In honor of the fact that I am taking my 12 year-old son and his friend to see Slayer, Exodus, and Suicidal Tendencies at The Forum in Los Angeles tomorrow night, this week’s Thrashback Thursday thrashes all the way back to where it started for me. I was about their age when I went down that heavy metal rabbit hole. Slayer and early Metallica were like a godsend for a hormonal teenage boy to headband his aggressions, frustrations, and angst out to. May the metal be as kind to the kids as it’s been to me all of these years.

With the opening track of their brilliant 1984 EP Haunting The Chapel here is the mighty Slayer with “Chemical Warfare.”