Metal Anarchy

During a recent interview with Belgian Jasper, Testament frontman Chuck Billy discussed the band’s upcoming album. According to him, the new material finds the band “getting pushed to the limits of trying something different.”

Billy said the following when asked about exploring new influences:

“Well, we’ve always had a sense of being TESTAMENT because Eric [Peterson, TESTAMENT guitarist and main songwriter] doesn’t like venture out and try to listen to new bands. He sticks to the classics that he likes and also he likes a lot of black metal. So he kind of listens to his niche of music, but he doesn’t listen to something… Like Sirius [XM] radio, that’s where we all find what’s new and modern and coming out now — he doesn’t listen to any of that, so he’s not influenced by that, but [new TESTAMENT drummer] Chris [Dovas], being with Chris and spending so much time with him, Chris has turned him on to some newer bands, and Eric’s, like, ‘Whoa. Wow, that’s brutal.’ So I know his gears are turning when he’s creating songs with Chris. And I know that since Eric didn’t follow the leader all the time, he’s always had his own style of writing, and it’s staying true to TESTAMENT.”

He also added:

“This new record, it’s still staying true to TESTAMENT, but it is influenced by what’s going on, which I’m kind of excited [about], because [Eric’s] always kept it in the same vein but always trying to improve what TESTAMENT’s doing, where this one, it’s pushing me vocally, pushing Alex [Skolnick, TESTAMENT guitarist] solo-wise — everybody’s getting pushed to the limits of trying something different and new and fresh and not making the same old record. We don’t ever wanna do that. We wanna make something that we enjoy and we feel that we’re confident to put this out there to the public and I think they’re gonna react to it.

Eric’s always been the guy that had to, like, kind of tell the drummer, ‘Play this beat, play that beat, try this,’ where I think with Chris, Chris was just ready to go. Chris was ahead of him, like doing stuff where Eric’s, like, ‘Whoa, what was that? Oh, wow. I like that.’ And just getting to be Eric and just play guitar. [And] it’s been so good that now that we wrote the songs for this record, January, February and March [of 2025], Eric and Chris are getting back together to work on the next record already, because they had such a great time and it just clicked. And we’re, like, we don’t have time to sit around and wait anymore. Let’s just keep carrying on. Don’t waste time and stretch us out for two, three years, four years. Let’s write another record, put this [new one] out [first] and be ready to go, get ahead of the curve.”

[via Blabbermouth]