Ok, I'm hoping on the classic thrash debut review bandwagon here today.

Metal Blade era Slayer is, has always been, and likely always will be one of my top bands, there's a very distinct brand of "evil" captured on these records that has just the right mix of camp and sincerity to not be overly serious or goofy, completely flawless. Hell Awaits may very well be a hulking satanic monolith as well as the best death metal album ever recorded, hell, I'd even go as far to say it's the very epitome of all that's Slayer, but Show No Mercy is by far my favourite of the bunch. What gives it the winning edge to me is that there's still a hefty amount of the ultra regal Maiden/Priest influence that hadn't quite worn off yet from the demo stages that really goes quite well with the satanic themes, when ya listen to it they're not saying that it's them who're most evil or anything like that, it's all praise for a higher power, adds a real depraved sense of things to the mix, whereas Hell Awaits was part two of the equation once the power had been harnessed and horrors had been seen, which is awesome, but I just prefer the lowlier angle of Show No Mercy, there's a great ambition in the approach. Haunting the Chapel is fantastic too, I'd like to say that it's the first pure Slayer release that was all them and all outside influences gone from the sound but that Captor of Sin intro's just a little too Mercyful Fate, so Hell Awaits gets the title instead.


...oh yeah, and Jeff's solo in Die By The Sword is righteous beyond righteous, buncha great ones from both guitarists on the debut.

YEAH!!! Love this tape. Haunting the Chapel/Hell Awaits are still my faves (even more than Reign) but Show No Mercy rules. I have a playlist on my ipod with this, Kill Em All, War & Pain, Heavy Metal Maniac and a few others from this period in time.

I really love the rawness of this era of metal and the massive FUCK YOU attitude everyone had back then.

Yeah Slayer did no wrong in the 80's and everybody has at least one Slayer album that makes at least one top 5.
Show No Mercy & Haunting the Chapel EP bring me back to sneaking out the window for keggers in 8th grade. \m/

Yeah, this is a good one. While I appreciate the aggression of their later material, I've got a soft spot for their earlier songwriting, because of the aforementioned classic Priest/Maiden influences, brought up to thrash levels.

Last time i saw them they played The Final Command near the end of the set- I went slightly bonkers as that came completely unexpected.

I'm always beggin' for those metal blade era songs at the shows, one of the encores when I saw 'em earlier this year was Aggressive Perfector, that was wild.

The first time I saw Slayer was for the Show No Mercy tour, only time they played stuff like Face the Slayer. Except for the Hell Awaits tour, after that I think the only Show No Mercy songs I ever heard them play was Die By the Sword every show, except for once they played Fight Till Death instead.