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Testament > The Spitfire Collection > Reviews
Testament - The Spitfire Collection

Pathetic - 0%

pinpals, April 13th, 2007

"Oh shit, we just lost the biggest band on our label. Their last album sold several thousand copies! How am I supposed to pay for that store-brand cereal I feed my kids? This Timex watch won't pay for itself. There must be some way we can exploit the time that Testament was with us. I know it's possible, I think I saw it in a movie once. Wayne's World or something like that. Oh wait, that had nothing to do with exploiting bands on a music label. Oh well, anyhow, I guess we own the rights to the songs. Eureka! A greatest hits collection! Even though Testament never had any hits, I'm sure there are some scene kids who just bought the Trivium album and want to gain credibility. That re-recording we did, "First Strike Still Deadly," paid off. Because now we can add the names of classic songs to the back case, and these morons will be none the wiser that they are getting lifeless re-recordings of older songs. Not to mention live tracks, can't forget those. And now to pick out some songs from our releases to put on here. Hmm....we can start with the title tracks. What do you mean none of the albums had title tracks? Fuck. Did you listen to Demonic or The Gathering? Neither did I. Well, you can't go wrong with "Riding the Snake," that sounds metal. Oooo, and "Hatreds Rise," we all know teenagers that want to piss off their parents will like that title. Ok, I have the track-listing of the two albums in front of me. I'm going to close my eyes and point to a title. Where my finger lands, that will be put on the album. 'John Doe.' 'Down For Life.' 'Careful What You Wish For.' Hmm, that last one sounds kind of lame; put it on for a couple of seconds. Gaaah, I said for a couple of seconds! Ok, it has heavy guitars, it can stay. You think only five actual tracks that were written when they were with us is ok? Yeah, me too. Send it in, we're going to miss happy hour."

This isn't the transcript taken from the security cameras at Spitfire, but it could have been. I cannot comprehend the stupidity of this release. Of course, I'm nice, so I want to think of it as stupidity, but really it's more likely that it's just a way to get ignorant scene kids to buy it based on two factors:

1. They go into the store having heard of Testament, and just get the first greatest hits they can find.
2. Put some "metal" looking cover on it, and hope to impress kids who want to be "metal."

And if they wanted any points....any points at all, they would have at least included ONE good song from the two studio albums that are covered. Yet, no "D.N.R." no "Legions of the Dead," "Eyes of Wrath," or even "Demonic Refusal." And the track listing is terribly inconsistent. The two studio releases on Spitfire were modern sounding, yet they're mixed up with the live versions of the older songs (which are amazing, but when heard out of the order they played them live, they lose their effect) along with the re-recordings found "First Strike Still Deadly" which weren't improvements at all and featured Skolnick with a boring, jazzy guitar tone. Just buy the studio albums (preferably the pre-The Ritual ones) and don't give cheapo label execs anything more than your bitter disgust.