The L.A. Times interview has disappeared into the ether, so I am including it here.
On April 29, Testament releases its first studio album in nine years, "The Formation of Damnation," and for fans missing the early energy and gruff melodicism of other '80s Bay Area thrash-metalers such as Metallica and Megadeth, it's a must-purchase. After a quarter-century of adversity, Testament is touring with its classic lineup; it has shot a segment on Alcatraz for MTV's "52 Bands/52 Weeks" series; it has a new label (Nuclear Blast) and a new manager (Maria Ferrero).
"Everything's happening at once for us right now," says guitarist Eric Peterson, lounging in a tour vehicle behind San Juan Capistrano's Coach House, where the band played last week.
We talked to the enthusiastic, straightforward Peterson and natural storyteller Chuck Billy, the group's vocalist, after they autographed a Testament skateboard. It was a bootleg, but what the hell, it was for the fans.
The new album's fantastic.
EP: "We knew that it had to be something special, and we accomplished it."
You spent a lot of time on it.
CB: "We spent some time, but it's more, I guess, spending thought."
You've had some obstacles through the years.
CB: "We've just had nightmares. We've had two labels that went bankrupt on us."
EP: "Then Spitfire Records sold their company, and they turned turned the label into, like, a country label."
CB: "And Gospel."
That would have been great company for a band called Testament. Talk a little about your roots.
EP: "I wasn't even in a band yet, and I was seeing Metallica at the Old Waldorf in '82. When they came on, I just pictured my whole future. Already I had listened to Accept, "Fast as a Shark," but when I heard Metallica, it just opened up a whole bigger can of worms."
CB: "In those early '80s, L.A. was the hot spot for music, but it was more glam. New York had more hardcore. The Bay Area had Metallica, which was a different style of music -- it wasn't set up on image. They didn't rely on 'Let's be pretty and wear the uniforms, put makeup on, tease our hair.' It was cool to be not in the mainstream and not care about popularity."
Chuck, you're sounding better than ever.
CB: "On this record, I wanted to have melody and sing. Before I got into this band, I was singing more commercial heavy rock -- Dokken, Ratt. I can bark and I can do brutal death, but I always wanted to keep a melody in there."
You were diagnosed with cancer in 2001. Did it ever affect your singing?
CB: "No, the cancer was on my heart. It had nothing to do with my throat. I had a tumor about that big [he makes a shape the size of a cantaloupe with his hands] in the cavity of my chest, so it was hard to breathe. It's a funny story -- I had a lady come and tell me she had somebody who wanted to buy my house. A week later my house was sold. So when we moved, we decided, okay, we're gonna get a new doctor. And that's when he found it. This lady that sold my house saved my life, because I never would have gone for a checkup."
On your new album, the song "Dangers of the Faithless" has some unusual rhythms.
EP: "[Guitarist Alex Skolnick] showed me some of his riffs, and I got 'em down fine. He was, 'Oh, I thought that'd be hard for you.' And I go, 'No.' He goes, 'Well, it's in 5/4.' And then I couldn't play it!"
The Alcatraz thing sounds wild. The whole San Francisco Bay must have heard it when you cranked up.
CB: "Their big concern was that it's a bird sanctuary, and if we disturbed the environment and the nesting, they'd have to shut it down. But when we were playing, there were birds right on the window sill outside watching. They were like, 'Okay, it's all good.' It had been, like, 21 years since we had all been on that island together -- because we did our first video there, 'Over the Wall.' And after that, nobody's been able to go out there and film, except for the movie 'The Rock.'"
Whose father is your new song "Afterlife" about?
CB: "Both of ours."
EP: "He [Chuck] wrote it about his dad, but coincidentally my father passed away too. Six years ago."
CB: "It's just kind of a tribute, saying, 'We'll meet again in the afterlife -- if there really is an afterlife."
What did your fathers do?
EP: "My dad was a great carpenter. He did a lot of nice houses and churches in Contra Costa. I did so much work with him when I was a kid, I regret not paying attention. "
CB: "My father worked at a lot of different banks, on their computers and machines. But he was at heart a baseball, football, basketball coach. All my friends knew him as 'the coach.'"
The lyric says, "He believed in me."
EP: "Both of our dads really believed in what we did."
CB: "In his dying days and his final hours, my dad told me, 'Don't ever stop what you're doing, you're meant to do what you're doing.' That was heavy for me, because I was sick, and at that point I was thinking, 'My music career is probably over, and I'm just gonna try to live and be with my family.' When he told me that, it kinda sparked something in me -- 'I have to do this for my dad and just stick with it.'"
EP: "Thanks, Mr. Billy!"
I saw Testament at the Sunset Strip House of Blues in 2003, the night Lana Clarkson met Phil Spector there.
CB: "She was kind of helping us backstage, catering to us."
You were some of the last people ever to talk to her.
CB: "Yeah. We were."
EP [whispers]: "That's so weird, man."
The Disneyland-adjacent House of Blues has banned heavy metal now.
EP: "Damn that Mickey!"
Read Burk's LA Times review of Testament at the Coach House, April 10, here.
For the record, a few facts in the review got misstated due to misunderstandings in the edit. 1) The new songs were not all played at the beginning; they were sprinkled throughout the set. 2) The encore was four songs, not one. 3) Eric Peterson is not stone-faced, he's stoner-faced.