CEPHALIC CARNAGE — Anomalies (review)

CEPHALIC CARNAGE — Anomalies album cover

Album · 2005 · Deathgrind

4/5 · 2011-05-11
UMUR

"Anomalies" is the 4th full-length studio album by US extreme metal act Cephalic Carnage. The album was released through Relapse Records in March 2005. A promotional video was shot for the metalcore parody track "Dying Will Be the Death of Me". "Anomalies" features the same lineup who recorded "Lucid Interval (2002)", but it´s the last album to feature bassist Jawsh Mullen, who left Cephalic Carnage in January 2006 to concentrate on his education and other musical adventures.

The band are known for their eclectic and experimental extreme metal style that´s somewhat rooted in grindcore but expands beyond the boundaries of that style. On "Anomalies" the band incorporate elements from grindcore, death metal, deathcore, metalcore, sludge, and avant garde. And most of the time you´ll have elements from several of those genres within one track. The vocals on the album are mostly very extreme, ranging from death grunts, to higher pitched screaming vocals, and everything in between. But in addition to the more extreme vocals on the album you´ll also be exposed to raw sludgy type vocals and even some clean metalcore styled vocals in the track "Dying Will Be the Death of Me". So there are a plethora of vocal styles on the album. It can be both a strength and a weakness depending on your point of view and open mindedness towards those various vocal styles. Whichever style of music the band chose to play and incorporate into their songs they pull it off with ease and conviction though, be it deathcore breakdowns, sludgy parts, fast blasting grindcore sections, groove based death metal, or avant garde sounding dissonant fretboard runs and other oddball ideas (including the rather unconventional lyrics).

The sound production is professional, powerful, and suits the music perfectly.

Cephalic Carnage is the kind of act that defies valid catagorization. Fortunately they are fully capable of succesfully mixing the various stylistic elements that they chose to use in a seamless fashion. They are not only extremely skilled musicians, but also rather accomplished composers. Of course an album like "Anomalies" require an open mind and I have to admit that it´s taken me a couple of years to fully digest and appreciate the album. The first time I gave the album a listen, I simply didn´t get it. I felt the music was all over the place and it simply didn´t appeal to me. I knew from the first listen that there was something about the album though. After a couple of years and multible spins the album has opened to me and the tracks have become memorable and distinguisable from each other. The combination of different extreme metal styles is quite ingenious and deserves praise. This could have resulted in utter failure and unlistenable music, but Cephalic Carnage skillfully combine all musical styles into an adventurous sound that´s unmistakably their own. A 4 star (80%) rating is deserved.