Sacrament & Testimony of Apocalypse are Back!

Been following this news for a couple months.

I can’t wait!

Not familiar with this band. Need to check them out.

Gilbert wrote:

Not familiar with this band. Need to check them out.

They were one of the best Christian thrash bands. Similar to old Testament. (No pun intended)

Checking those out. Very good stuff.

Thanks for the links TZ .

I’d love to see them come back with Rob Wolfe on vocals but this is still good news! I’ll take it!

Those old albums aren't that easy to find.

Thrasher73 wrote:

I’d love to see them come back with Rob Wolfe on vocals but this is still good news! I’ll take it!

Yah, I'd love to see that. Haunts of Violence was a ripper of an album

Soooo they used to be "Sacrament," now they're called "Testimony of Apocalypse." Got it. Why the name change?

Gilbert wrote:

Those old albums aren't that easy to find.

Retroactive Records reissued them a couple of years ago. Boone's Overstock has them:

https://boonesoverstock.com/search?q=sacrament

Fat Freddy wrote:

Soooo they used to be "Sacrament," now they're called "Testimony of Apocalypse." Got it. Why the name change?

They said on their FB page that it wasn’t really a full blown reunion because it wasn’t all the members but they wanted to release new stuff so I guess they just went with a different name.

The original members were back, but there was some disagreement in terms of the direction, so a 30 year reunion album was placed on hold indefinitely. However, born out of that decision were two bands creating new music, with the original members split. Mike Torone (vocals) and Paul Graham (drums) will be part of Testimony of Apocalypse and the other members (TBD) will release under Sacrament. Could possibly include Rob Wolfe, Erik Ney, Mike DiDanato, and/or Brian Toy.

I wonder what the exact disagreement was about the musical direction? Is the Mike Torone version more thrash than the other? I really hope Rob Wolfe is involved with the other group.

I think it might have been more about continuing with the bold message than the music. Rob Wolfe recently contributed some lines on the Motivik “Souls in Torment” cover track, so its sounding like he could be back in the game.

steelers wrote:

I think it might have been more about continuing with the bold message than the music. Rob Wolfe recently contributed some lines on the Motivik “Souls in Torment” cover track, so its sounding like he could be back in the game.

When you say there was hesitation about continuing with the “bold” message, does that mean some of the guys are not Christian anymore? Or does it mean some of the guys want to be more mainstream.

Good question. The details of those discussions were not provided.

I revisited some Sacrament on YouTube yesterday cuz I'm not sure I ever heard them back in the day. I liked the music but the vocals turned me off. Reminded me of when Chuck Billy went "death metal" for a couple of albums in the 90s.

I like the shout/scream/growl style. Two vocalists and two very different styles. Most like both, but some prefer one or the other. Check out Haunts of Violence. It’s definitely not death metal sounding.

Fat Freddy wrote:

I revisited some Sacrament on YouTube yesterday cuz I'm not sure I ever heard them back in the day. I liked the music but the vocals turned me off. Reminded me of when Chuck Billy went "death metal" for a couple of albums in the 90s.

Did you only scope Testimony of Apocalypse album? If so, check Haunts of Violence. Vocals are cleaner.

SideShowDisaSter wrote:

Fat Freddy wrote:

I revisited some Sacrament on YouTube yesterday cuz I'm not sure I ever heard them back in the day. I liked the music but the vocals turned me off. Reminded me of when Chuck Billy went "death metal" for a couple of albums in the 90s.

Did you only scope Testimony of Apocalypse album?  If so, check Haunts of Violence.  Vocals are cleaner.

I think so yeah. I'll give the other album a try next time.

Strange promo… but I’m still looking forward to hearing the album!

I thought it was pretty clever and creative. I think the point was to emphasize a return of the old school as if hunkered down in a basement thinking about ideas and honing skills over the past 30 years, before rising up (returning). Their former guitarist probably said it best:

“Old school thrash singer with old school boombox (including cassette tape) welcome to 2021=Thrash!!” - Brian Toy

Great news!