Riffology Score: 78/100

Strip away the top hat and the stadium pyro and Slash has always been a blues player wearing a hard rock costume. Orgy of the Damned is the album where he finally takes the costume off, hands the microphone to a different singer on almost every track, and lets a dozen old standards do the talking.

Album details and background

Released on 17 May 2024 through Gibson Records, Orgy of the Damned is Slash's sixth solo album and the first he has built entirely around the blues. It was produced by Mike Clink, the man behind Guns N' Roses' Appetite for Destruction, and recorded across 2023 at East West Studios and Slash's own Snakepit Studio in Los Angeles. The record is part reunion: the rhythm section pairs Slash with Johnny Griparic on bass and Teddy Andreadis on keyboards, both veterans of his late-1990s side project Slash's Blues Ball, alongside Michael Jerome on drums and Tash Neal on rhythm guitar.

It is a deliberate left turn. After the riff-driven hard rock of his work with Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators, capped by the 2022 album simply titled 4, Slash assembled a cast of singers from across rock, country, pop and blues and let each take a turn fronting a standard. The result is closer to a Los Angeles club jam captured on tape than a polished solo statement.

Album facts

FieldDetail
ArtistSlash
AlbumOrgy of the Damned
Release date17 May 2024
LabelGibson Records
ProducerMike Clink
StudiosEast West Studios and Snakepit Studio, Los Angeles
GenreBlues rock
Track count12
Total runtime69:39
Lead single"Killing Floor" featuring Brian Johnson and Steven Tyler
Riffology Score78/100

Album analysis

The album opens with a seven-minute take on Hoyt Axton's "The Pusher", with Chris Robinson of the Black Crowes howling over a slow, smoky groove that sets the tone: unhurried, lived-in, and built to let Slash stretch. From there the guest list does the heavy lifting. Gary Clark Jr. trades licks with Slash on a muscular "Crossroads", and Billy Gibbons brings his unmistakable Texas drawl to "Hoochie Coochie Man", two of rock's most recognisable guitar tones meeting exactly as well as they should.

The standouts tend to be the ones where the singer pulls the song somewhere unexpected. Chris Stapleton turns Fleetwood Mac's "Oh Well" into a country-soul sermon, and Demi Lovato's "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" is the album's biggest surprise, a near-eight-minute slow burn that proves the most pop-leaning name on the bill belongs in this company. Beth Hart tears the roof off "Stormy Monday", while Paul Rodgers brings effortless gravel to "Born Under a Bad Sign".

Then there is the lead single. "Killing Floor" hands the Howlin' Wolf classic to AC/DC's Brian Johnson, with Steven Tyler blowing harmonica underneath, a combination that has no right to work on paper and absolutely does on record. It is the moment the all-star conceit clicks hardest.

"'Killing Floor' was a song that I've always wanted to do. Brian was the only guy I thought of for that song, just because I know Brian's voice, and I know what it sounds like when he sings in a lower register."

Slash, Rolling Stone, 2024.

The honest caveat, and the reason this is a strong record rather than a great one, is that the arrangements rarely stray far from the originals. These are old warhorses given respectful treatment, and a listener hoping for radical reinvention will not find much here. Slash plays beautifully throughout, never grandstanding, and the lone instrumental, the closing "Metal Chestnut", is the one place he steps fully into the spotlight.

Slash featuring Brian Johnson and Steven Tyler, "Killing Floor", the lead single from Orgy of the Damned.

Tracklist

  1. "The Pusher" (featuring Chris Robinson)
  2. "Crossroads" (featuring Gary Clark Jr.)
  3. "Hoochie Coochie Man" (featuring Billy Gibbons)
  4. "Oh Well" (featuring Chris Stapleton)
  5. "Key to the Highway" (featuring Dorothy)
  6. "Awful Dream" (featuring Iggy Pop)
  7. "Born Under a Bad Sign" (featuring Paul Rodgers)
  8. "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" (featuring Demi Lovato)
  9. "Killing Floor" (featuring Brian Johnson and Steven Tyler)
  10. "Living for the City" (featuring Tash Neal)
  11. "Stormy Monday" (featuring Beth Hart)
  12. "Metal Chestnut"

Tour and conclusion

Slash took the spirit of the album on the road through the summer of 2024 with his own travelling blues showcase, the S.E.R.P.E.N.T. Festival, a rotating bill of blues and roots acts that carried the album's collaborative ethos into the live setting. The record itself performed solidly, debuting at number one on the US Billboard Top Blues Albums chart with around 10,500 first-week copies, reaching number 98 on the Billboard 200, number eight on the UK Albums Chart, and the top three in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Scotland. Reviews landed in the mixed-to-positive band you would expect for a covers project, from an 8 out of 10 at Blues Rock Review to a far frostier 3 out of 10 at PopMatters.

Orgy of the Damned earns its 78. It does the standards justice with taste and a murderer's row of guests, and the best moments, "Killing Floor", "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" and "Stormy Monday", are worth the price of admission on their own. What holds it back is the safety of the arrangements: this is a tribute played with love rather than a reinvention played with daring. For Slash fans, blues lovers and anyone who wants to hear one of rock's great guitarists at ease among friends, it is an easy recommendation.

That is our take on Orgy of the Damned. The Riffology podcast digs into the records that shape rock and the players who make them, and is available on all major podcast platforms. We would love to hear where this one sits in your own Slash ranking.