"I grew up listening to a lot of Fear Factory, so they play a pretty big influence on our music."

They call Soilwork, Meshuggah, Fear Factory, Devin Townsend and Pantera their strongest influences... and they're audibly right. You could describe the music on the debut album by this young Canadian quintet, "Under Reprisal", as a mixture of the audio-creations of the bands mentioned above. Due to be released in Europe in May 2006 via Nuclear Blast, this firstborn offering by Threat Signal was produced by Christian Olde Wolbers of Fear Factory, mixed and mastered by Tue Madsen and... Let's ask vocalist and founder Jon Howard about the rest.

Vassil Varbanov: Hey, Jon, how are you?

Jon Howard: It's going pretty good, man!

V. V.: Where are you at the moment?

J. H.: I'm in the game room at Nuclear Blast's office.

V. V.: To begin with, please tell us the story of Threat Signal in brief.

J. H.: We started back in 2003 with myself on vocals and Rich Howard and Kyle McKnight on guitars. Rich is actually my cousin and Kyle I knew from the neighbourhood. We wanted to make some kick-ass music, heavy yet melodic at the same time, so we put all the elements needed together, started Threat Signal and began writing songs and demoing material. Nuclear Blast loved it and... it just went from that.

V. V.: You know, Canadian music stands for high quality stuff - not only because of bands like Rush, Voivod and The Tea Party, but also due to acts like Kataklysm, Strapping Young Lad, etc. Is there anything typically Canadian in your music?

J. H.: Oh, it's almost 100% Canadian, although we just acquired a drummer from the USA (George Parfitt). You know, there's not a lot of metal coming out of Canada except for the acts you mentioned, so when you talk about a Canadian metal band, this kind of makes you wanna stop and pay attention to it.

V. V.: Your debut album, "Under Reprisal", has been produced by Christian of Fear Factory, and we can feel a touch of their music in your songs, too. Were they your main influence?

J. H.: Yeah, I grew up listening to a lot of Fear Factory -В albums like "Obsolete" and "Demanufacture" -В so they play a pretty big influence on our stuff. It was great to work with Christian, and I was happy he was really interested in us. He had the same vision we were going towards, he understood our music... It was a great experience.

V. V.: You're going to go on tour with Soilwork...

J. H.: Yeah, it's gonna be exciting, because Soilwork is also one of my main influences!

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