Band manager Craig Luckin eventually reunited the core of the group to record a follow-up to The Evil One, with Erickson on vocals and guitar, Billy Miller on electric autoharp, Motown artist Andre "Mandré" Lewis on keyboards, and lead guitarist Duane Aslaksen handling musical arrangements and production as Stu Cook had on the previous album.

In 1984 he recorded five songs with a group of Austin-based musicians fronted by producer Speedy Sparks, including three tracks that he'd done for the unreleased Burn the Flames album.

[6] Although the album contains spooky, sinister, and vampiric songs like "Burn the Flames," "Haunt," and the re-recorded "Bermuda," Don't Slander Me marks a departure from the pure horror rock of The Evil One.

The Village Voice's Robert Christgau called it "a garage rant about blues theology" and said that the album "sounds like a bunch of would-be old farts (with genuine article Jack Casady lending a touch of authenticity) latching onto the old wildman for the kind of magic carpet ride other music lovers only collect.

"[9] Ira Robbins' 1987 New Music Record Guide called it "typically gripping," adding that, "the inclusion of two [Buddy] Holly-inspired pop tunes makes for a bizarrare contrast to "Burn the Flames.

"[3] The Los Angeles Times noted, "There's a menacing edginess underlying some of the tunes—for all the bouncy garage-rock spunk of the title track, you wouldn`t want to ignore its repeated warning.

"[14] In retrospective reviews, Austin Chronicle writer Scott Schinder called Erickson's 1980s albums, released after his half-decade involuntary stay in a Texas psychiatric hospital, "the clearest glimpse into his raging musical soul."

He described Don't Slander Me as more ragged and less focused than Erickson's previous album, 1981's The Evil One, but a grabber nonetheless, anchored by such classics as 'Bermuda' and the title track, and revealing a romantic edge in the Buddy Holly pastiches 'Starry Eyes' and 'Nothin' in Return.

'"[8] Pitchfork reviewer Jason Heller said that Don’t Slander Me's "cleanliness and control ... makes for a more palatable but less vital Erickson" than on the 1981 disc The Evil One, but that its mix of "souped-up garage rock" and "ringing, jangly " power-pop were still powerful, calling the song "Burn the Flames" "good, clean, Halloweenish fun".