Belgian death metal outfit Carnation return with a new look and sound casting the band into a deeper and darker light for third album Cursed Mortality.
Opening track “Herald of Demise” is full of gloomy synths but don’t let this fool you as it also is quite possibly the heaviest track the band have released to date. As someone who has the band’s previous offerings on very nice coloured vinyl there is not only a huge sigh of relief but a new found appreciation of the new additional soundscapes. The track also features King Diamond’s Andy LaRocque so it’s obviously getting bonus point for that.
Follow up track “Maruta” also wallows in the ferocity but still maintains elements that are immediately recogniseable to me as a fan from the band’s inception, and as the album crashes into “Metropolis” – laden as it is with dominant basslines – it’s abundantly clear Carnation are on a mission to assert some dominance in the OSDM revival space.
But wait! Melodies and clean vocals interweaved with mud drenched guttural deliveries, I know not of this witchcraft and it wasn’t a direction I was expecting. By the end of “Replicant” it’s a combination I am ready to hear more of.
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This album does feel like a big step up in musicianship and highlights the band’s maturity and willingness to incorporate other elements into their overall delivery. “Dutroux” is a great example of this.
As the album moves into the slower, menacing “Submerged in Deafening Silence” with its hypnotic guitar parts, I am justified in my decision that I gave up my chance a few years ago to see a 25th anniversary album show of a very well known band to see Carnation perform for the first time in UK. This is a followed by another blistering performance on “Cycle of Suffering”.
All that remains is title track “Cursed Mortality”, which at seven and half minutes gives the band the opportunity to really pull back the curtain and almost unveil every influence. They present it in such a grandiose way, too. The clean vocals are back but with it comes an almost gothic doom wave in the vein of Novembers Doom, yet at the same time they still maintain that undercurrent of death metal.
Honestly this combination is going to ensure that album number three ends up in the vinyl collection too.
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Header image by Gaëlle Spaas
Cursed Mortality is released on 3rd November
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