I agree with the score, give or take a couple tenths, although the tone of the review is more negative than I would be. The title track was my first encounter with Testament and subsequently made this the first album of their's I got, so I feel a bit different about it than the rest of the testament albums, but I very, very rarely return to the album compared to it's 3 predecessors, or the likes of Low or Formation of Damnation. I agree with the highlights, bar replacing Falling Fast with Face in the Sky, but I don't think the rest of the songs are all that bad. I can easily listen to the likes of One Man's Fate and Malpractice if they come up in shuffle; it's just when all the songs come together in one album, they lack the overall interest factor to make you want to the whole thing in one sitting.
Tbh pretty similar to my feelings towards The Ritual - enjoyable songs on their own but too much effort to listen to as a whole album. Those two and Demonic (my least favourite) are a couple of steps lower on the quality ladder than the rest of their stuff. Nevertheless, the title track and The Legacy by themselves justify its presence in my music library.

Written by musclassia on 20.05.2012 at 15:44

I agree with the score, give or take a couple tenths, although the tone of the review is more negative than I would be. The title track was my first encounter with Testament and subsequently made this the first album of their's I got, so I feel a bit different about it than the rest of the testament albums, but I very, very rarely return to the album compared to it's 3 predecessors, or the likes of Low or Formation of Damnation. I agree with the highlights, bar replacing Falling Fast with Face in the Sky, but I don't think the rest of the songs are all that bad. I can easily listen to the likes of One Man's Fate and Malpractice if they come up in shuffle; it's just when all the songs come together in one album, they lack the overall interest factor to make you want to the whole thing in one sitting.
Tbh pretty similar to my feelings towards The Ritual - enjoyable songs on their own but too much effort to listen to as a whole album. Those two and Demonic (my least favourite) are a couple of steps lower on the quality ladder than the rest of their stuff. Nevertheless, the title track and The Legacy by themselves justify its presence in my music library.

Pretty much my feelings about this, and yes, "Face In The Sky" is pretty much the same quality of "Falling Fast". In fact I mix between them because the vocals are identical. Though, you gotta bear with me, my first encounter was The New Order and thus it was pretty much a quality hop to the gutter after listening to this as my last Testament album (yes, I've heard all the good ones before it).

Yeah, I can understand going from Into The Pit to some of this stuff is a definite drop-off ha

Good one, agree with the review. I would have given it more of a 7.5 though. And you said it like three times, but yeah, the title track and "The Legacy" are amazing songs.

Written by Unhealer on 21.05.2012 at 03:27

Good one, agree with the review. I would have given it more of a 7.5 though. And you said it like three times, but yeah, the title track and "The Legacy" are amazing songs.

No matter how much one stresses on that point, it's still always a cause of argument for this album.

I've always had a soft spot for this album given it's the first work I ever picked up from Testament. It dropped around the time I picked up my first guitar and give Alex was one of my idols at the time I listened to this rather relentlessly. I agree with a lot of the criticism in this review, especially on Peterson's rhythm section/songwriting blurring together a bit and causing some inevitable filler as a result, but I still think more kindly towards some of the tracks mentioned. Beginning of the End into Face in the Sky is generally still a pleasing section of this disc to my ears. Falling Fast isn't doing much different but keeps my interesting going and Souls of Black caps in as the highlight (had a fun time learning on bass years later). From there it turns into filler for me until The Legacy (aka THE BALLAD ), then closes with filler. The production sounds pretty thin these days but compared to other thrash albums from the time I don't think it was abysmal. Also, if the "cheese" factor is brought into earlier day thrash reviews there aren't many bands that would have gotten out alive, to me that was part of the charm. Looking back it probably does deserve a 7 as a whole body of work but even today I don't think this is a bad Testament album.

The first truly terrible Testament album. But the worst was yet to come...