bunghole
Slayer is an awsome kick a#@ heavymetal band!!!! Anyone that knows me well knows that I worship heavymetal.(not literally) Slayer has been a favorite band of mine for a few years, they have some of the heaviest music that gets me hyped up and leaves me no choice but to bang my head every time I hear it. But I don't understand thier satanic material. There are plenty of other things to write songs about. Maybe it's what sells but there are plenty of other bands that make plenty of money off of clean c.d.'s. Actually a c.d. doesn't have to be clean for me to buy it. Language or sexual material doesn't bother me it's the things like scuicide,drugs,murder and satanic things that bother me. I do watch horror movies but for some reason they don't bother me. My dream is to make it big as a guitarist in a band and Iv'e decided there's no reason to perform songs like that. If I die without having made it big in a band I will feel like Iv'e failed in life. Because that's my goal in life.