Tom Araya tells Fucking Slayer Gang to fuck off

You know what? When you're bullying the wife of the leader of the band you claim to be supporting, you might have lost your way a little:

"Hi. This is Tom Araya, and I'd like to talk to you about something that has recently spiraled out of control.

"I hate to blame an entire group for the actions of a few.

"There is a group on Facebook that associate themselves with my band, SLAYER, Claiming to be fans, they made up a sign that they use to represent themselves as SLAYER fans. They call themselves Fucking Slayer Gang, [or] FSG. They came into existence about eight months ago and had approached my wife, Sandra, under the guise of a family asking for support and if she would ask me if I would also show support by throwing the SLAYER hand sign that they had come up with.

"After a few months had passed, my wife did not like how this group was managing their Facebook page and decided it was best to leave their group and all other groups she was part of. The conduct that this group was showing, and has shown, is distasteful, rude and disrespectful to all SLAYER and metal fans.

"Now, I [flashed] this sign [for a photo] in support for my wife, who later told me that it was not a good idea to associate with this group or sign, that they were cyberbullies and that they would attack anyone who questioned their motives, and have even gone as far as attacking my wife publicly on SLAYER fan pages and metal fan pages.

"It has come to our attention that they have taken liberties with the photo of myself and my wife [throwing] the so-called 'SLAYER sign' by posting these pictures and claiming our support. Well, I'm here to say that it's not true. We do not support this gang or such behavior.

"The metal community is a growing community of loyal fans, not only to the bands that they support, but to each other.

"Thank you."

This is Tom from Slayer saying that you're overstepping a line. It's a bit like the Krays suggesting you tone down the violence,

It's all yours, Tom Araya

In the week of the Kerrang Awards, it's hard to imagine of a greater honour that could be presented to a noisy-music-maker, but Chile have come up with a nice gift for Slayer's Tom Araya.

This:

Okay, not quite that, but he has been given the freedom of Vina Del Mar in Chile.

Araya was born there, and lived there until his family moved to the US when he was five years old. You'll note that this is roughly the length of time Ringo lived in his first home - clearly Chileans feel those early years are more significant than Liverpool City Council does.

Tom was quite sweet about the honour:

"I think it's awesome," said Araya during a press conference. "I'm kind of speechless; I don't what to say. They're probably gonna change the locks when they give me the key!

"You see other people receive rewards like that, but it's usually people of political status or someone that's really done something for the community or done something important," he added. "All I can say is thank you."

There is, of course, a risk that having said that Slayer "isn't important" Tom will have offended Slayer fans around the world.

[Vina Del Mar photo by Bracani...Antonio under CC-BY-NC-SA licence]

Slayer splits - Whatever shall we do without them?

Oh, no: popular culture is about to implode. Clothing will be rent. Slayer's Tom Araya has been hinting the band might call it a day:

"Let's put it this way, this is the final record of our commitment with Rick Rubin. When we first signed a deal with him back in 1986, we never sat down and said, 'How long do you guys want to keep this together?'. We signed the deal and we've just been doing records since.

We're working on new ideas now just so that people can have a taste of what's coming. Kerry and Jeff are putting together ideas, so what the end result of this next two-and-a-half months is, I don't know. Once we've put together new material, we can get together and discuss our future plans."

We love the idea that there's a process involved in "putting together ideas" to make a Slayer record, like they're going to be gathered round a whiteboard with the words 'ballet?' 'string quartet' and 'RAWK' written on, weighing the pros and cons.

It seems age is just catching up with them:

"Seeing a 50-year-old man headbanging on stage would make me cringe. If I was watching that, I'd think, 'Dude, you're a little too old for that, aren't you? You're gonna fall off!'."

Heavy rock - it's a young man's game. Once you're past 48 it's time to quit, eh, Tom?