Testament
First Strike Still Deadly

THE REVIEW

After my overly generous judgment on the debated "Magic And Mayhem" by Finnish band Amorphis (which, in hindsight, I would slightly reevaluate by lowering the score, while still acknowledging its decent quality), I read with interest a harsh critique on this "First Strike Still Deadly", and I listened to it carefully.

The Testament, drunk on success after the earthquake of the magnificent and rightly acclaimed The Gathering, rashly decide to re-record old tracks in a modern guise, at least only in terms of sound. The result, predictably unfortunately, is mediocre, beyond the bounds of senselessness. The raw charm of The Legacy is gone, as are the baroque sounds of the imposing The New Order, where the Los Angeles group painted spatial and very personal frescoes.

The resulting music is dull, faux powerful, where the impact is more due to the clean production, in step with the times but sadly impersonal. The line-up promises to repeat the pyrotechnical feats of the previous album (in which the talented bassist Steve Di Giorgio had collaborated), buoyed by already well-established compositions, but the flop is so resounding that unsurprisingly it is quickly shelved by the band itself, pretending it never existed.

"Into The Pit" appears bloated, and the vocal performance in "Alone In The Dark," a mythical minor gem, is terrible. "Disciples Of The Watch" and a few others hit diligently, as the technical performance is generally punctual, but it fails to amaze. The songs themselves are the same as more than ten years ago, reproduced faithfully to the point of dogmatism; what difference between the authors of "Trial By Fire" and "Over The Wall" and a seasoned pub cover band?

The band does its homework by passing a layer of cheap plaster over old statues that should have remained untouched, with their imperfections, their rough features typical of an era. Little else to say, what a pity.