Bay Area legends TESTAMENT are set to lay waste to Australia in June 2025; their first headline tour since 2010.
Since emerging from the San Francsico Bay Area Testment have delivered some of the greatest metal anthems of all time. ‘Over The Wall’, ‘Practice What You Preach’, ‘Rise Up’, ‘Into The Pit’, ‘Brotherhood Of The Snake’, ‘Low’, ‘The New Order’, ‘First Strike Is Deadly’... The list of absolute classics seems endless as they unleashed one crushing album after another.
With no shortage of critical acclaim, Testament remain one of the select few bands with 2 albums, (both The Legacy and The New Order) inducted into Decibel Magazine’s prestigious Hall Of Fame, alongside Metallica, Black Sabbath, and Motörhead.
Revolver Magazine included The New Order on their list of 14 Thrash Albums You Need to Own. Guitar World recognized Practice What You Preach as one of the Top 10 Shred Albums of all time. Guitar World called Low as one of the Iconic Albums That Defined 1994. The Formation of Damnation won Best Album at Metal Hammer’s Golden Gods Awards. And released nearly 30 years after the band’s formation, Dark Roots of Earth became their highest-charting album yet!
Testament have remained steadfast over the course of literal decades; always managing to present the genuine aspects of thrash metal that defines their existence while spreading into unique horizons through new crisp and fascinating sounds. Now they are bringing those sounds to Australia so this week I sat down for a chat with the legend himself – Chuck Billy.
“It’s a good feeling because it has taken us like, what, 13 years to come back?” says Chuck as we talk about the fact that the announcement of their tour lit up social media with excited fans demanding tickets straight away. “2012 was our last appearance there and we have been trying to get back for a long, long time. And then of course the pandemic hit so that slowed things down but finally the promoters got out from under a rock and called us up and now we are making it happen.”
“We’re excited because of course we have the brand new record and you guys are first in line to get some of the new music played live by Testament,” he says with a laugh.
We are still waiting for an exact date for the album to drop but Chuck says fan will not be disappointed with this one.
“We are really excited about this one,” he says. “Our new drummer, Chris Dovas, he went out and worked with Eric Peterson in his home more than any drummer ever has before. He really lit a fire under Eric and the result is a really, really strong record. It is very fast, it is very aggressive. It is very current and modern sounding. It is very exciting and that is the great thing about music – creating new music, and especially for a band that has been around for 38 years, finding new things and ways to create new music is really, really exciting.”
That leads us to talk about how Testament has kept that fire lit to be creative after so many years and not just rest on past albums to keep them going.
“I think Eric Peterson is the key component to that,” says Chuck after thinking for a moment. “Eric doesn’t really follow bands or jump on social media. He is a really quiet guy but he is really stuck to what he likes – the old classic Merciful Fate, Judas Priest or early Scorpions – that is the classic stuff that excites him but he still somehow keeps writing these albums and keeping everything new but keeping true to classic Testament.”
“And I love that,” he says continuing. “Because I would hate to just keep making records that sound the same. I think it would be too easy and I love the challenge of doing something new. I like trying to figure things out – like what kind of vocals do I sing here, what are the lyrics going to be? When you succeed at finding something new because it is like ‘wow’. But I am still being challenged and I am still finding new voices and tones to use when I record and that makes it exciting. “I don’t think we have ever had a record that we have made where we go ‘yeah it is the same ol’ same ol’. It’s never been like that so it has always been exciting when we are making new music.”
The thought of being able to play some of the new tracks in Australia live for the first time is also something that Chuck is really looking forward to.
“I am really excited about that,” he says laughing again. “Sometimes when you pick a track to do live and you are practicing for it it just doesn’t have that right feeling. But when you find a track that really does fit that live performance situation then it is really fun and it becomes a little easier because it just makes sense.”
The other exciting equation for Australian fans is that since Testament last toured they have also released Brotherhood Of The Snake and Titans Of Creation meaning we have never heard those songs tracks live either. I ask Chuck whether that means Aussie fans of a real onslaught of new music to look forward to.
“Well for us we have just come off tours playing our The Legacy and The New Order albums so we are looking forward to being able to play some of our more current songs. We are very proud of those current albums so these days it is really difficult to put a set list together but we always aim to get at least 2 tracks off our newest record but it is really hard. And when you are doing a headline show it is our choice how long we play – we can do an hour and an half or we can do two hours and that means we can do a whole mixture of stuff. Not being there for 13 years means that the song selection and show is going to be great – we can’t wait!”