Artist: TESTAMENT
Album: THE LEGACY (CD)

Release date: 1987
EAN/UPS: 75678174124
Media type: CD

Staunch campaigners of the Thrash cause and an act that came tantalisingly close to achieving major success, TESTAMENT was founded as LEGACY in the infamous Bay Area melting pot of Thrash Metal in 1983. As LEGACY, the Oakland-based band comprised high-school-student guitarists Eric Peterson and his cousin Derrick Ramirez, bassist Greg Christian and drummer Louis Clemente. A 1984 four-song demo saw Ramirez handling lead vocals, after which Steve ‘Zetro’ Souza was recruited as frontman. Recruiting guitarist Alex Skolnick, tutored by none other than JOE SATRIANI, a second demo session arrived in 1985, the track 'Reign Of Terror' gaining exposure from being featured on the Eastern Front Vol. 2 compilation album. These tracks were produced by Doug Piercy, a noted scene guitarist with credentials stretching through CONTROL, COBRA, ANVIL CHORUS and DELTA. However, Souza then bailed out to join another local up-and-coming thrash outfit, EXODUS.

Jonny Zazula’s Megaforce label took the band on, this arrangement securing major distribution through Atlantic Records. To avoid legal clashes with another band also titled LEGACY, the band switched names to TESTAMENT, the intended title of their first album. The valuable acquisition of former GUILT and RAMPAGE vocalist Chuck Billy was drafted in as new recruits for the Alex Perialas-produced debut 'The Legacy'. Chuck Billy would go on to become the central lynchpin and focal point of the band. Such was the undisputed quality of 'The Legacy', recorded at Pyramid Sound Studio, Ithaca in New York, that many predicted TESTAMENT were to join Thrash's front runners METALLICA, MEGADETH, SLAYER and ANTHRAX. The group capitalised on the favourable press and fan reaction by touring across the USA and Europe as direct support to ANTHRAX.

Megaforce maintained the momentum by combining a studio outtake, 'Reign Of Terror', with live tracks culled from the band's showing at the famed 'Dynamo' festival in Holland as the December 1987 European release 'Live In Eindhoven', oddly not released in the band's homeland until 1990. The studio follow up, May 1988's 'The New Order' maintained, and indeed boosted, the quality levels. Cut at Pyramid Sound and produced once again by Perialas, engineering credits went to RAVEN drummer Rob 'Wacko' Hunter. Bravely the record, which landed the band in at no. 136 on the Billboard album charts, included a take on AEROSMITH's 'Nobody's Fault' amongst the expected riffage.

TRACKLIST:

1. Over The Wall
2. The Haunting
3. Burnt Offerings
4. Raging Waters
5. Curse Of The Legions Of Death
6. First Strike Is Deadly
7. Do Or Die
8. Alone In The Dark
9. Apocalyptic City

LINE-UP:

Chuck Billy (vocals)
Alex Skolnick (guitar)
Eric Peterson (guitar)
Greg Christian (bass)
Louie Clemente (drums)