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Review: Testament, Motion
There ought to be some kind of law against playing death metal during daylight hours. But another of those absurd early starts at Motion sees Poland’s Vader take to the stage just as Bristol’s commuters are wending their way home. Still, band founder Piotr Wiwczarek has been doing this stuff for more than 30 years now and knows how to grab an audience by the scruff of the neck and beat it into submission. In keeping with the theme of the evening, Vader play a fair bit of their earlier, thrashier material during an all-too-brief set, though even the more recent Triumph of Death sounds like a rock’n’roll song passed through a death metal filter. There are plenty of fans – including a fair number of Poles – here to cheer them on as the venue slowly fills up.
Fact fans may wish to note that Canada’s Annihilator first played here back in 1989 as fresh-faced youths supporting Onslaught at the Bristol Hippodrome. (Yes, metal kids: they really used to have this sort of stuff at the Hippodrome – albeit very, very briefly.) Back then, Annihilator were very much on the rise thanks to founding multi-instrumentalist Jeff Waters’ reputation as an innovative guitarist. Indeed, he’s ranked in third place in Joel McIver’s 100 Greatest Metal Guitarists – ahead of Tony Iommi and Michael Schenker. But frustratingly for Waters, Annihilator have remained in the ‘cult heroes’ box with their albums liable to be cited as influences by more successful peers rather than actually purchased by the public.
is needed now More than ever
Approximately 586,597 people have passed through the band’s ranks over the years, leaving Waters as the sole remaining original member. Nonetheless, rather than being downhearted he cuts a much more confident and athletic dash these days, seemingly having taken lessons in gurning and goofballery from his fellow countryman Devin Townsend (“Give me a fucking break, I’m nearly a fucking grandfather!” he tells an impatient heckler). He also seems genuinely surprised that this very partisan crowd knows all the songs – especially the ones from early concept album Alice in Hell.
This is precise, melodic, technically demanding thrash of the variety popularised by Megadeth and it’s all the more impressive given that the current Annihilator line-up is a multi-national one, which must make rehearsals something of a challenge. As is traditional in recently refreshed veteran bands, one member (Italian drummer Fabio Alessandrini) wasn’t even born when much of this stuff was written. And with Rich Hinks, mastermind behind Cambridge prog-metallers Aeon Zen, on bass, the headliners would have cause to be worried about being upstaged if they didn’t have Alex Skolnick in their ranks.
A huge circle pit opens up for the fast’n’furious Twisted Lobotomy and they conclude with a track apiece from their first two albums (Alison Hell, Phantasmagoria), much to our delight.
There are those who claim that thrash metal’s Big Four (Metallica, Slayer, Anthrax, Megadeth) should be expanded to accommodate a fifth band: Bay Area veterans Testament. With a few reservations, tonight’s show makes the case admirably.
They’re on ferocious form, with a magnificent light show (give that lighting designer a pay rise!), newies like ancient alien astronaut-fixated The Pale King underlining the band’s remarkable post-reunion renaissance by holding their own alongside such crowd favourites as Into the Pit. There are also some infrequently aired treats, like the title track from 1994’s inconsistent Low album, which help to keep things fresh.
Chuck Billy plays air guitar with his microphone stand as usual, and uses it to symbolically stir the circle pit in between delivering those gruffer-than-Hetfield vocals. But it’s breathtakingly talented guitarist Alex Skolnick who really elevates this stuff, and one cannot help but wonder what the minority who may know him only for his world music and jazz-fusion trio endeavours would make of his full-on thrash metal guitar heroics.
His spellbinding solo spot quotes from everyone from Ritchie Blackmore to Hendrix. Trouble is that shortly thereafter fellow guitarist Eric Peterson gets a solo. Then there’s an typically impressive Gene Hoglan drum solo (cheekily incorporating the climax of Opeth’s Deliverance). And, as the old joke reminds us, we all know what happens after that. Interspersed between the songs, these simply serve to sap the set of its momentum. Testament recover, obviously, but it all seems so unnecessary.
While no one could accuse them of being an overtly political band, Chuck takes the time to underline his solidarity with human rights campaigners in the introduction to Stronghold, a celebration of his Native American heritage. He also reveals that Testament have arrived here via shows in Russia and Israel, as if to remind us that what the world needs right now is more nation-uniting metal and less bone-headed nationalism. It’s apt, then, that we should all end up bellowing along with the thunderous Practice What You Preach.
And speaking of very different tribes, there was more fun to come at the end of this early-curfew show as a queue of clubbers waited patiently outside, only to look suitably horrified when the doors burst open and an audience that resembled the bedraggled losing army in a Vikings/Game of Thrones battle emerged, steaming gently in the cold night air.
All photos by Mike Evans
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