Grave Infestation : "Carnage Gathers"

Taking a break from black metal to review this Canadian Death Metal band. They take you back to the early days of the genre and feel like a mix of Death and Obituary. I'm sure if you are really into this era of death metal other bands could be a reference point, as I can also hear a little Entombed, but once you get mired down into some of those bands they begin to all sound the same. They like many others focus on hyperaggression and paint their songs with a similar shade of blood red. It works well on the opening track but by the second song, some of the blasting begins to blur. I can make out the word extermination, but the gurgled gutturals are spewed in a manner that just sprays their bile as a layer on the riffing. 

I like the fact they have a very dark sound. "Inhuman Remains" is a little more nuanced and finds the buzz saw guitars grooving more than the previous song. "Black Widow" makes me think of early Slayer but with Tom's vocals replaced by this gurgling growl. It gives this a more putrid mood, but is more dynamically limited than even the vocals on "Show No Mercy".  This song shows they are making more of an effort to write songs than half the death metal bands occupying my inbox. 

There is more of a frantic blitz to "The Anthropophagus". The album's cover art refers to this song, which is about a 17th-century French Cannibal who was a hermit who starved to death. You would think a cannibal would have the sense to live closer to his food source. The growls are not articulated enough to understand the narrative they have chosen to tell this story which is a shame. It is not until the solo section that some melody creeps into the otherwise chaotic barrage of the title track.  The moshing mood of "Drenched in Blood" comes and goes. There is only marginally more form and function than the previous song. 

"Murder Spree" closes the album out. The need for ultra-heavy riffing sometimes makes these guys stray from the foundational elements of metal. This song finds the band trying to balance it out but the need for speed seems to be winning by the halfway mark. What bands need to focus more on is what emotions are they going to be able to convey that will set them apart from the rest of the pack. This is not the area of the band that is most defined though at times they make an effort. I will give this album an 8 more the overall mood and effort the do put in is more than most death metal bands.

pst63