Rick Florino of ARTISTdirect recently conducted an interview with SLAYER bassist/vocalist Tom Araya. A few excerpts from the chat follow below.

ARTISTdirect: New songs like "Psychopathy Red" and "Hate Worldwide" maintain SLAYER's traditional speed and intensity.

Araya: Everybody is going to love the new album. It's awesome. It's very classic SLAYER. It's everything you want to hear in a SLAYER album. You won't be disappointed, let's put it that way.

ARTISTdirect: Does "World Painted Blood" continue SLAYER's storytelling tradition?

Araya: It does [Laughs]. The title track is actually really cool. It's the one song that I can't wait for everybody to hear. There are a few tracks on there I can't wait for the world to experience, but the title track is just big [Laughs].

ARTISTdirect: What was the genesis of it?

Araya: Shit, it fell together like a lot of the songs did on this album. We had the music, and then we started working out the parts. Jeff [Hanneman, guitar] brought in words, and he kept bringing in words. I offered some words and lyric ideas. There are a lot of dynamics in the song. I think everyone is going to enjoy it. It's a very big song. That's all I've got to say [Laughs].

ARTISTdirect: What's the story behind "Psychopathy Red"?

Araya: We recorded that one last year in October with two other songs. That was the song that initiated the idea of staying in the studio and recording as opposed to doing a tour in January and February. "Psychopathy Red" was the first one we recorded, and it just fell together. Boom, it was done! We had it done in less than a week. We figured that we should just work on a whole album. The bulk of material came out when we were in the studio while we were recording, which is new for us.

ARTISTdirect: Was "Psychopathy Red" the album's catalyst?

Araya: Yeah, that one sparked it. That's about a Russian serial killer named Andrei Chikatilo. He came out in the '80s around the same time that Jeffrey Dahmer and an Englishman by the name of Dennis Nilsen were doing what they were doing — you know what I mean? Dahmer and Nilsen were doing the homophobic thing, and this Russian guy was doing the little kid thing. All three were killing and eating their victims. We came out with a seven-inch vinyl for "Psychopathy Red". All of the record and song information is in Russian. It's pretty cool.

ARTISTdirect: Do you watch a lot of movies while you're writing?

Araya: It depends on the movie. Sometimes if I'm writing on a subject and I happen to watch a movie that deals with that subject, things will spark. I'll write scenes of what I see and try to describe them the best way I can. Books do that too. Jeff wrote about Unit 731, which was a Japanese military medical unit that did experiments on people to judge different things. A subject like the philosophy and the theory behind frost bite will inspire me — different ways to survive frost bite. You look these up on the Internet. You want to read up on it and make sure that what you're singing about is what you're trying to convey. You have to do a little reading [Laughs].

ARTISTdirect: It always seems like SLAYER records require some research.

Araya: Oh yeah! It's good research because I'm learning! In the middle of all that I'm learning. You're teaching the fans something too [Laughs]. They'll go, "Wow, what's that?" Then they'll research the true story and all of the disgusting details.

ARTISTdirect: SLAYER has created its own myth. Kids can still pick up "Hell Awaits" or "Reign In Blood", delve into them and ask questions.

Araya: There are definitely stories behind a lot of our songs.

ARTISTdirect: That's probably why you have such devout and crazy fans.

Araya: [Laughs] I don't know! That isn't why we have crazy fans. When we put out our first record, "Show No Mercy", on Metal Blade, it tripped the label out because we had sold so many records. We sold something like 16,000 copies, which blew their minds. They immediately wanted another record, so we did the "Haunting the Chapel" EP. We didn't have quite an album but we had an EP. To me, it was surprising when we had such a strong response to the first album. It blew my mind. Right out of the gate, we sold quite a bit. I guess at the time it was unheard of for Metal Blade because they immediately wanted another record. They got the EP, and then we gave them "Hell Awaits". It was the same thing with "Reign In Blood". Right away it sold a lot of records, and the response we got was really surprising.

Read the entire interview from ARTISTdirect.