Back in the Game

• Artist: Slayer
• Rating:
• Release Date: July 25, 1998
• Type: Live, Bootleg
• Genre: Rock

Review

A superb bootleg CD and a metal treasure, Back in the Game finds Slayer making a triumphant appearance at the Roskilde Festival in Denmark on June 25, 1998. This powerful performance assaults the listener on two levels -- the lyrics are consistently disturbing, and Slayer's sound is brutally compelling. No vocalist in thrash metal and death metal has sung about evil, war, mass destruction, and the occult more convincingly than Tom Araya, who is in excellent form on such disturbing favorites as "Dead Skin Mask," "Altar of Sacrifice," "War Ensemble," "Raining Blood," and "Mandatory Suicide." With many other metal outfits, songs about the occult come across as more comic and entertaining than anything -- Slayer, however, takes its subject matter seriously and avoids being even the least bit campy. But even if you didn't understand a word of English, the headbangers' dense, relentlessly heavy sound would still jolt you -- in 1998, Slayer's sound was still as disturbing as its lyrics. Recorded from the soundboard, Back in the Game boasts excellent sound quality and captures Slayer's heaviness perfectly. Slayer fans who are able to find a copy of this bootleg should grab it at once. ~ Alex Henderson, Rovi

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