Kerry King begins the European leg of the “From Hell I Rise” tour in honour of his 60th birthday

Kerry King of Slayer, marked turning 60 on Monday, June 3rd, by opening the European leg of his “From Hell I Rise” solo tour at Poppodium 013 in Tilburg, Netherlands. Similar to the first three concerts Kerry performed in the United States with his solo band, the Tilburg show’s set selection featured songs from Slayer as well as several of the thirteen tracks from King‘s debut solo album, “From Hell I Rise,” which was released on May 17th via Reigning Phoenix Music.

1. Where I Reign
2. Trophies Of The Tyrant
3. Toxic
4. Repentless (Slayer cover)
5. Two Fists
6. Tension
7. Everything I Hate About You
8. Chemical Warfare (Slayer cover)
9. Idle Hands
10. Rage
11. Hate Worldwide (Slayer cover)
12. Residue
13. Disciple (Slayer cover)
14. Crucifixation
15. Shrapnel
16. Raining Blood (Slayer cover)
17. Black Magic (Slayer cover)
18. Payback (Slayer cover)
19. From Hell I Rise

Enjoy some footage of the show:

When he was asked about the setlist of his solo shows, King stated:

For this coming summer in Europe, we’re gonna do like nine or 10 tracks from the album and, depending on set length, fill it with stuff I’ve done — something I wrote in Slayer or co-wrote. So nobody can say ‘he’s playing Jeff [Hanneman] songs,’ because although I love Jeff songs and he was such a big part of my life, I don’t want to rely on it this year, this album cycle. At some point, I will play ‘Angel Of Death’, but there’s so many fucking faceless haters on the Internet, I don’t want to give them ammunition.

Is there an important message in “From Hell I Rise”? Kerry replied:

I don’t know that there’s a message on the album. I’m not that kind of person. I like to bring things to a conversation. Say, for instance, I’ve been talking today about, I think a lot of people are born into a religious belief based on being handed down from their parents, friends, whatever. What I like to present to people is ideas that if that makes them question what they believe, what they were taught… I think everybody should make up their own mind. And at the end of the day, that would be my message. Make up your own mind, be it politics, be it religion. Just be your own self.

He also talked about his influences.

Realistically, my influences were influences 40 years ago and they still are my influences. And along that way, did I pick up more? Yeah, absolutely. But I think in doing this project, it’s just the next record for me. I didn’t have anything that I wanted to achieve that necessarily I hadn’t achieved. I just wanna make up the next batch of music for people that I think are my fans, that I think they would like, because Slayer has a gigantic amount of fans, and if I make 95 percent of them happy with what I do, I think I had a good day.

And his goals as well.

Musically, not really. Just keep putting out music that translates between me writing it and the fans liking it. The thing that I can’t wait for, which is a lot closer than I expected — I was told today our first show is in, like, 10 days [laughs], so I gotta go home and rehearse. But I’m looking forward to playing with the guys, ’cause even though we’ve done a video, we’ve never actually played together all at once. So, that’s gonna be pretty exciting. And that happens Sunday. I fly home Saturday, and then I gotta fly to the West Coast Sunday and start rehearsing. So I’ve got a big week, but that’s what I look most forward to these days, is getting in the rehearsal room and then finally getting on stage and showing the new band to everybody.

More details about his solo project by clicking here!