The Gathering

Enthusiasm returned to Eric Peterson and Chuck Billy so much with the release of "Demonic" that soon after the release of that album, the Americans began recording the next one. Of course, the line-up was refreshed and reassembled in the meantime, which was quite typical for Testament in the nineties, although when it was announced that on their eighth album, "The Gathering", the band would be completed by a musicians in the form of Steve DiGiorgio, Dave Lombardo and - again - James Murphy, this album almost immediately became one of the biggest metal sensations of 1999. This time, indeed, there was no exaggeration in these announcements. "The Gathering" met huge expectations and turned out to be the best longplay that Eric Peterson's band released.

It's interesting because we are talking about the eighth album on the group's discography, which in the case of thrash veterans rarely came into outstanding things. And that's what "The Gathering" is all about. From the eighth album Testament oozes an amazing dose of energy and ingenuity on every level, and at the same time, full professionalism and precision. Simply put, "The Gathering" is an album that does not lack power and professional performance, but also freshness. Compared to "Demonic", "The Gathering" stopped more overwhelming sounds (but not worse production), and fast, tight and very aggressive thrashy sounds returned to the band, although this does not suggest that the group recorded too conservative or calculated material. On "The Gathering" the main means of expression is more modern thrash metal, which is full of speed, original melodies, non-obvious atmosphere, but also death metal elements (mainly in Billy's vocals, who, apart from clean singing, adds grizzly growls) and occasional more slightly squeaky, groove metal riffs. And all these components come into a huge number of ultra-hit songs, among which "Fall Of Sipledome", "D.N.R (Do Not Resuscitate)", "Down For Life", "Eyes Of Wrath", "True Believer" and "Allegiance" deserve special recognition - even though it would be wisest to mention the entire tracklist here.

One more word about the line-up of "The Gathering". As far as Chuck and Eric I can only mention praise from previous reviews, it's so interesting that Dave Lombardo got the biggest chance on "The Gathering". As you can easily guess, the style of this American perfectly complemented the music here and by him this longplay is bursting at the seams with fast paces and sophisticated variety. What is surprising, however, is a slightly different look at the parties of James Murphy and Steve DiGiorgio. Well, both gentlemen are a bit behind, i.e. their solo performances are quite heavily dosed compared to the rest (and for example DiGiorgio showed his skills only in "Riding The Snake" and "Sewn Shut Eyes"). And what's most interesting, that fact does not bother...at all! "The Gathering" is so full of power that actually in many fragments a larger number of solos and a stronger bass could unnecessarily weaken the whole album.

"The Gathering" thus closes the so-called the second chapter of Testament with a huge bang, definitely eliminating much earlier, Metallica-Slayer comparisons, and at the same time bringing their more modern face to the very top. The eighth album of the Peterson's band is a piece of brilliantly and originally composed, thrash metal music, showing that in the mediocre 1999, significant and powerful albums in this trend could be created. Well, in fact, these Americans, on the occasion of their next releases, were largely inspired by "The Gathering".

Originally on A bit of subjectivism...in metal