Threshold - Subsurface

*=Staff's pick	Mission Profile* Ground Control Opium Stop Dead* The Art Of Reason* Pressure* Flags And Footprints Static The Destruction Of Words What About Me (limited edition bonus track)*

Genre	Progressive Hard Rock	Andrew McDermott	Vocals
Tracks	10	Karl Groom	Guitar
Runningtime	63 Min.	Nick Midson	Guitar
Label	InsideOut	Steve Anderson	Bass
Release	02 Aug. 2004	Johanne James	Drums
Country	England	Richard West	Keyboards
Similar artists	Royal Hunt, Dream Theater, Fates Warning

Can we go on? Can we be strong? Already there, by the first vocal line I know that this is gonna be a great album. The opening Mission Profile starts with driving guitars and moves on in a traditional Threshold way to the explicit chorus in this eight minute epic track. And right here, in this track, you get everything what Threshold is about - progressive and emotional hard rock at its finest. After hearing this first track on the album, the need for more songs felt unnecessary, but after repeating Mission Profile a couple of time I carried on with the album, only to discover a chest full of gold.

To describe their music in an easy way is to compare Threshold with Dream Theater, but with, I wouldn't say simpler music, but with a more direct approach. And not as much introverted instrumental fieldtrips making Threshold come close to the sound of Fates Warning. And just like those two bands Threshold also has a unique style and a sound of their own that makes you immediately aware of what band you are listening to just by the way it sounds. Emotion and flow are two of the most important things with Threshold, no matter if the music is going slowly or has a more aggressive edge there is always a flow in their music that makes you drift with them. Threshold consists of six really great musicians and also of very talented songwriters that fills their music with many great progressive elements and perhaps more important - strong melodies. There are a lot of melodic refrains and vocal lines, as well as there are many great instrumental parts in their music to discover on the way filled with beautiful melody lines and great harmonies, with the guitars interacting with the keyboard.

Subsurface holds two epic tracks. Besides the magnificent opener, Mission Profile, you also get the ten minute opus in The Art Of Reason. A more complicated track than Mission with more progressive moments and a wider spectra. The seventh studio release from Threshold is a very strong album, even the bonus track that differs a little from the typical Threshold sound comes out really strong, and it makes me wish that drummer Johanne James, that has written What About Me, will contribute more to the songwriting from now on. There are two slower tracks to be found, Flags And Footprints and The Destruction Of Words where the first mentioned is the only exception on this otherwise magnificent album. A sentimental and sleazy ballad that avoids being banal just barely due to the great musicianship Threshold masters. The Destruction Of Words is also of the ballad kind of track, but is far more powerful and a slightly melancholic song that has a harder edge than the other ballad, making it just as good as any of the other tracks on Subsurface, especially with the amazing and powerful voice that Andrew "Mac" McDermott has.

The bonus material on the limited edition of Subsurface does not offer that much that makes it worth that extra money, apart from the track What About Me. You get a rehearsal kind of video on the track Pressure and access to some additional web contents with pictures and info on what equipment that was used on the album, the radio edit version of Pressure as an Mp3 and some pictures and that's it. Not much to be stoked about, but hopefully they will fill that site with more stuff later on. But the liner notes in the extended booklet is somewhat interesting reading.

Apart from the track Flags And Footprints you can divide this album into two categories: bloody brilliant and damn good. Mission profile stands for the first while the rest of the album stands for the second. The weaknesses on Subsurface are very few while the strengths are many. And although I haven't heard every Threshold album in its entire, I hereby declare Subsurface as their best one, so far. Did I hear anyone say album of the year?

See also review of: Dead Reckoning , Critical Energy , Critical Energy (dvd)

Production	Vocals	Compositions
8	9	8

Summary
9 chalices of 10 - Thomas