Review Summary: Carnifex's Dead In My Arms is a strong debut album for a new Deathcore band. They don't do anything mind-blowingly new, but they do it well.
At first I was going to make a reply to an old review of this album, but it began to get lengthy. If you see this twice I apologize, the artist showed up under "Other" and I couldnt get it to change.
Well first of all, I believe that reviews should be written by people who actually enjoy the style of music they are reviewing. Anyone can write a review about a genre they hate and fill it with a bunch of propganda about how horrible it is because they don't like it. I'm not going to do that here, I am writing this review based on the fact that I have heard a lot of bands in the "Deathcore" genre. I've been to my fair share of shows and did the whole scene kid thing for a while.
That said, on to the review. Carnifex doesn't do anything groundbreaking in their Debut album, but if what you are looking for is a good Metal band with good guitar riffs and heavy breakdowns you will enjoy this album. Most of the fills between breakdowns are good, although a bit repetitive. My biggest complaint about this CD is how similiar the whole thing sounds. They do a few things here and there to spice it up, but over all there needs to be more variety involved to really catch peoples eye. Twice throughout the CD before a breakdown they use a one liner where all the music cuts out to say a cheezy line like "Fine, **** you than." It may annoy people, but I find it rather humorous and it brings a certain level of diversity to a genre that definitely needs it.
To fully enjoy this music, you really need to listen to it with subwoofers. the "bass bombs/bass drops/808/whatever you want to call them really add to the heaviness of the music, and bring some much needed variety to breakdowns. In this aspect it reminds me a lot of The Acacia Strain CD "The Dead Walk" Carnifex and The Acacia Strain tend to overly use the bass bomb, cheapening the "cool" effect that it has when you only hear it once every few songs. It still sounds good, and its fun to listen to, and sometimes unnoticeable unless you are either really listening for it or have subs hooked up.
The vocals are rather good compared to some of the absolutely horrid excuses of Death metal bands that are popping up over myspace. Crappy bands like Waking the Cadaver and we come with broken teeth give the genre a bad name with their terrible lyrics, horrid screams, repetitive breakdowns and lack of originality. Carnifex does a much better job on this front, his growl is very well done, and there isn't an over excess of pig squealing. His high scream is one of the best i've heard, it sounds amazingly like the one from Job for a Cowboy. The drummer is nothing to write home to my mom about, and the guitars are typical.
All in all this album isn't going to blow you away. If you like the genre I absolutely recommend picking this album up, it's one of my favorites this year. If you don't, it isn't going to change your mind about the genre.
