Gary Holt

guitar

b. 1964 in Richmond

Slayer today

Gary Wayne Holt (born May 4, 1964) is an American musician from the San Francisco Bay Area. He is the guitarist and main songwriter for thrash metal band Exodus, and has also been a member of Slayer since 2011, initially joining as a temporary guitarist in place of Jeff Hanneman, and as a permanent guitarist after his death in May 2013. Despite the fact that he did not join Exodus until 1981, Holt is the only member to appear on all of the band's albums. Loudwire called Holt "arguably the best pure thrash guitarist".

Personal life

Outside of music, Holt enjoys foreign and period films. According to Holt, the track "War Is My Shepherd" on the album Tempo of the Damned is a treatise of America's "pro-God" and "pro-war" stance and how he feels the two beliefs are incompatible with each other. Holt endorsed Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential election, stating, "I used to have a lot of respect for McCain, but he realized after the dirty defeat that he suffered at the hands of George W. Bush in the South Carolina primary in the (2000) election that he can only get elected if he plays the Karl Rove tactic b.s. He's doing it. It's just one debunked lie after the other. He's the kind of guy who will tell you the sky is red, you look up and it's blue, and he won't admit he's wrong. He's playing dirty politics. Palin is just terrifying, the thought of this lady being a heart attack away from having the nuclear codes. She's crazy and she's dumb." In the 2004 election, Holt vouched for John Kerry, but conceded that "they're all dirty crooks, all politicians. But at least (Kerry) wasn't a coward. He fought in the Vietnam War whereas George W. Bush Jr. was a draft dodger." In 2017, he referred to President Donald Trump as a "serial liar" and an "embarrassment to this country, this world, and everyone living in it." Holt is an atheist. In October 2017, he became a vegan. …