Testament's Chuck Billy Memoir Holding My Breath Gets Signed Collector Editions, Rob Halford Foreword and Randy Blythe Afterword

Chuck Billy, longtime frontman of Testament, will release his memoir Holding My Breath: The Two Testaments of Chuck Billy on November 10, 2026 through Permuted Press.

Co-written with Dave Erickson, the 224-page book traces Billy’s life from his Native American and Mexican-American roots through the rise of the Bay Area thrash metal scene, Testament’s career and the cancer diagnosis that nearly ended his life at age 38.

For collectors, however, the release also comes with dedicated autographed hardcover editions offered through Premiere Collectibles. Premiere Collectibles lists an Autographed Hardcover Bookplated Edition featuring Chuck Billy’s signature on a bookplate inside the book, accompanied by a certificate of authenticity. Among the special variants is a Limited Gold Signed Edition, signed in gold ink and restricted to 999 copies.

A separate Limited Red Signed Edition features Billy’s autograph in red ink.

Both the Gold and Red variants are currently listed as sold out, while Premiere Collectibles continues to show an autographed hardcover preorder priced at $42.99. The retailer also offers optional JSA authentication for an additional charge.

Importantly, only the Gold edition is currently identified by the retailer with a confirmed pressing-style quantity of 999 copies; no comparable production number is shown for the Red edition.

The title reflects the book’s central structure. The memoir follows what its promotional material describes as two connected “testaments”: one built around Billy’s younger years, Bay Area thrash and the growth of Testament, and another centered on mortality, illness and the life that followed his cancer diagnosis.

Billy was 38 years old when he was diagnosed, and the book explores not only conventional treatment but his spiritual experiences, Native American heritage and the support that came from the heavy metal community.

“This book is about two versions of me that are really just one story,” Billy says in the announcement. “The guy who thought he was invincible, and the guy who learned how fragile life really is.”

One of the central historical episodes revisited in Holding My Breath is Thrash of the Titans, the 2001 benefit concert organized during Billy’s battle with cancer. The event became both a personal rallying point around Billy and a major gathering of musicians from the Bay Area thrash scene at a time when many of those bands had traveled very different paths since the genre’s 1980s peak.

Permuted Press specifically identifies Thrash of the Titans as an important part of the memoir’s story of survival, community and renewed brotherhood.

Billy recovered from cancer in 2001 and continued fronting Testament, eventually bringing elements of his Pomo heritage more openly into his music and public identity.

Holding My Breath also carries contributions from two major metal frontmen outside Testament. Rob Halford of Judas Priest provides the book’s foreword, while Randy Blythe of Lamb of God contributes the afterword.

That places Billy’s personal account between perspectives from two different generations of heavy metal vocalists: one whose career predates the Bay Area thrash explosion and another whose band emerged from the generation that followed it.

BOOK DETAILS
Title: Holding My Breath: The Two Testaments of Chuck Billy
Authors: Chuck Billy with Dave Erickson
Publisher: Permuted Press
Release Date: November 10, 2026
Pages: 224
ISBN-13: 9798895657690
Foreword: Rob Halford
Afterword: Randy Blythe
Formats: Hardcover, paperback, ebook and audiobook; signed hardcover editions available separately through Premiere Collectibles.

Holding My Breath therefore works on two levels for Testament followers: as a physical collectible built around Billy’s signature, and as a first-person record of one of Bay Area thrash metal’s most recognizable voices confronting the period that nearly silenced him.

Written by Gino Alache – Music Journalist

IMAGE CREDIT: Courtesy of Chuck Billy/ Adrenaline

Watch Testament’s official video for “Native Blood” below: