Remasters of metal albums are a tricky thing. Sometimes remastering can breathe new life into a classic album that happens to have some pisspoor production. Other times the original mixes (warts & all) are so beloved and engrained in your psyche that any deviations are utterly alien and verboten. Where do these remasters fit in?
Both Testament and their first two albums are very near and dear to my heart. I first heard the song “Disciples of the Watch” by way of the tape-trading scene I was heavily into back in the late 80s. Yes, it’s a little silly to think that as a Bay Area metal guy that my first introduction to this Bay Area Thrash Metal band was by way of a sketchy C90 Maxell cassette tape from some dude in Oslo, Norway, but that’s just how things were long before The Internetz lol.
I was so wow’ed that I jumped onto my ten-speed bike and immediately rode over to Rasputin Records in Pleasant Hill CA, and bought both “The Legacy“ and “The New Order“. #hailvinyl Since both albums came into my little metal world the same time and same day, I have since always conflated these two Testament albums in my mind as one consolidated release.1
| That said, and in regards to these remasters…. let’s start things off and keep it brain-dead simple with a meme: |
 |
Most notable production fails were vastly improved with modern production/mixing techniques — the re-record and/or remasters of the very early Destruction and Sepultura albums, the remixes of RUSH‘s “Vapor Trails“ and Nevermore‘s “Enemies of Reality”, et al. But here I’m not understanding the raison d’être for the remasters of these two Testament albums. Neither album sounded bad back then, and the production by way of Marsha Zazula (R.I.P. 2021) and Jon Zazula (R.I.P. 2022) still very much holds up to this day.2
 |  |
With both albums, but most especially “The New Order“, the remastered mix is darker and murkier. The bottom end has been boosted, and mids and high ends torqued. On a multiband equalizer, this sounds like this went from a classic late 80’s Heavy Metal “U-shape” profile (i.e. big bass + big treble + scooped in the mids)… to what can be best visualized as an Olympic ski jump slope: all bass, and then a straight line downhill to the muddy mids and flacid highs, and maybe a little ski jump at the very highest band. It’s sounds all darker and frankly a bit lazy.
For example, my beloved “Disciples of the Watch” now has a darker and more reverby “alt-metalcore” mix applied to it. The guy in charge of the remaster does mostly pop, alternative, screamo, and metalcore3 , so the notion of that same mixing/production vibe being carried over to the remasters for a thrash metal band twice his age is to be expected, I guess. It’s almost as if he dialed in his EQ specs with the expectation of this only being played through an online stream or on a tiny cell phone speaker, and boosted the bass accordingly. The kids may call this mix “dank”, but I call it “disappointing”.
I guess the band and Nuclear Blast didn’t want to just re-release the original albums, but rather put out a “remastered treat” for fans, new and old. But as an old fart fan of this band from as far back as when Reagan was in the White House, I’m underwhelmed — and more than happy to stick to the old school releases in this case.
———————————————————————————-
1 It is also a notable that the band deftly dodged the dreaded Sophomore Slump that plagued a bunch of Thrash Metal bands back then. For example, Death Angel: I’m listening to your “Frolic in the Park“, and I’m iving you a thumbs down while making rude fart noises lol
2 If anything from Testament needs some help in the mixing booth, it’s their very rushed and muddy sounding “Souls of Black” album.
3 Warbringer is the only notable exception that I can see on that list, and that’s a meh band anyway IMHO