CD Reviews

Shadows Fall

Threads of Life | Atlantic

By BEN RICHARDSON | May 1, 2007

3.0 Stars

Metal fans are a dogmatic bunch. Reveling in their self-appointed roles as arbiters of “true” metal, they can often turn on a band with a sudden, unexpected fury. With this in mind, it’s hard not to admire the courage displayed by Shadows Fall in releasing their unabashedly commercial new album. These Springfield metallurgists have emerged as the biggest name in American metalcore; 2004’s The War Within sold 300,000 copies and charted at #20. This success led the band to abandon respected metal indie Century Media Records for the bigger budgets at Atlantic, in the process providing countless headbangers with fuel for their internecine, scene-defending critical furnaces. Listening to the album makes it clear that they’ve decided to ignore any backlash. Threads of Life is rife with catchy, immaculately produced riffs, and singer Brian Fair has refined the gruff bellow heard on previous albums into a competently tuneful Hetfeldian growl; the call-and-response between Fair and the syrupy, multi-tracked clean singing of guitarist Matt Bachand sounds better than ever. Not a single note on the album seems out of place (their emphasis is less on “shred” and more on “julienne”), and in the end the album’s slickness is its strength, haters be damned.

Shadows Fall + From Autumn to Ashes + Haste the Day | Lupo’s Heartbreak Hotel, 79 Washington St, Providence | May 9 | 401.272.LUPO