Human is the fifth studio album by the Canadian rock band Three Days Grace. The album was released on March 31, 2015, through RCA Records. This is the group's first of three albums without original lead singer Adam Gontier, and the first with My Darkest Days lead singer and Brad Walst's younger brother Matt Walst.
Following Adam Gontier's exit from the group in January 2013, Matt Walst of My Darkest Days served as his replacement during the band's US tour with Shinedown. The group later confirmed in March 2014, that Walst was now the full-time frontman.
Recording for their fifth studio album began in late 2013, recorded at Noble Street Studios in Toronto with producer Gavin Brown, who produced the band's debut self-titled studio album. According to drummer Neil Sanderson, the album features more raw and aggressive sounds than their previous records. Bassist Brad Walst also added that they went back to their hard rock roots for this album and credited Brown for "getting them in the right mindset." "Painkiller" was the first song they wrote for the album, as well as the first one they wrote with Matt.
The group embarked on the Human Tour in North America from July to November 2015, in support of the album. The band later toured across Europe and Russia from January to February 2016.
On April 1, 2014, the band released the album's lead single "Painkiller". On April 8, 2014, the song was released to US rock radio stations. The song reached number one on the US Mainstream Rock chart, which made it their eleventh number-one single. The album's second single, "I Am Machine" was released on September 30, 2014. The song topped the US Mainstream Rock chart. On March 23, 2015, "Human Race" was released as the third single. On September 15, 2015, "Fallen Angel" was released as the fourth single.
Human received positive reviews from music critics. Johan Wippsson of Melodic stated, "Matt really delivers here and shows that his voice suits really well for this type of rock and believe that many of the band's fans agree with me. The rest of the album is almost the same class and overall is it very solid, actually a little better than expected." Allison Stewart of Revolver noted that "little has changed" on the album compared to their previous record Transit of Venus outside of their use of synths and said "every track starts slow and ends big, with crunchy, roundhouse-punch choruses sandwiched in between."
Heather Allen at Mind Equals Blown stated "It's always worrisome when a singer gets replaced because the band that you've come to know and love could easily do a complete musical 180. Luckily, Three Days Grace didn't stray too far from their original style and Walst did his absolute best to channel Gontier without being a complete replica of him." MusicReviewRadar wrote a similar review stating, "the departure of the iconic Adam Gontier could have forced the band's loss of identity and direction but Matt Walst managed to fill in Adam's spot without becoming a complete replica" and that "the album was a good surprise [...] well balanced between soft and good-old Three Days Grace-style tracks."
A mixed review was written by Ultimate Guitar who said "it isn't a bad album - it is something worse - it is SO mediocre and 'same' that it is insidious and gets on the radio, gets stuck in your head, but doesn't really do or mean anything or have any kind of real musical value to it." Darryl Sterdan of Toronto Sun gave a negative review of the album remarking that the group "resumed churning out the same morose, morbidly misanthropic modern-rock/post-grunge/alt-metal crud-blort as before." Jeff Miers of The Buffalo News described the album as "a collection stuffed with the sort of generic alt-metal that makes radio programmers squirm with delight and makes the rest of us deeply suspicious."
The album debuted at number two on the Canadian Albums Chart, selling 6,700 copies in its first week. The album peaked at number 16 on the Billboard 200 and sold 18,000 copies first week. As of January 8, 2016, the album has sold 121,000 copies in the US.
Human earned a nomination for "Rock Album of the Year" at the 2015 Loudwire Music Awards, though ultimately lost to Dark Before Dawn by Breaking Benjamin. The album was certified gold in Canada, Poland, and the United States.
Credits adapted from the album's liner notes.