Testament: Dark Roots of Earth Review

9/10

Welcome to my very first blog! In this first blog, I will be reviewing the tenth album by thrash metal band Testament, "Dark Roots of Earth". Starting with just the artwork, this album already looks badass. The cover features some dude speaking to a giant satanic looking God thing that seems to have erupted out of the ground. This God thing has antlers, snakes, and a beard, so it's pretty cool. Anyway, this is actually only the third Testament album I've ever listened to in it's entirety (the other two being "The Legacy" and "Souls of Black"). But I was so impressed by this album, that I was actually motivated to start this blog just so that I could write down some of the things I'd been thinking when I first heard it.

01 Rise Up: The first song kicks off the album as a typical thrash metal song. Which is absolutely fine for Testament, so no complaints here. Right away, it's obvious that this song is a perfect "sing-back" song for live shows, so it's almost guaranteed that Rise Up will be a staple in Testament's setlist on their upcoming North American tour with Anthrax and Death Angel. The chorus involves Chuck Billy growling, "When I say rise up, you say war!" Which will be a perfect bit for the audience to yell back at live shows.

02 Native Blood: The second song of "Dark Roots of Earth" is definitely one of the highlights of the entire album. It has fairly cleaner singing than the majority of Testament songs, and it serves to prove that Chuck Billy can do more than just growl and yell. Native Blood is Chuck Billy singing about taking pride in his Native American blood, and about the hardships he had to endure when he was younger because of it. The choruses have some really great melodic singing, and all in all Native Blood is a great performance from the whole band. There's also a blistering solo, and re-recruited drummer Gene Hoglan's playing is as airtight as ever.

03 Dark Roots Of Earth: Ahh the title track. It is a fairly slower song compared to the first two songs, but it's not a bad thing by any means. Featuring another great sing-along chorus, it is very easy to imagine crowds of rabid Testament fans yelling "Dark roots... of the earth!" with metal horns raised high. As it mentions some kind of God, I would imagine this would be the huge creature depicted on the album cover. And as I listen closely to it right now, I'm pretty sure this is another one of Testament's "climate change" songs. That would most likely mean that the creature erupting out of the earth is what pollution and such is doing to the earth. Sweet metaphor.

04 True American Hate: The fourth song launches right into a spectacular, most likely finger-tapped solo, which is an excellent way to start a song. Hoglan's double bass pedaling is fantastic as always. Aaaand here's another chorus that they're going to love playing to audiences. Billy will sing "True American hate!" and the audience will yell back "HATE!". After the second chorus we get another excellent finger-tapped lick/solo, before leaping into the main guitar solo, which will bring the song to a close after another couple of choruses (HATE!).

05 A Day In The Death: There are two versions of this song if you get the iTunes deluxe edition. The version which appears on the album has drumming from good ol' Gene Hoglan, while the second bonus version features a guest appearance from Lamb of God's Chris Adler. Unfortunately, I only have the Hoglan version, which is still pretty damn epic. A Day in the Death [of Mankind] is a song written about the various states of disarray the world is in nowadays, whether it's dictators, revolutions, or protests, everything seems to be contributing to the death of mankind. A phrase often repeated throughout the song is a haunting "my back is against the wall."

06 Cold Embrace: This song is now my favorite song on the album, and probably my favorite Testament song of all time. Chuck Billy's clean singing is so beautiful, and the lyrics are extremely poignant. The lyrics and theme of the song remind me a bit of Symphony X's "Lady of the Snow". After the second verse (which ends with the excellent line "sorrow is the color of her dream"), the song speeds up a bit, with lyrics reminiscent of Metallica's "The Day That Never Comes" ("the sun will never shine"). Cold Embrace is also the longest song on the album, clocking in at 7 minutes and 45 seconds. But don't worry; that's 7:45 of pure awesome.

07 Man Kills Mankind: I assume this title is a play-on of the phrase "guns don't kill people, people kill people". Pretty clever, guys. Because in reality, there really is only one thing responsible for the majority of the horrible things that happen in the world today, and that is mankind.  One notable thing about this song is that it features some really good harmonies, with one of the singers going quite high. And of course, Gene's drumming is fantastic.

08 Throne of Thorns: The eighth song of the album is the second longest on here, standing at 7 minutes and 4 seconds. The song starts with some very nice acoustic guitar parts, before leaping into the excellent riffage that is thrash. The "God of war! Fire born! Throne of Thorns!" part of the chorus is a definite highlight of the song, and of the whole album (I'm pretty sure that's what the lyrics are: it could also be "Firemourne", which sounds totally badass, whatever it might be). There's a distinct possibility that Throne of Thorns could refer to the Iron Throne in George R.R. Martin's "Song of Fire and Ice" series. And if that's the case, then it most likely contains references to Joffrey Baratheon.

09 Last Stand For Independence: The non-deluxe part of the album ends as it began: with a furiously fast thrash metal song. Packed with awesome riffs and licks, this song wouldn't sound too out of place on "Souls of Black". There's not too much to say about this song. I think it maybe would have been better to have it somewhere in the middle of the album, and have had something like "Man Kills Mankind" or "A Day In The Death" as the closing song, but that's pretty much the only criticism I can have with this song and the album in general.

Well that's all I have to say about the normal version of "Dark Roots of Earth". Read on for my thoughts on the bonus tracks that come with the bonus edition. And listen to "Cold Embrace" again.

10 Dragon Attack (Queen Cover): Oh God yes. A Queen song. Queen is one of my all time favorite bands, so I was incredibly stoked when I saw a cover of Dragon Attack show up on the bonus tracks. Chuck Billy himself said that he didn't want the cover versions to just sound like karaoke versions, so they tried their best to re-imagine the songs. And they certainly did. With this cover, Testament have made this excellent Queen song their own. There's a nice easter egg hidden near the end of the song, where Gene Hoglan plays a bit of the drum beat to "We Will Rock You". I'm really hoping one of the cover versions will make it's way onto the setlist for the Death Angel/Testament/Anthrax tour, and I really hope it's this song.

11 Animal Magnetism (Scorpions Cover): Now, I have never actually listened to the original version of this song, which is a bit odd as I really like Scorpions. Anyway, I thought I'd still give it a try. What we have here is very doom metal-y sounding song, with very slow chugging guitars, and very distorted/echo-y vocals. When I first listened to it, I thought it sounded similar to Scorpions' "The Zoo". Which makes sense as "The Zoo" and "Animal Magnetism" are both on the same album. This version doesn't sound quite like Testament, nor does it sound quite like Scorpions, which is perhaps exactly what a Testament cover of a Scorpions song should sound like. Again, Testament have succeeded in re-imagining the song.

12 Powerslave (Iron Maiden Cover): Unlike the previous two covers, Billy says that Testament didn't even try to change this song up. It was too much of a classic to try and mess with. Given the success of the other two covers, however, it's very likely that they would have done a fine job at trying to make this one their own too. But this version is fine as is. One thing that stands out on all three of these covers is how different Chuck Billy can make his voice sound on each of them. If I was shuffling my iPod and "Powerslave" came on right after "Dragon Attack", I would probably assume they were two different bands. Kudos to Chuck Billy on his excellent vocal range.

13 Throne Of Thorns (Extended): This version of the song features an extra 37 seconds of the song, but other than that, there's no difference.

This is an awesome album. If I had to describe this album in one sentence, it would be that one. What an awesome album for their 10th. I give "Dark Roots of Earth" NINE horns up out of TEN. Nice job Testament!

Favorite song: Cold Embrace

Buy tickets to see Testament with Anthrax and Death Angel this fall!: http://www.testamentlegions.com/site/tour-dates/