Chuck Billy of Testament recently talked to Chaoszine about how he became a frontman and shared how James Hetfield influenced him.
“James Hetfield, of course, was number one at that time because he did it very well,” he said when asked who he looked up to and copied in his early years. “He was the one sing in that style, there wasn’t many other bands that were doing it like that. So James was probably one of the ones I followed even to this day.”
Billy admitted that he and the band often think, “We write songs like, ‘What would James do? How would James do this one?’ So that’s always carries in the back of my mind how he does it and what he does.”
Even though both Testament and Metallica were formed around the same time and became popular, Testament has never toured with Metallica. But one of Billy’s goals is to tour with Metallica one day. “I think my number one on my checklist is to be able to go on tour with Metallica, a band that grew up in our scene, our area, paved the way for this kind of music,” he said in another interview. “We’ve never had that opportunity to perform a tour with them. We might have played a couple of shows and festivals over the time, but never got to tour.”
“There’s a lot of history there that I really don’t know the answer why we never have, and maybe you could pose that question to them one day — why not? — and maybe I’ll get my answer someday what the reason is,” he added.
Right now, Testament is on tour with Anthrax and Kreator. Their next show is tonight in Paris, France, and the tour will finish on December 15 in ‘s-Hertogenbosch, Holland.
