During a recent press conference to promote his appearance at the Bangers Open Air 2025 festival in São Paulo, Brazil, Kerry King spoke about why the setlist for the performances from his solo band includes some of the SLAYER classics he wrote or co-wrote. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “Part of the reason I’m doing SLAYER songs in my set is because it’s part of my past, part of our legacy, and if SLAYER never comes down here again, I play these songs so people in South America, wherever I play, they can still enjoy the songs that I’ve written over the last 40 years. So, to me, it’s an extension of SLAYER because SLAYER went away. SLAYER got taken away from me as well. I planned on being SLAYER forever. And I still am; we’re just not playing that often. But I like to give fans a taste of what I am now, what I was then, songs they’re probably never gonna see again live. I wanna give that to them. I wanna show people that were too young to see SLAYER the first time how cool it was, because I think we do the SLAYER songs justice. And me moving forward, I’ll have more and more solo material, but I’m not ever gonna forget that I was in SLAYER and I’ll always play some of that too.”
The setlist for King‘s solo shows usually contains several SLAYER songs, including “Repentless”, “Hate Worldwide”, “Chemical Warfare”, “Disciple”, “Raining Blood”, “At Dawn They Sleep” and “Black Magic”.
Last year, King told Metal Hammer magazine that he wanted the setlist for the shows from his solo band to only include SLAYER songs that he “wrote or co-wrote. So nobody can say ‘he’s playing Jeff [Hanneman, late SLAYER guitarist] songs,’ because although I love Jeff songs and he was such a big part of my life, I don’t want to rely on it this year, this album cycle,” he explained. “At some point, I will play ‘Angel Of Death’, but there’s so many fucking faceless haters on the Internet, I don’t want to give them ammunition.”
SLAYER made two festival appearances in September and October 2024 after a five-year hiatus.
This past March, the band announced a run of 2025 North American and European dates, marking SLAYER‘s first U.K. and Canadian shows in six years. They expanded that run last month with the addition of the only East Coast performance of the year, in Hershey, Pennsylvania in September.
King‘s debut solo album, “From Hell I Rise”, came out in May 2024 via Reigning Phoenix Music. All material for the LP was written by the 60-year-old SLAYER guitarist, who was accompanied during the recording sessions by the rest of his solo band, consisting of drummer Paul Bostaph (SLAYER),bassist Kyle Sanders (HELLYEAH),guitarist Phil Demmel (formerly of MACHINE HEAD) and vocalist Mark Osegueda (DEATH ANGEL). Helming the sessions at Henson Recording Studios in Los Angeles in 2023 was producer Josh Wilbur, who had previously worked with KORN, LAMB OF GOD, AVENGED SEVENFOLD and BAD RELIGION, among others.
Prior to “From Hell I Rise”‘s arrival, Kerry admitted to France’s Loud TV that launching a new project several decades into his career was “a lot more difficult than I thought. I’ve been kind of pampered for the last at least three decades,” he said. “And starting over, even though I have a gigantic history in SLAYER, starting over, you’re still starting over — you’re lower on the bills, you’re not making the [same kind of] money. Having to figure out how to make sure everybody in my band makes money so it’s worth their time. But, yeah, never for a second did I consider not going on, because at this point in life, any record could be your last. I don’t think this is my last record, but I have to move on like it is. So put it out, hope the fans like it, hope the fans show up. I like it. I think the fans are gonna like it, and I think we’re gonna have a lot of good times.”
Asked if the lineup for his solo band is made up of “friends”, Kerry said: “Absolutely. The thing that meant the most to me about moving forward in this project was getting my friends. I could get anybody in the biz — I can get people I don’t know, people I’ve never met, but I have enough friends in this business to know that I could put a band together of outstanding musicians that are friends that, after the show, we can get on the bus and have a drink and just have fun. No drama. Nothing weird is gonna happen that we don’t foresee. I look forward to getting out on the road with these guys and having a good time.”
King told Rolling Stone about the decision to call the band KERRY KING: “It was going to be KING’S REIGN for a long time, which is really cool. But even with that one, I went to the guys, like, ‘I’m not a vain dude. I don’t want my name to be a part of it.’ We talked about BLOOD REIGN for a while, but it didn’t work. Every time I came up with anything remotely cool, it was taken by some obscure band in Eastern Europe. It became KERRY KING because I love that logo.”
Source: blabbermouth.net
