`@TheDaveLombardo on the organic “push and pull” of classic albums like 'Reign in Blood' versus the sterility of much modern recording in the digital era. In a @loadedradio interview around the album’s 40th anniversary (released October 7, 1986), Lombardo reflected on how *Reign in Blood* still hits him physically and why that restless energy feels rarer now. > “It still gives me the chills when I listen to that album. The palms of your hands get sweaty, your heart rate increases, and you’re in the moment.” He linked it to years of playing the songs live: “I’ve performed those songs so many times in my life on stage, and that adrenaline, just thinking about it, and when I listen to those songs, it triggers that adrenaline. I get charged.” He joked that if he went into cardiac arrest, someone should play “Angel of Death” or “Raining Blood” and he’d pop up saying, “Hey, what’s going on?” ### The missing “push and pull” vs. modern sterile recordings When asked about thrash today, he said he still enjoys good thrash and there are commendable attempts, but: > “Since computer software, music recording software, a lot of the music has turned very sterile. And so you kind of miss that push and pull of those albums that were almost restless. They were very just aggressive, I would say. And you could hear it. You could hear it in the recording.” In his view, the digital tools (quantizing, perfecting timing, click tracks, heavy editing) often flatten the natural human variations, slight tempo shifts, and live-room tension that made older records feel restless and aggressive. That organic push-and-pull—the way the band leans into or pulls against each other—is what he hears missing in a lot of modern productions. ### How that energy landed on *Reign in Blood* He explained how the aggression translated onto the @Slayer record in 1986 (pre-widespread digital recording software for this kind of work). In the studio they would look at each other and drive each other: > “All right, let’s go. Come on. Let’s fucking kill it. Let’s nail this one. Let’s get this song.” > “Faster?” > “Yeah, play it just a little faster.” > “Okay, let’s go.” Count four and the band comes in. “Yeah, anger, angst, adrenaline — everything.” No click-track perfection; it was the band egging each other on take after take, capturing the live-room restlessness and aggression that you can still hear in the finished album. That is the “push and pull” he contrasts with the more controlled, sterile results common once recording software became dominant. In short, Lombardo sees *Reign in Blood* as the product of human urgency and mutual pushing in the room—something the digital toolbox can make harder to retain if overused—while still acknowledging that good #thrash exists today. #thrashmetal #heavymetal #hardrock