01. World Painted Blood 05:53 02. Unit 731 02:39 03. Snuff 03:42 04. Beauty Through Order 04:36 05. Hate Worldwide 02:52 06. Public Display of Dismemberment 02:34 07. Human Strain 03:09 08. Americon 03:22 09. Psychopathy Red 02:26 10. Playing with Dolls 04:13 11. Not of this God 04:20

It can’t be easy, being Slayer. They were really too good in the 80s; releasing four classic albums in a row tends to build expectation for your subsequent work. Hence the 90s were a darker time for the thrash icons, as a string of questionable releases threatened to impinge upon their legacy. Reuniting the ‘classic’ lineup in 2001 with the return of Dave Lombardo on drums was a step in the right direction, but 2006’s “Christ Illusion” left many disappointed. So, even before its release, their 10th album “World Painted Blood” had quite a burden on its shoulders.

Kerry King has stated that this is Slayer’s most diverse album since 1990’s “Seasons in the Abyss”, and from the start, definite comparisons spring to mind. Titular opener ’World Painted Blood’ is, at almost 6 minutes in length, probably the longest Slayer song that springs to mind since ’Seasons’ itself, although for the most part it gallops along at an almost frightening pace. There are also a couple of other longer songs, ‘The Human Strain’ and ‘Playing With Dolls’, which attempt a slower tempo than the band’s usual 100-mile-an-hour thrash, and even flirt with melody - the latter actually standing out as one of the album’s strongest. ‘Beauty Through Order’ perfectly showcases how this slower, more melodic approach can coexist with classic thrash-Slayer, opening at an almost sedate pace before undergoing a lycanthropic transformation and finishing at breakneck pace.
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01. Infected Nation 5:33 02. Now Demolition 5:46 03. Nosphoros 5:30 04. Genocide 7:42 05. Plague To End All Plagues 5:55 06. Devoid of Thought 5:38 07. Time No More 4:00 08. Metamorphosis 7:41 09. Hundred Wrathful Deities 11:15

In this age of a rapidly accelerating music industry, the inevitable backlash to a burgeoning genre (or in this case, genre revival) seems to occur almost instantly. As soon as the ‘New Wave of Thrash’ grabbed metal press headlines in 2007, cynics and friendless naysayers were waiting to moan about bands “offering nothing new” or “cynically cashing-in on nostalgia”. Two years is a long time in the music world and it’s make or break time for many of this resurgence’s highly-publicised acts. Can they offer more than a mere throwback fix or is it all just another fad?
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