Scale the Summit
The Collective
By Nick Habisch
Rating: 
When the year 2011 opened, there were not many albums I was looking toward. In the metal world there was new releases coming out by Born of Osiris, The Famine, and my old favorites Becoming the Archetype, and Scale the Summit’s newest release. As 2011 drifts into the summer months, Born of Osiris has come and gone, The Famine never got off the ground, and Becoming the Archetype hit the fan and fizzled, but the one album that has stood the test of time and listening is The Collective by Scale the Summit.
Having been a fan of Carving Desert Canyons, I was eager to see what the Texas based instrumental band had up their sleeves, but I was not prepared for just how incredible an album The Collective was. Starting out with the appropriately named “Colossal”, the album started out in typical Scale the Summit fashion: heavy chords, which eventually gave way to smooth beautiful melody. The combination of heavy and melodic is present on The Collective, although this album sees the band leaning toward the softer side of things in tracks like “The Levitated’ and “Drifting Figures”.
Scale the Summit has always been able to write guitar licks, but this newest release shows some of their most hauntingly beautiful lines they have ever written; from the ambient end of “Whales”, to the sweet lead line in “Secret Earth”, to the drifting line in “Drifting Figures”, the band manages to make an instrumental album that evokes feelings of emotion. Even with all the guitar beauty this does not mean the band has completely left the heavy sound at the door.
The two-headed punch of “Origin of Species” and “Gallows” delivers the heaviest punch on The Collective, with the music taking a less melodic approach and driving at the listener more forcefully. Granted this still delivers a fair share of melody, just not as pronounced as some of the other tracks. Although this is a guitar-led album, the drum work and bass are just as impressive. The drumming on tracks like “Black Hills” and “Origin of Species” shows that the oft-overlooked drumming is just as impressive as the guitar work, and the album is filled with catchy technical bass lines throughout.
With The Collective, Scale the Summit has delivered one of the best albums of 2011 so far. Although the album tends to drag a pinch near the back end, and the similar beginning “Origin of Species”/”Gallows” back-to-back in the track listing is puzzling, this does not detract from how phenomenal this album is. The Collective will have a place in my top 5 of 2011, if not the number 1 slot. I highly recommend this album for all listeners.
