131-136 Drum Parts
3/10/08
11:15 AM
Page 131
PAUL BOSTAPH “Killing Season” BY
TESTAMENT
PHOTO BY TYLER CLINTON
BY DAVE CONSTANTIN
“I think it’s 4/4. Unless it’s 3/4. To be honest with you, it could be 6/8, but I’m not a big time signature guy. It’s like, I hear the track and I play it … It’s a triplet feel.” –Paul Bostaph on “Killing Season.”
O
kay, this might just have been the paint fumes talking (Bostaph did admit he was feeling a little “spacey” during our interview after having spent the day house painting). After all, how could this world-class veteran metal giant, rhythmic backbone for such demanding acts as Slayer, Forbidden, Exodus, and now
Testament, never have to count? In the case of “Killing Season” at least, the answer is: easily. In this song, having the right feel is what it’s all about. That’s because “Killing Season,” unlike every other thrash metal song you’ve ever encountered, actually swings! And while you’re not likely to confuse Testament with The Count Basie Orchestra, that swing factor does make “Killing Season” a standout among a series of already eclectic, brutally powerful tracks on the band’s ninth studio album, The Formation Of Damnation.
It’s also the thing that almost damned it from the start. “It definitely was one of the hardest songs to compose – definitely one of the ones we weren’t sure if it was going to make it to the record,” Bostaph says. “It was one of those songs where, if you don’t do it just right, it could just be a dud – because it is different; because it’s a shuffle song, but you have to fit it into this heavy format with all these other heavy songs. So it’s like, ‘How do I take this song and still make it cool for what it is, but yet not overplay
MAY 2008
DRUM!
131