Slayer's Paul Bostaph and Gary Holt hope to do more reunion shows
Slayer recently made their return to the live stage and it appears there is some interest in doing more shows down the line. Nothing is planned at the moment, but two members of the band, drummer Paul Bostaph and guitarist Gary Holt, have expressed hope that further reunion concerts will happen.
Bostaph said the following during an interview with 107.7 The Bone's Nikki Blakk:
We played our last one… If everybody's asking that question [about the possibility of more Slayer gigs], I am too, but I don't have the answer to that question. So, yeah, Aftershock was the last one. And we all hope that there will be more. It's fun to play Slayer songs. So, hopefully that can happen in the future. But [as of right now], that was the last show.
He continued:
How do I feel [about the shows]? Um, wow. That's a really good question. I'm kind of a bit drained. Sacramento was a lot of guests there, a lot of friends, not to mention the show. So it was a lot of energy just put out. But each one of the shows kind of felt that way because it was kind of overwhelming because I never thought it would happen again. So, yeah, it was a lot of relearning songs that you really thought you did know, but you hadn't played them for five years. So, I don't know — it was great. I feel like it was probably one of the best live experiences I had because the fans were really into it. They were hungry for it, and that kind of made it special.
Holt also added the following during a separate interview with Loudwire Nights:
Surreal. It was awesome. We rehearsed really hard for it, like full production rehearsal. In the past, when I did rehearse — Slayer rehearsed in this tiny little music studio room with little half stacks. This was cool 'cause I got to play with the entire rig — three amps, six cabs all on. I got to redesign the rig based on my Exodus rig. So it was the exact same identical thing tone-wise, just three times as large, which was awesome.
We were nervous Tom [Araya] was nervous, and he sounded amazing. Sometimes you've just gotta forget about the time and how long it's been and just let muscle memory kick in and just do it. I mean, I only played one song I'd never played, and that was '213'. And 'Reborn' I'd only played, I think, once, so that was almost a new song — once or twice. Everything else was just refreshers.
I started working on the songs a long, long time ago, when the shows were first announced: 'All right, I'd better make sure I know how to play this shit still.' And I literally had to like dive into Internet tab on songs I'd played a hundred times. But then I'd [go], 'Man, I'm playing it wrong.' Then I just forget about it and just play, and then all right, my hands remember where the notes are.
But it was spectacular. Losing the second show [at the Louder Than Life festival] due to the weather, the tail end of the hurricane, was a real, real bummer, especially for all the fans who flew in. I met people at the airport who flew in from England for it. And they had the best attitude about it. Obviously, it wasn't our fault. We tried everything we could. You can't control 50-mile-an-hour gusts. The crew had to evacuate, like, three times that afternoon. We never left the hotel.
But it was amazing. It was surreal. It was like this moment. The crowd was just very happy. And we were happy, and everything was good. And hopefully we'll do some more.
[via Blabbermouth]