Threshold - Dead Reckoning

Published March 15 2007

*=Staff's pick	Slipstream This Is Your Life* Elusive Hollow* Pilot In The Sky Of Dreams* Fighting For Breath Disappear* Safe To Fly One Degree Down* Supermassive Black Hole (Digipak bonus track)

Genre	Progressive Hard Rock	Andrew MacDermott	Vocals
Tracks	10	Karl Groom	Guitar
Runningtime	55 Min.	-	Guitar
Label	Nuclear Blast	Steve Anderson	Bass
Release	23 March 2007	Johanne James	Drums
Country	England	Richard West	Keyboard
Similar artists	Royal Hunt, Fates Warning, Redemption

Threshold return with the follow-up to Subsurface, and how they are going to top that album is beyond my perception. It achieved the Album Of The Month award at Metal Covenant, and you know only the best albums gets that. Well, it also achieved that award at fifteen other places, but those can't rank as high as ours, can them? Dead Reckoning is the eighth studio-album from these English gentlemen and there has been a change in the band as guitarist Nick Midson is taking a break from the band.

The progressive music that Threshold supply is not as introverted as with many other progressive bands, and they don't shove their skills in your face with endless and pointless musical fieldtrips. What first strikes me with Dead Reckoning is that Threshold sound heavier this time around, the opening track Slipstream starts with a heavy and groovy riff and carries on to a melodic and catchy refrain that is labelled with the Threshold trademark. However, what is surprising with the song is the guest appearance from Dan Swanö (Edge Of Sanity, Nightingale, etc.) that lays down some growling vocals in Slipstream and further in the song Elusive, and by that you realise that Threshold without compromising with their own unique style can incorporate elements you thought where far apart from their sound.

My personal favourite on the album is This Is Your Life, somewhat heavy and with a driving force it has an uplifting spirit. It is a good example of one of Threshold's greatest features, and that is that they always manage to give their songs a constant flow, and the tasteful keyboard arrangements in the catchy and powerful refrain make me simply love this one. Emotion is another feature that Threshold have a lot of, and in the very powerful track Hollow's calmer parts, Andrew MacDermott puts a lot of it in his singing. There are a couple of tracks that really don't match up to my expectations of high standards for Threshold on Dead Reckoning, Elusive is one of them. Even though it contains much of the Threshold significant style and holds some really great progressive parts and even though they are trying out new stuff within the song, it nevertheless feels to be put together by several different ideas that don't melt together that well. Another song that is not among the best is Safe To Fly, it has kind of a power ballad vibe resting over it and if it had been a band other then Threshold I would have probably not liked it as much as I do now. But then again, that is yet a proof that the skilled playing and the vocals in Threshold can save practically any song.

There are two tracks on Dead Reckoning that are to be considered lengthy. Pilot In The Sky Of Dreams, which was intended to be the title track originally, and the closing One Degree Down. The first of the mentioned starts as a ballad and builds up to a display of awesome progressive music where the many melodies and the vocals make it hard to resist. One Degree Down has an ambience that makes it perfect as a closing song and as it with the ending parts simply floats away, you just want to close your eyes and completely lose yourself in the wonderful music that brings the album to its end.

The album is produced by Karl Groom and Richard West, and they leave me with nothing to complain about. The album has a rich and dynamic sound complete with a flawless performance as always from the band. So what can you say, the high standards are kept more or less intact and Threshold continue in the same grand manor as with Subsurface, only with a touch of more heaviness added, although it does not quite match up with its predecessor with all of the songs. The digipak edition of Dead Reckoning will contain a bonus track in the shape of the Muse cover Supermassive Black Hole. Unfortunately, for me, this song is not featured on the promo, but judging from the original and Threshold's superb music, something tells me it is the digipak one should buy.

See also review of: Subsurface , Critical Energy (cd) , Critical Energy (dvd)

Performance	Originality	Production	Vocals	Songwriting
10	7	9	9	8

Summary
8 chalices of 10 - Thomas