Dave Lombardo, former drummer of thrash metal giants Slayer, has recently shared some fond memories of the band's wild early days, including their first-ever show. In an interview with Louder, Lombardo recalled the gig, which took place on May 11, 1984 at the Woody's nightclub in Huntington Beach, California.
"We knew we were good, and you could feel it when we got onstage," he said. "We had our own props, smoke machines… we’d build our own pyro! Rig these nails with copper wire and then plug them in so they’d explode and ignite some gunpowder we kept in steel pipes. Thank god there were no regulations – there was a lot of smoke and a lot of chaos in those early shows!”
"We were playing so hard that we actually broke the drum riser," Lombardo added. "It was just a little riser, but it was still pretty funny. We were just so into the music that we didn't even realize we had broken it until after the show."
Lombardo's memories of Slayer's first show are a reminder of the band's raw energy and passion in their early days, and leave no doubts as to why he thinks Slayer was the best band of The Big Four.
"Ha ha ha! Who else could I pick?! We were brutal man, we were on top of our game, and if you watch the videos we were on fire. We really showed everyone else how it should be done — we tore everyone a new one."
As for Lombardo's opinions on ever reuniting with Slayer, he recently told the Mark And Me podcast that it pretty much ain't never happening.
"I really don't wanna answer anything like that because what ends up happening is that the focus right now would be Empire State Bastard and my future, and the future, which is… I think, a big part of my personal success is that I don't look back. I'm always striving to better myself musically in every way possible, so answering a question like that sometimes takes away of what our focus is on right now. So, respectfully, I'm gonna have to decline to answer that question."
