Divine Intervention
Product Details | Similar Products | Customer Reviews | Artist: Slayer List Price: £15.99  |
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 | Product Details: Release Date: 04 August 1994 Record Label: American Rating:   Sales Rank: 142331 | | Look for similar items by category:
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| | Customer Reviews: GOOD EFFORT !!! (21 March 2008)And on par with their 3 predecessors; it contains elements of the 3 of them, retaining the speed, agression and their hardcorish thrash/speed-metal signature sound. Their first after a 4 year hiatus and the departure of their famous drummer Dave Lombardo now incorporating the competent Paul Bostaph. Problem is the band were moved from one studio to another( to a total of 4) so production is quite inconsistent but once you're familiar with the record it starts kicking ..ss bigtime. yep,the worst slayer album of them all (04 September 2006)Slayer by 1994 were a band struggling somewhat i feel,with lombardo gone and bostaph replacing him clearly something was missing and on divine intervention we meet a band that decided to drop some of their distinct melody,due mainly to king writing the majority of the music and while this is a heavy album,it lacks the classic killer slayer touch. The album agains courts controversy with the inclusion of a photo of a fan who cut slayer into their arms with a razor blade and the topics of some of the songs,i dont have a problem with that but the albums tracks blend into each other and sound stale which doesnt suit the band. There are of course some strong songs which makes a change from a strong album,these include ss-3,213 and mind control but songs like the opener killing fields fail to spark the senses like south of heaven and spill the blood for example. Listen to this album with caution is my advice,it isnt a masterpiece by any means. Maybe not divine, but inexplicably underrated... (03 March 2006)I honestly can't understand the problem some fans seem to have with this album! As far as Slayer albums go, the low point surely has to be the uninspired "Diabolus In Musica" album that came after this one. "Divine Intervention" was the last thing that sounded like a proper Slayer album to my mind. "Killing Fields" is an excellent opening track, with its slippery drum patterns and screaming vocals, and the brutal "Sex Murder Art" is one of the best songs the band have (as far as I know anyway) never played live. Much is made by other reviewers of the speed of "Dittohead", but really this song was just the sound of a band trying a bit too hard to show how heavy they still were in the face of overwhelming competition. Far more interesting is the extremely disturbing "213", very nearly the equal of "Dead Skin Mask" in its uncomfortably well observed portrait of the mind of Jeffrey Dahmer (Tom Araya is just too good at this stuff, it's a shame he doesn't seem to write lyrics at all these days). Elsewhere we find some very tasty riffing going on in "Circle Of Beliefs" and "Fictional Reality"...I really can't think of a duff track anywhere on the album. True enough, this isn't as good as any of the "classic three" albums (that's "Reign In Blood", "South Of Heaven" and "Seasons In The Abyss" for the uninitiated), but who honestly expects Slayer to ever reach those heights again? "Divine Intervention" is the next best thing, though, and surely something that anyone calling themselves a Slayer fan should own... Underrated classic (21 March 2005)Following the indisputably all-time classic thrash albums of Reign In Blood, South Of Heaven and Seasons In The Abyss, a lot of Slayer fans seem to write off Divine Intervention as a misfire, but in my opinion to do so would be a grave mistake. The most obvious difference this time around is in the line-up of the band, with original drummer Dave Lombardo having been sacked and replaced with Forbidden's Paul Bostaph. While at the time Lombardo was considered the most talented drummer around Bostaph completely technically outclasses him on this album, and by the end of the whirlwind drums on opener Killing Fields you'll be saying "Dave who"? In fact the biggest difference as far as the music goes is the division of writing credits - normally Jeff Hanneman is the driving force behind Slayer's music, but for some reason in the long gap between Seasons In The Abyss and Divine Intervention the balance of power has shifted, and now Kerry King has a writing or co-writing credit for all but one song on the album, which leads to a different feel, with the emphasis less on classic metal riffs now and more on weird time signatures and rhythms. The production is unquestionably the best of Slayers career thus far, with the crispness and clarity of the sound only increasing the heaviness. As on the last couple of albums the tracks range from the full-on speed attacks of Sex, Murder, Art and Dittohead to such slow moody songs as the title track (which features Tom Araya's best vocal performance ever as he really yells out the verses) and 213, an attempt to replicate the success of Season's Dead Skin Mask, this time writing about Jeffrey Dahmer rather than Ed Gein. Maybe track by track the album cant quite match the pedigree of the previous three releases, but with the best production, drumming and vocals Slayer have ever had coupled with the most technically proficient and complex music they've ever recorded Divine Intervention is a necessary updating of Slayers sound, and definitely not an album to be dismissed lightly. Weakest Slayer Album (14 January 2005)Although Slayer have never produced a bad album, this is probably their weakest. As other reviewers have commented there are some great tracks here, notably 213, Dittohead and the title track, but most of the other tracks here are non-entities. Opener Killing Fields is a statement of intent rather than a song and suffers for it, as it pales in comparison to Angel of Death or even Bitter Peace. The main flaw in this album has to be the lack of direction; There are shades of punk and a couple of semi-epics but this feels like a collection of songs rather than a combined effort; Hannemann still comes up with 80's lyrics while Araya focuses much more on the sickening aspects of reality and there are never 3-4 great songs in a row like their classic efforts. The real quality of this album is shown in the bands shows; only Dittohead is a live staple and Kerry himself makes excuses for the album on the Diabolus promo (soundtrack to the apocalypse disc4). Although it was commercially a big success - it got a gold disc and charted at no.15 in the U.K., this is probably only an essential purchase for anyone who is only expecting 4 tracks of RIB /SITA quality. Anyone else would be better off getting 'Heartwork' by Carcass. |
