Band: Threat Signal
Title: Threat Signal
Label: Nuclear Blast Records
Distribution: PIAS
Release date: October 7th 2011
Review: CD

Honestly, Canada’s Threat Signal’s 2009-full length Vigilance could not enjoy me that much at all. It wasn’t the worst thing I had to undergo that very same year, but actually I didn’t listen to it anymore since then, and I don’t think I will in the near future either. So can you imagine my enthusiasm this time?
Don’t start dancing around the camp fire to honour (your) god yet, because this self-titled album is not, suddenly, out of the blue, the most interesting and surprising recording either. It’s just, well, as if the band did mature throughout those years… Especially when it comes to the guitar play, the professional progression indeed is a remarkable and undeniable fact.
Travis Montgomery worked out his capacities and abilities enormously and this progression is a huge step forward in comparison to Vigilance. He mixes forms of shredding with melodic riffing, he redefines the contrasting opposition of technical versus rhythmic play, and he sort of carries the overall groove on Threat Signal (the album) (or is it: the overall groove for Threat Signal (the band)). I heard Travis being compared to Darrell ‘Dimebag’ Abbott (Pantera, Damageplan, Tres Diablos) and Fredrik Thordendal (Meshuggah) and who am I to make any contestation? It sort of fits for sure.
Musically it all sounds rather modern, multi-layered, progressive-technical, and pretty varying as well. Not renewing, no, but much ‘wider’ than before. The rhythm section supports the lead parts with merciless brutality and fierce persuasion, but I expected some more cohesion and elegance. No, sorry, after the former album my expectations weren’t that high at all, so it indeed turns out slightly more positive than un-positive … or something like that.
A few times Threat Signal (the band) do surprise with (parts of) creations that go way beyond the past effort. More oppressive and / or asphyxiating spheres, more worked-out experience, more own ideas, more emotions whatsoever, it is a reason to appreciate this effort more than the debut.
Singer Jon Howard is the main ‘problem’ from time to time (my opinion, my own, personal opinion). His screams / grunts are not world-shaking (yet not pathetically stupid either); and his clear vox make my pubic hair curl, turn grey, and fall out… It’s nasal, it’s annoying, it’s painful and a complete turn-off. Positive element in this history: those clean voices are not too frequently used (yet each single time is one time too many, too much), but such a stupidity belongs to those would-be acts that wanna surpass the limits behind radio-, internet- and television-popularisation.
Threat Signal (the album) lasts for forty five minutes, by the way.

75/100

Ivan Tibos.