Testament
Brotherhood of the Snake

2016 was a year of thrash. Many (great) names from the past returned to the scene, from Metallica to Death Angel, from Testament to Megadeth, and across the Atlantic, Sodom and Destruction have emerged again, while we await the new work from Kreator, completing the German "triad."

We stay in the States: the Testament of Chuck Billy and Alex Skolnick are, in the opinion of the writer, those who have managed to maintain the highest quality bar among the old names. Megadeth recovered with "Dystopia" but first went through a very dark phase, Metallica alternates years of silence with deeply questionable releases, Slayer have reappeared after years. Testament have managed to maintain an attitude and quality of songwriting capable of not letting them slide into the blandness that has now destabilized the genre, among works that recycle the past, completely incoherent openings (read "Super Collider" by Megadeth), few and confused ideas, and recordings polished and far too in line with the times. This last flaw is also present in the new "Brotherhood of the Snake." It seems that cleaning sounds, crystallizing them into a sort of computerized perfection, has now become a diktat for musicians and producers. The warm sounds of the eighties will be lost forever in the gray repetition of aseptic modernity.

Let’s fly beyond the criticism of plastic sound to focus on the point of the new work: BOTS is an album positioned on the same lines as the previous "Dark Roots of Earth." The realm is that of speed/thrash, and the feeling is of a band that has now abandoned the melodic heavy hues present in albums like "Souls of Black" and "The Ritual." The sound has gradually become heavier, the sporadic (and splendid) ballads like "The Legacy" or "Trail of Tears" have completely disappeared, in favor of a more direct approach, but not for this simplistic in the construction of songs. After all, with a pair of guitarists like Peterson and Skolnick, it would be exceedingly embarrassing and unforgivable to trivialize the song form. Yet when Testament recapture that flavor of the past, as in "Seven Seals", they manage to find that epic pathos and those vocal lines that are sometimes lacking. It's useless to dwell on the description of the various songs: the length is contained considering the times, and as mentioned, the variations are practically non-existent. The technical skill and mastery remain unaltered, Billy sings exactly as he did 30 years ago, and the invective "Centuries of Suffering" is there to prove it, but one could also mention the excellent "The Pale King", another example of old school thrash metal that has adapted to modernity.

With these new releases from the big names, the discourse risks always being the same. For some, the ideas have run out, others recycle from outside their sound to survive, others rework the formula and at least manage to save themselves. This last is the case of Testament, a band that tries to resist like a monolith to the storms that have disintegrated the genre. An honest album, which has some tracks that would make many other names among the "greats" envious, but that inevitably ends up fitting into the aforementioned discourse. Yet it is a nice listen, especially compared to the very tough times that classic metal is going through.

7/7.5