CARCASS: NECROTICISM - DESCANTING THE INSALUBRIOUS (1991)
1) Inpropagation; 2) Corporal
Jigsaw Quandary; 3) Symposium Of Sickness; 4) Pedigree Butchery; 5) Incarnated
Solvent Abuse; 6) Carneous Cacoffiny; 7) Lavaging Expectorate Of Lysergide
Composition; 8) Forensic Clinicism / The Sanguine Article; 9*) Tools Of The
Trade; 10*) Pyosified (Still Rotten To The Gore); 11*) Hepatic Tissue
Fermentation II.
This is where they finally realized that a
proper metal band has to have two guitarists in order to achieve real
respectability — and at least one should preferably be of Scandinavian origin,
cuz there's nothing like a shot of thick Viking blood to add that authentic
berserk component to your metal riffage. Thus, enter Michael Amott, a natural
choice since his own recently formed Swedish band was called Carnage, and was
essentially the Swedish equivalent of
Carcass. The result was obvious — a more «melodic» (so to say) form of the
music, with a separate lead player capable of adding colorful flourishes to the
brutal riffs and dutifully churning out speedy-flashy classical-influenced
solos where deemed necessary. Now the
band was finally set up to produce their equivalent of Slayer's Reign In Blood, if it really wanted to.
Indeed, the record is far more ambitious. The
songs are lightly adorned with special effects (including occasional voiceovers
that are probably sampled from obscure B-movies, or an occasional atmospheric synthesizer
backdrop, or even a tiny bit of acoustic guitar now and then), the song
structures become even more complex and now regularly alternate between
Sabbathy slow and ultra-fast, and then there's all that lead guitar. If not for
the lyrics, this would have been just a regular speed-thrash-whatever-mash-up —
the lyrics, however, stubbornly persist in this grotesque fascination with the
morgue, as the album is formally organized around the concept of finding
various ways of dispensing with corpses (both out of practical necessity and as
a hobby).
The problem is that it is completely impossible
to seriously praise the record in «layman» terms. The musical structures of
these tunes, some of which now run for as long as six or seven minutes, clearly
seem «progressive» — the band is now approaching their music as actual music,
rather than mere noisy backdrop for staged offensiveness, and all the
compositions work as compositions; in fact, sometimes I think I'd much rather
listen to the instrumental versions without having to divert attention towards
the growling vocals that really sound
the same all the way through, not just in style and timbre, but even in simple
phrasing. Compared to the vocals, the instrumental work is far more demanding —
the riffs are more complex than Metallica's and the shifts between multiple
sections are flawlessly executed. But the riffs also do not lend themselves
easily to «visualization» — for the life of me I couldn't even begin to
explain in what way the emotional impact of ʽPedigree Butcheryʼ differs from
that of ʽCarneous Cacoffinyʼ.
At the same time, we should also keep in mind
that Carcass were far from the only metal band experimenting with the limits of
the genre — and if they did not have that particular anatomical-pathological
schtick of theirs, chances are serious that Necroticism would have been completely lost in the sea of high-profile,
technically accomplished metal releases from around the year 1991. So perhaps
the best news here is that the original «spirit of Carcass», despite all the
increased complexity, is still loyally preserved, and that it adds the
necessary shade of theatrical gore to the music. No, scratch «gore» — it adds
the necessary shade of macabre fun to
the music, which is the perfect aural equivalent of indulging in your dark side
when splattering your opponent's brains (or other parts) against the wall in a
fighting video game. Of course, it goes without saying that, in the light of
this, Necroticism should only be
recommended for people with good mental health — so, if you happen to have
Charlie Manson in your family history, please disregard this thumbs up
and submit yourself to preventive therapy in the form of my Avril Lavigne
reviews or something like that.
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