TESTAMENT Hopes To Begin Recording New Album By End Of Year

San Francisco Bay Area metallers TESTAMENT have wrapped up the "American Carnage" tour with SLAYER and MEGADETH and are ready to head into writing and recording mode for their upcoming follow-up to 2008's "The Formation Of Damnation".

"The 'American Carnage' tour was great for us, but now is the time for us to hold off on performing and go full steam ahead on getting the record finished," states vocalist Chuck Billy.

"We currently have studio time booked at the end of this year, and we're shooting for a mid-2011 release.

"The new album will most likely be a culmination of 'The Gathering' [1999] and 'The Formation of Damnation', but we're definitely not going to forget who we are or our roots. I think we've found a comfortable spot in our writing style."

Adds guitarist Eric Peterson: "I think the tour went really well for us. It's the first time we had a stage set to our live performance, which was a lot of fun, and it brought the band to a whole new level in regards to performing.

"Playing with MEGADETH and SLAYER again was a lot of fun.

"We're going to be home during the fall and winter working on new material.

"As we speak, I'm working on new music, and we're shooting to record by the end of the year. That's our plan, but we're not going to just put out a record to put out a record. We have standards, and we're picky as to what exactly we want to put out."

Regarding the band's continued collaboration with acclaimed British producer Andy Sneap (MEGADETH, MACHINE HEAD, ARCH ENEMY, EXODUS, NEVERMORE),Billy said in a recent interview with LoudTrax.com, "He's a musician first of all before being a producer, and so he understands the style of music and what it takes. If you get a producer who hasn't produced a metal band before, it won't sound good even though he does a good job with big bands that aren't metal. There's a real art to making fast drums and heavy guitars sound clean. So there is a challenge for mixing metal bands and I think Andy's really got a grasp on that as a musician."

TESTAMENT performed its first-ever album, "The Legacy", in its entirety during the month-long trek that found these thrash titans crisscrossing the nation on the "Rust in Peace" 20th anniversary tour.

"The Formation Of Damnation" was reissued on February 23 in a deluxe tour edition. The two-disc edition includes the band's comeback album plus bonus footage of classic tracks and more.