KERRY KING Announces First-Ever Solo Headlining Tour With MUNICIPAL WASTE And ALIEN WEAPONRY

Following his recent tour with LAMB OF GOD and MASTODON and his first European headline tour earlier this year, SLAYER guitarist Kerry King and his new band will hit the road for the 28-date North American headline tour 2025. With MUNICIPAL WASTE as special guest and ALIEN WEAPONRY supporting, the tour is set to launch in San Francisco on January 15, 2025, and wrap at House of Blues in Las Vegas on February 22.

A special BLABBERMOUTH.NET presale will begin on Thursday, October 3 at 10:00 a.m. local time and end on Thursday, October 3 at 10:00 p.m. local time. When prompted, type in the presale code "RESIDUE" to access tickets before the general public. Check back here on Thursday for ticketing links to individual shows. General on-sale will be Friday, October 4 at 10 a.m. local time.

"Getting back on the road for the first time in five years wasn’t exactly like riding a bike, that's for sure," King aknowledged. "I've never had that much time off, but the first tours with my new band — in the U.K. and Europe, and then in America with LAMB OF GOD and MASTODON — were all total blasts. We'll be headlining on this next tour, so we're playing a longer set than we did with LAMB OF GOD and MASTODON. We've got a little bit of a learning curve, so will start rehearsing the first week of November. And we might put an extra SLAYER song into the set and learn a cover song or two."

The complete itinerary for Kerry King's North American headline tour 2025 is as follows:

Jan. 15 -The Regency Ballroom, San Francisco, CA
Jan. 17 - Spokane Live Casino, Spokane, WA
Jan. 18 - Showbox SoDo, Seattle, WA
Jan. 19 - Roseland Theater, Portland, OR
Jan. 20 - Commodore Ballroom, Vancouver, BC CANADA
Jan. 22 - The Palace Theatre, Calgary, AB CANADA
Jan. 23 - Midway Music Hall, Edmonton, AB CANADA
Jan. 25 - Burton Cummings Theatre, Winnipeg, MB CANADA
Jan. 26 - The Fillmore, Minneapolis, MN
Jan. 28 - The Rave, Milwaukee, WI
Jan. 30 - The Majestic Theater, Detroit, MI
Jan. 31 - House of Blues, Cleveland, OH
Feb. 01 - Danforth Music Hall, Toronto, ON CANADA
Feb. 02 - L'Olympia, Montreal, QC CANADA
Feb. 04 - Royale, Boston, MA
Feb. 05 - Theatre of the Living Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Feb. 07 - Irving Plaza, New York, NY
Feb. 08 - Baltimore Soundstage, Baltimore, MD
Feb. 10 - Buckhead Theatre, Atlanta, GA
Feb. 11 - Jannus Live, St. Petersburg, FL
Feb. 13 - House of Blues, Houston, TX
Feb. 14 - Emo's, Austin, TX
Feb. 15 - The Studio at the Factory, Dallas, TX
Feb. 17 - Ogden Theatre, Denver, CO
Feb. 18 - Sunshine Theater, Albuquerque, NM
Feb. 19 - The Nile Theater, Phoenix, AZ
Feb. 21 - House of Blues, Las Vegas, NV
Feb. 22 - The Fonda Theatre, Los Angeles, CA

Also announced today is the release of King's brand new music video for the album track "Where I Reign". Shot in black and white, the "Where I Reign" video was directed by Jim Louvau who also directed King's videos for the album cuts "Residue" and "Toxic".

"I wanted to capture the fury and the energy of the band in a live setting," said Louvau, "an intensity that is matched from a visual standpoint that matches the intensity of the song and the energy that the band brings each and every night on tour, and I think we were able to do that. There are some still photos in the video that also show motion and energy, and I was really just trying to bring that energy to life in a live setting that is different from the other two videos that were done in the studio and were a little more in a controlled environment. So this video was definitely the guys’ being themselves and just showcasing what the band provides in a live setting."

King's debut solo album, "From Hell I Rise", was released in May. All material for the LP was written by the 60-year-old SLAYER guitarist. Helming the sessions at Henson Recording Studios in Los Angeles last year was producer Josh Wilbur, who has previously worked with KORN, LAMB OF GOD, AVENGED SEVENFOLD and BAD RELIGION, among others.

Joining Kerry in his new band are Mark Osegueda (vocals; DEATH ANGEL),Phil Demmel (guitar; MACHINE HEAD, VIO-LENCE),Kyle Sanders (bass; HELLYEAH) and drummer Paul Bostaph (SLAYER, TESTAMENT, EXODUS).

Osegueda is the first new vocalist King's been in a band with for 40 years, and his voice is well-known and revered. "I think a lot of people — namely industry types — were worried about him sounding too much like DEATH ANGEL," King says. Those concerns proved moot. "I knew what we had; he and I worked really well together."

Yet Osegueda's singing was so powerful and unique that King was momentarily uneasy: "By the second song Mark finished singing, I went into the studio and asked him, 'Is this sustainable? Because I've never heard you sing like this. I want to make sure you're not blowing your load in the studio and can't reproduce this live." Mark said, 'I can totally do it.' So I asked him again in about an hour. And again, in another hour. Then I figured, 'All right, I guess he means it.'"

King authored all the lyrics, mainly for logistical reasons. "I finished everything before Mark knew he had the gig," he explains. "But that's not to say he will or won't write on record two." Circumstances dictated that King sing on all "From Hell I Rise" demos. "I did scratch vocals on everything," King says, adding, "I'm not a singer. I'm a guitar player. I've got conviction when I sing, but I have no range, and I need some distortion to help me out a little bit. There was always, 'I got this if whatever we're looking for doesn't work.' Luckily, we didn't have to go that route."

In early May, the KERRY KING band performed its first live show at Reggies in Chicago. In the days following, the band went from playing an intimate venue to performing at the huge U.S. festivals Welcome To Rockville (Florida) and Sonic Temple (Ohio).

KERRY KING launched a European tour on June 3 — King's 60th birthday – in Tilburg, The Netherlands. The trek combined headline shows in the U.K., The Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Spain but also festival appearances such as Rock Am Ring, Hellfest, Tuska, Download, Sweden Rock Festival and many more.

The SLAYER guitarist's solo band played its first concert as the support act for LAMB OF GOD and MASTODON on July 19 at the Texas Trust CU Theatre in Grand Prairie, Texas. The six-week "Ashes Of Leviathan" tour wrapped on August 31 in Omaha, Nebraska.

Photo credit: Jim Louvau