Dave Lombardo declares Slayer to be the best thrash metal Big Four band

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In not terribly surprising news, ex-Slayer drummer Dave Lombardo feels that his former band was the best of thrash metal’s Big Four, which also includes Metallica, Megadeth and Anthrax.

Speaking to Metal Hammer about why he feels the “Raining Blood” outfit deserves the title, Lombardo explains, “We were brutal man, we were on top of our game.

“If you watch the videos we were on fire,” Lombardo says. “We really showed everyone else how it should be done — we tore everyone a new one.”

Lombardo recalls watching other bands from Slayer’s era and thinking that his group was always better and faster.

“It wasn’t necessarily arrogant, but it was inspiring if we watched a band that couldn’t deliver the ferocity we were because it made us feel amazing, like, ‘Oops, failure!’” Lombardo shares. “It was a youthful approach — you want to be better than the guy before you, you want to blow everyone away, and that was our mantra.”

“We were competing, but not in a negative way,” the drummer continues. “We wanted to be the best, we wanted to be the heaviest, the fastest. So our rivals were any band that’d open up for us — we’d be like, ‘Let’s blow ’em out the water!’ I can’t think of a single band we had a real negative relationship with.”

Slayer played alongside Metallica, Megadeth and Anthrax for a run of Big Four shows in 2010 and 2011. Lombardo left Slayer in 2013, and the band played their final concert in 2019.

In other Lombardo news, his project Empire State Bastard with Biffy Clyro frontman Simon Neil and touring member Mike Vennart has released a new song called “Tired, Naw?” The track is a reworking of “Tired, Aye?” — a cut off ESB’s debut album, Rivers of Heresy.