It was the cover more than anything else. I started my affair with California’s Testament with Practice What You Preach for the same reason, but there was something about the glass of the logo, the blues and blacks that made me think The New Order was colder, a more clinical and icy experience than what I already knew. I don’t recall hearing any of the tracks beforehand; radio was miles away from this and MTV was busy with the new album so I took a chance, as you did back then. What I got depends on your starting point: it was indeed a colder, icy and more clinical thrash attack than the more streamlined and accessible approach of the band’s breakout. But compared to The Legacy, you can hear the band stretching into an identifiable form, turning into what would break them to the wider world just a year later.

Recorded just eight months after the release of The Legacy, the band clearly knew their strengths, and The New Order shows it off with “Eerie Inhabitants” blasting off an extended intro, galloping verses, and Greg Christian’s bass popping through in almost a funky R&B vein. Lyrically both the opener and the majority of the album start to tackle current events, getting more political than any of their peers at this point, though we still delve into the fanciful dark with tracks like “Disciples Of The Watch” and “The Preacher”. But 16-year old me wasn’t interested in that yet – I wanted stuff like Alex Skolnick’s opening to the title track, the man turning into a guitar hero before my very ears. Between Skolnick’s trilling licks and the way Chuck Billy tore the chorus out of the earth I was completely hooked.

Listening back now some 35 years later, and on the heels of deep-diving into the band’s debut there’s a sense of loss: the unbridled fun that clearly came across on The Legacy is practically gone, replaced by an almost maniacal work ethic to get better, to be taken, uh-oh…seriously. The New Order is for its first side very serious. “Trial By Fire” opens with a clean section that recalls what the band would do with “The Ballad” on Practice, but it soon transforms into a nasty piece of guitar work, anchored again by Christian’s groovy baseline. Maybe the “Hey!” gang vocals that open the chorus are a capitulation to gain a wider audience and craft an anthem (it was a single, as you can see by the wonderful video above), but it works, and the songwriting by Skolnick and Eric Peterson feels more refined. I love the opening riff to “Into The Pit” and apparently so do the folks pimping Heavys headphones, as they’re using it in their ads for the “metal headphones”. It might be my favorite song on the album, just super heavy with a take no prisoners attitude.

But if I’m being honest, there are a few things that make the album sound a bit rushed. You have all the time in the world to craft your debut, but everyone wants the sophomore album ASAP. In interviews Alex Skolnick indicates as much, which is why they had to last minute add the Aerosmith cover of “Nobody’s Fault”, the interludes like the fine but slight “Hypnosis” and the extension of certain songs to make their contractual 40 minutes of music. Is that why so many of the songs follow the same template of short instrumental passage followed by galloping thrash attack? Even if that’s the case, Side 2 doesn’t have nearly the same impact as Side 1, though “Disciples Of The Watch” is a fantastic track even as it follows the structure of “Eerie Inhabitants” so close its nose gets stuck, if you know what I mean. Skolnick’s solos, though…chef’s kiss. And as guitar-centric as thrash tends to be, I love how clear and up in the mix Greg Christian’s bass is. It’s certainly amplified on the 2024 remaster, but I can hear it plain and clear in my original mix vinyl and it’s pretty glorious.

I can’t help but think of Anthrax and Among The Living when I hear “The Preacher” – it’s the track that sounds most like everyone’s favorite jams-wearing mosh titans, and Among The Living’s cover is so iconic it kind of cornered the market on anything preacher-related for me. I’m not really sure what to make of the Aerosmith cover of “Nobody’s Fault” – I only recently got into the band’s music after largely ignoring everything but the massive radio hits for decades. I can hear it being a hit for someone without Chuck Billy’s voice – it’s got a pretty sweet arrangement for a hard rock band, but Billy’s voice is so frayed it doesn’t work for me.¹

That leaves “A Day of Reckoning” to close The New Order out, and there’s a bit of the menace of “Alone In The Dark” in its verses, and I love the small section that ties the verses together. Skolnick’s solo again utterly whips, blending sweeps and blues into a seamless showcase on its own. Yeah, there’s technically “Musical Death (A Dirge)” after it, but at four minutes long it’s not only a dirge, it’s a bit of a slog. I would love to have heard what The New Order sounded like in its original, tighter incarnation; for now it’s a fine piece of nostalgia – particularly that first side – but my older, crankier self prefers the direct attack of The Legacy.

Next time we’ll check out my actual introduction to the band and see how Practice What You Preach holds up.