My feelings regarding this news are rather neutral. I really enjoy some Toxik, but I wasn't exactly craving for more. Also, I'm on the fence (haha) between the wildly optimistic and the stone-cold cynical regarding the likeliness of a come-back album meeting expectations (that's a big step for me, I used to be firmly in the latter camp). So yeah. Is it necessary? No. Can it be good? Maybe. We'll see.
Metal_Detector wrote:
Think This [is] more like Proggy/techy USPM than thrash like World Circus or similar tech/thrash bands like Realm (Endless War). The vocal performance and songwriting lead in a more progressive direction, even if their roots are in thrash.
Now, this is more like it. I quite like that album, albeit nowhere near as much as some here, but it couldn't be a thrash album if it's life and those of a hundred puppies depended on it. My personal experience of Toxik's music was that I bought 'Think This' a million years ago, and although I certainly liked it, I wasn't really sure what to make of it. It wasn't every day I stumbled upon a glam/prog/speed hybrid back then (and this hasn't changed to this day).
On the one hand, Toxik's ties with a band like Skid Row and Josh Christian's haircut both made sense, as a lot of aspects of the album were screaming "BACKGROUND TO YOUR WORKOUT, BABY!", including the whole concept, the homo-erotically "muscular" yet objectively neutered production job (big fat Toys 'R Us-sounding snare and double-bass drums > clean vocals > biteless mediums-über-alles compressed rhythm guitar tone > the rest), the "laugh all you want now, but wait until you end up loving the song I introduce and consequently have to endure me each fucking time you listen to it!" goofy TV samples, the Weiki-level embarrassing ballad, a number of solos, and some high-pitched sexy-in-a-Cherry-Pie-way vocal vibratos & group hugs in back-up vocal form, notably.
On the other hand, the fact that they saluted a bunch of thrash and speed bands in the liner notes also made sense, as there are plenty of songs and moments on this album that are more akin to ambitious, no-holds-barred power/speed songwriting wise, with some technical thrash influence and a complex, weird-as-fuck yet very entertaining approach to arrangements. Stuff like "Spontaneous", "In God", the title track, "Shotgun Logic" or "Technical Arrogance", for the most part. In that sense, the album has more to do with an odd mixture of classic-era Agent Steel and mid-period Voivoid than it does Cinderella, for sure. But does it make it thrash in and of itself? Fuck no.
Mind you, this opinion was formed before the Internet and MA and being regularly exposed to widespread fan opinions that are sometimes so wildly opposed to my own analysis that they can only come across as conspiracies. I was still regularly exposed to widespread critics opinions, and back then paper magazine reviews still had some sort of consistency and credibility (I'm talking late 80s early 90s here), but the French metal press back then was content slapping the melodic speed metal tag on that stuff, with or without "progressive" or "technical" to nuance it, and that was fine by me (it's also what they called Keepers-era Helloween back then, but hey! good times). When I first discovered this site a few years ago and found out a lot of people seemed to be adamant on calling this thrash, I went "lol what?!". I've just given the album a fresh listen while reading this thread and typing this post, and well... this is still no fucking thrash, folks.
'World Circus', while somewhat melodic (more in a classic-era Anthrax way than in a EuroPM way) is certainly a relentless and technical speed/thrash album with character, class and energy in spades, though. I'm absolutely fine with calling that one thrash. I suppose the fact that it came first is the main reason people still mistakenly think of 'Think This', its sophomore, as being thrash as well. Well, think again, guys. It's not.
On a side note, are you people deliberately yanking ANA's chain by pretending not to get his obvious joke? He posted "Think this sucks. Listen to some real thrash" with a link to a Bon-Jovi's-hairdo-meets-Californication sappy ballad containing 0% of metal. It stands to reason that he was mocking the album's alleged thrashiness. What's not to get?
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