PSYCHEDELICATESSEN

My first review of this excellent band will be short and to the point, mainly because I've picked their worst release as the subject. Now, carrying on with what I said about a concise review, let me define this album by UK's best (and only I think) prog-metal band in two words: bad and boring. Now, how could it be?

Well, the answer remains solely in one person's shoulders: Glynn Morgan.

Or maybe I'm being unfair, because the song-writing is really uninspired and monotonous, with the Threshold of Hypothetical and Subsurface nowhere to be found in here. Even the longest track, Into the Light, fails to live up to future amazing songs like Narcissus or even Into the Unicorn from then-next release Extinct Instinct. Tracks don't have good choruses (and that's a staple of Threshold style, the ability to write catchy, broad, melodic anthemic choruses) here; there's no good riffs in this album, every riff here seems to have been taken out of the "metal-riffs-for-dummies" book.... so the musical quality in itself is weak, but.... let's get back to the point....

Glynn Morgan. Now, he's not a atrocious singer like Dominici was in Dream Theater's first album or Ray Alder in (sadly) Fates Warning' last 8 albums, but he's nowhere near the quality level of singer-to-be Mac Dermott, or of high-octave-master-singer (sadly only for one album) Damian Wilson. Morgan has a decent voice in terms of reach and power, he can climb a few notes up and down the scale... but he doesn't have MUSICIANSHIP in his voice, this meaning for me the ability to switch the vocal sound to suit different musical moods, to convey emotion, despair, hate, happyness, in a word, to MATTER. I've criticized overly theatrical singers like Peter Gabriel or Fish because at times they seemed to put drama first and melody, note-singing second....but they knew how to sing, it's just their style that doesn't do it for me! In this case, morgan could've learned a little bit about these prog and neo-prog legends (both from Threshold's country, by the way) about injecting some adrenaline (or some narcotic, depending the music's mood) to his vocals. Too bland, too lineal....too BORING.

But, in the end, maybe it was not Morgan's fault...maybe the material was so weak that he just couldn't put interesting vocal lines to such lame music.

If you are new to Threshold, try their masterpieces Subsurface or better yet Hypothetical first, and then Clone and Critical Mass, and go on with Extinct Instinct, an album still not up to par with the band's best, but with some amazing singing by Damian Wilson. DO NOT BUY THIS ONE AS YOUR FIRST THRESHOLD ALBUM, FOR IT MAY ALSO BECOME YOUR LAST.

Not recommended for: fans of interesting, good prog metal with variety, great riffs and choruses that make you want to, well, sing.

Recommended for: well.... Threshold completionists like me, who don't have anything better to do with their hard-earned dollars (or euros or whatever you use)... Wait, I had a lot of better things to do... I just made a MISTAKE. And so is this album, A MISTAKE.