Carnal Forge
Please… Die!
Century Media
Ow! My ears hurt! Please… Die! – what a great, abusive, mean-spirited name for an album! Nothing but blast after blast of harshness. The first track, “Butchered, Slaughtered, Strangled, Hanged,” is a lot of screaming, in two keys, that’s directed at people the band doesn’t like, as are all the songs here. “Hand of Doom,” a familiar title, is Slayer-esque, though vocally I’m reminded of many, many other bands of the late-1980s punk/thrash revolution. What makes this band as great as it really is is the incredible guitar work. Carnal Forge merges the metal guitar work of the power metal school with blistering speed metal and ragingly abusive, screaming vocals which not only works, but makes it clear that Carnal Forge could be in a league of their own. “Totalitarian Torture” crunches like the best Slayer march, and then takes things to an almost space-age, prog-metal level, though it’s brought down to hell with the ear-splitting vocals. “Welcome To Your Funeral” and the title track are too abusive – in fact, they hearken back to an age when if I needed to clear a room of philistines, I’d look for a band like this. “No Resurrection,” “A World All Soaked in Blood,” and “A Higher Level of Pain” (note: there’s a bonus track at the end of the last one, it’s nothing but explosions and screams, mostly!) are, again, hyper-abusive, but you know, considering that the rap-metal experiment of the American “nu-metal” (sigh) bands is mostly hype, Carnal Forge, a bunch of maladjusted Swedes, ought to come here and kick everyone asses. Indulge me for a moment, the American “thrap” bands have enjoyed a commercial success that they did not deserve. The similarity between a band like, oh, one of the bands that wear jumpsuits and leather masks, and Carnal Forge is there: their lyrics are abusive, there’s hostility, etc. The American bands, who have, again, received success they do not deserve, and I am so glad that their end is in sight, for they sought to make the lead guitar irrelevant in favor of lousy noise and boring yelling. Carnal Forge has the same level of anger, hostility, etc.; their music, just like the rest is a release – but they know the heavy metal formula that demands guitars and a sense of melody. Hence, I would like to see them stamp out the remaining plague of false metal that’s polluting my mailbox…
Century Media Records: http://www.centurymedia.com • Carnal Forge: http://www.carnalforge.com
