In a recent episode of the “Talk Toomey” podcast, John Tardy of Florida death metal veterans Obituary discussed their incredible experience opening for Slayer on their 2018 European tour alongside Lamb of God and Anthrax.
He said: “I’ll tell you what: thirty years ago, I would not wanna have opened for Slayer. [Laughs] ‘Cause if you remember, at those Slayer shows, those Slayer fans wanted no part of any band. I didn’t care who you were, all you heard were ‘Slayer‘ chants the whole time. But we did get invited. And it was the last time we were in Europe. And we did the Slayer tour with them. And that was awesome.
“Those guys were super cool,” Tardy continued. “Their crew was way nicer than they needed to be to us. And we had their stage manager come up to us, and he was, like, ‘I’ve never seen arenas near full when the first band was going on.’ And that was awesome, like I said.
“That was a really fun tour too — with Lamb of God. I love those guys; I get along great with those. And to hit that bucket list and get to play with Slayer, that was awesome. ‘Cause time was running out. We saw that Slayer was getting ready to wrap things up [and retire from touring], so we were really glad to get that phone call also… I sat out front and watched Slayer every night of that tour. No doubt.”
Obituary‘s newest studio album, Dying Of Everything, is now available on Relapse Records.
SLAYER played its final show of their farewell tour in November 2019 at the Forum in Los Angeles.
