Rocker Eric Slater has released his newest single, “Dead Men.” The track is an introspective, triumphant, yet darkly bleak rock waltz that plays on mortality for its theme. The light and airy nature of this early material shares few characteristics with the lurking and sinister, “Dead Men,” except that both are quality works of music from the same artist. In many respects, though, “Dead Men” is the superior result.Slater’s guitaring, though he is capable of playing in a wide variety of styles, is slowly strummed for this track in a black and blue tone that contains goth and punk-rock tendencies, reminiscent of Nick Cave’s work, or of TSOL’s mellower side (“Weathered Statues,” for instance). The song is crooned out by Slater in an intimate, cracking voice that sounds like a shadowy and more masculine Neil Young with a tinge of David Bowie, like The Verve’s Richard Ashcroft, although more mid-west American in the delivery.It is to the track’s benefit that Slater’s vocals are way out front in the single’s mi