40 years ago today (4/8/85), Slayer released their second album Hell Awaits. The album helped define thrash metal’s most extreme boundaries and marked a significant leap in complexity and ambition compared to their debut, Show No Mercy (1983). Of course, the album to follow, 1986’s Reign in Blood, would become even more defining in the metal realm. Watch Slayer perform the title track live in 1985..
