Chris Cleo sinks protein shakes for gains as he tries to reinforce his neck for the new Cannibal Corpse Album… did he survive…

The faces on the Mt. Rushmore of death metal might differ for everyone, but the one name that rings true for a vast majority of people is none other than Cannibal Corpse.  You can squint your eyes and wonder why Thomas Jefferson’s neck was sculpted to be about 4” thicker proportionally… only to realise that Corpsegrinder’s face sits right atop the mighty monolith of death, with the 16^th offering ‘Chaos Horrific’ set to release this Friday.  Any fan of death metal of any kind should really know what to expect from a Cannibal Corpse album – for a first time listener or a seasoned vet poring over their discography again you’ll either notice or remember that there are no real weak links.  Ok sure I never gave ‘Gore Obsessed’ the time it probably deserves and I thought that the last LP ‘Violence Unimagined’ could’ve done with some more faster cuts, but that doesn’t stop them from being anything but extremely solid albums.

And this is exactly what I was expecting from ‘Chaos Horrific’ – where to no surprise that’s exactly what it is.  Every interview I’ve seen of the band has them explain that they’re always out to just make the most brutal music possible and that’s what they manage do every time.  There’s no doubt that a Cannibal record will have bludgeoning riffs, massive production and no frills brutality, where with technicality that’s not overbearing (take note on how this is done other bands) the signature Cannibal Corpse sound has become so refined that the level of consistency is genuinely satisfying to recognize.  Opener ‘Overlords of Violence’ is one of my favourites ever from Cannibal – with the bass stabbing through the opening riff in a very ‘Epitaph of the Credulous’ way, and is somewhere in between a ‘Severed Head Stoning’ and ‘Demented Aggression’ on the speed scale; so for those of you who don’t get the references… this ones pretty damn fast.  The song embodies the Cannibal Corpse imagery so well from the thrashy beat throughout to the now trademark chunky production coming out of Mana recording studios.

The second track and aptly titled ‘Frenzied Feeding’ continues the same pace, just with more solos and a more frantic and jagged arrangement.  However, is the two singles where things start to slow down – ‘Summoned for Sacrifice’ and ‘Blood Blind’ are some of the slowest tracks on the album, with the former being slow to mid-paced throughout and the latter being predominantly slow but meandering through more fast thrashy sections.  While the album has been described by bassist Alex Webster as feeling like a ‘continuation of Violence Unimagined’, this was something I had fully picked up on with these two singles, where they match the album in question that had an abundance of similarly slower material with a more menacing atmosphere.  Not that atmosphere is what you look for when you put a Cannibal Corpse disc on the tray, and with noticeably more faster songs than the last LP one thing ‘Chaos Horrific’ does really well is not insisting upon itself.  Songs flow from start to finish with a recognisable flavouring that differs with each track and the way Cannibal Corpse write technical riffs are done in such a way in that they never insist upon themselves.  Obviously the first two tracks bring an extra rabid ferocity and the second two tracks are more crushing and complex, but certain songs have a more technical edge which is not uncommon for the band (although not quite as technical as cuts from ‘Torture’ or ‘Skeletal Domain’) and some songs have a noticeable hint of melody – which is important to note.

Now this is something I never thought I’d say in a Cannibal Corpse review, but this melodic flair is something that can’t go unnoticed.  With the unfortunate departure of Pat O’Brien a few years ago, the only clear choice (as much as this means we’ll have to wait extra-long for more Hate Eternal material) for a second guitarist Erik Rutan to contribute. Where the playing style of both guitarists differ, Rutan’s focus on melody is another extra flavour that hasn’t really been present in Cannibal’s songs in the same way until recent years.  In some ways this focus on melody is the polar opposite to Pat’s injection of technicality, that in itself would be used to create a real demented and mangled sounding riff.  Seeing (Webster/O’Brien) in the song credits, you just knew you were in for some sick shit, but in the same way Rutan’s haunting melody and attention to his lead parts in all his solos create an arguably equally demented kind of feeling.  Songs like ‘Vengeful Invasion’ and ‘Fracture and Refracture’ just have the Rutan signature plastered all over them, and whether it’s his attention to melody or it rubbing off on the other songwriters it’s definitely a new flavour that has only a part of albums that feature Rutan as a contributing musician.

At the end of the day though ‘Chaos Horrific’ is simply put: another Cannibal Corpse album.  I know that sounds like I’m moaning but trust me – I would be if this was anything else.  I’ve said before that one thing I admire about Cannibal Corpse is their consistency, where combined with their only goal being to capture murderous aggression on tape has led to them sitting with an impressive career at their rightful place on the throne of death metal.  Sure the songs might not be quite so wretched as others they’ve spawned, and they might not have pulled the most technical of riffs from the writings of the apocrypha (I can’t wait to see if we get that one in) but this is another extremely solid offering from an extremely solid-errrr band, and anyway – if I had a penny for every sub-par Cannibal Corpse song… I’d still be dead broke.

The new Cannibal Corpse Album Chaos Horrific is out on the 22nd September via Metal Blade Records