Shogun

About

Shogun (将軍) is the fourth studio album by American metal band Trivium. The album was released worldwide on various dates between September 23 and October 1, 2008 through Roadrunner Record. It is their last release to feature founding drummer Travis Smith. Work on the album is noted to have begun with producer Nick Raskulinecz in October 2007, with the band stating that they chose not to work with Jason Suecof again as they wanted to explore new idea. Shogun largely features a continuation of the thrash metal style featured on The Crusade, however, it also marks the return of Matt Heafy's screaming vocals and is also the band's first album produced by Nick Raskulinecz. In an interview for About.com, Heafy described the album's musical direction as a combination of various aspects including: "the past, present, and future of Trivium, all on one CD" and that is the "next evolutionary step". When asked about the change in his singing style, he said: "It’s the kind of thing that happened naturally." Shogun heavily features 7-string guitars and 5-string bass guitar, which had been used sparingly on The Crusade. Shogun sold 24,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release, and debut at number 23 on the Billboard 200 chart, and the top 100 in 18 other countrie, including #6 on the Japanese international chart, #4 on the Canadian Hard Rock Chart, #1 on the UK rock charts and #4 on the Australian chart. As of March 2009, the album has sold around 70,000 copies in the United States since its late September release, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The album received generally positive review, with Chad Bowar of About.com praising the band's progress on songwriting, as well as their musicianship. Bowar finishing its review stating: "Shogun won't silence Trivium's legions of critic, but I think most fans will like the harsh vocals along with the great riffs and memorable melodie." Eduardo Rivadavia of Allmusic described Shogun as "Trivium's most challenging and ambitious album yet." IGN's Ed Thompson wrote that with the release of their fourth full-length album the "band have done what absolutely needed to be done." The band's ideas and influences were praised by Thompson, and considered Shogun the best of their first four album. Thompson also defined Shogun as the band's "best effort to date." .

via Last.fm

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