Metal Anarchy

During an interview with Nikki Blakk of 107.7 The Bone, Testament’s Chuck Billy discussed the band’s upcoming album. According to him, “the record is very aggressive.”

Billy said the following about the progress that the group have made on the album:

“We’ve been here [in the recording studio] for — I don’t know — a couple months now, and we’re getting ready to leave for Europe in July. So we’ve gotta get everything done in June. So it’s our goal to finish everything this month.”

He continued when asked how many songs it will include:

“There’ll probably be 11 tracks, and then we have some covers that we’ve done. And we actually did a couple of re-recordings, a song off ‘The Legacy’ and a song off ‘The New Order’, just to have a newer version. And we re-recorded them… Just one song off of each album. Our thought is, ‘Okay, we’re pushing the remasters. Why not pick a song off each, and then let’s mix them, make them sound current, and just maybe put that out there to maybe push those products.’ I don’t know… These will just be total separate just for fun, marketing.”

He then further discussed the band’s timetable:

“We’ve took off from November last year to write the record. It took a while. We just got in the studio in May and June. So we’re finishing up. And right now, once we leave [for tour] in July, we won’t really have time until December, which is a good thing. We’ll be busy, but we’ll have like a week or two between tours to do any extra overdubs or anything. We’re gonna live with the record, which is really the first time we get to do this, because usually we’ll record it and it’s written in stone where now we know… Usually we have Andy Sneap mix it and he’s not available. So we kind of have some time to select somebody else. But in that time, we’re gonna live with the songs and come between tours to make any adjustments or changes, if we have to… We go to Europe and we come home in August and we start the U.S. tour. So we have 10 days or 11 days there before we start. And then after that, we have about 10 days before we start a European tour with Kreator and Anthrax, and that’ll go through December 16th. And then we’re home for the holidays. And then we’ll start thinking about mixing and finishing, getting it out there next year.”

He also discussed release plans:

“We hope to have a single maybe, just towards the end of the year. Give whoever we select [to mix the album] one song, ‘Let’s see how you do, see if we’re happy,’ before we do the whole record maybe. It’s a pain in the butt, but it’s still a little more convenient for us this time.”

He then added the following about the musical direction:

“The record is very aggressive. With this one, we have a new drummer, Chris Dovas, who’s really putting a fire under Eric [Peterson] and really, really got some really heavy, fast — I don’t know if it’s the word ‘modern’, maybe. I don’t know, but… ‘Current’, how about that? Current-sounding. So, Chris is adding to that.

I never know what the record is gonna be until we mix it. ‘Cause they’re all just individual songs, and I go, ‘Okay, they’re great.’ But until we mix it and listen to it as an album, that’s when we realize, ‘Wow, this came out better than I thought. Wow, this is really good.’ But this one, I’m excited going in before the mix, because I just know each song is one step up from the last record, as far as aggression, maybe.”

Billy also discussed the songwriting process:

“Chris has been coming out since probably December, maybe a little before that, and going to Eric’s house; he’s got an electric drum set there. So they’ve been working, writing, putting all this stuff together. And at the beginning of May, once Eric started tracking, we decided that, let’s bring Alex [Skolnick] and everybody in’ except for Steve [DiGiorgio], ’cause he’s on tour, let’s bring Alex and everybody here to the studio and let’s just go through all the music, all the songs and make sure we’re all happy with the arrangements. And every song got changed as well. Once Alex got here, we all started putting our heads together till we were all happy with the arrangements. And then he left and we said, ‘Okay, Chris, now here’s the new stuff. Let’s do it and track it.’ And he knocked it out last month, and now it’s the rest of us that [are tracking our parts]. So we’ve been a little more thoughtful on this record. We have the time to do it. So I think it’s gonna be a killer record.”

A lot of it is Eric’s riffs, but they’re put in the proper places or cut out if we don’t need it. And it’s good for me because I didn’t really get to sit with Eric. I just let them guys jam and just come up with as much as you can and we’ll sort it out later, which that’s what they did. But once Chris came out, then we knew, okay, it has to change or we’re gonna just have the same record, and maybe we wouldn’t be happy when it was all done. And also Eric’s actually been going to New York — he actually went to work with Alex out there, which he hasn’t done that in the past. And I think having Chris be available because like Gene [Hoglan] or whoever we worked with didn’t have the time to come up as much as Chris has. Chris has spent a lot of time here, which has been good and really pushing Eric to make music. And we’re at a point now to where Eric’s, like, ‘You know what? This has been fun. I think I’m just going to keep bringing Chris out. Let’s just keep writing songs. Even after this record’s done, let’s just keep making songs,’ which I think is great because that means we can get a jump on the next record. ‘Cause not spring chickens. It’s, like, let’s get it done now while we can.”

He also opened about the lyrical themes:

“[It’s] not as focused [on], like, the aliens, creating mankind and that kind of stuff, but there is some of that. There’s a lot. Each song definitely has its own identity lyrically. And again, we’re writing stuff that is real, that happens with the environment; we’re singing about that again. A.I., we’re singing stuff about that. That’s a big thing. So, there’s always an inspiration for songs. I think it’s a little easier. There’s so much going on in our world to write about now. It’s a crazy world today, so there’s a lot of stuff to talk about. And I like singing about what’s real and what’s going on instead of some fantasy lyrics, because, for me, I think when I sing ’em, I have more conviction, I believe in ’em a little more. And maybe it’s easier for me to remember the lyrics live. [Laughs]

There’s a song, ‘Havana Syndrome’, which is about the Havana Syndrome. People, look that up. There’s ‘Infanticide A.I.’, which is another song going A.I. direction. And there’s actually a slower song. We haven’t done a slower song. I’m not gonna say ‘ballad’, but I’m gonna say a slower song that has a lot of groove and soul, called ‘Meant To Be’. And it’s like a classic Testament-type ballad, I guess, if you wanna use that word. But we’ve got a little bit of everything, but, again, I think it’s really sticking to Testament, having to have some melodic stuff, even though there’s some really brutal lyrics and real brutal, more of a death voice. I still put the hook in with more of a melodic hook or something. It’s still classic Testament. If you listen to it, you’ll go, ‘That’s Testament, but a little more octane to it.’”

[via Blabbermouth ]