Aren't You Dead Yet?

Carnal Forge | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 29, 2009)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Century Media
• ASIN: B0002IQKBI
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #411,036 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Decades of Despair

2. My Suicide

3. Burn Them Alive

4. Waiting for Sundown

5. Exploding Veins

6. Sacred Flame

7. Inhuman

8. Final Hour in Hell

9. Totally Worthless

10. The Strength of Misery

11. H.B.F. Suicide [CD-ROM Track][Live]

Editorial Reviews

Carnal Forge

This product is manufactured on demand using CD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, October 3, 2004

By 

Tom Servo "Robot" (Satelite of Love) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Aren't You Dead Yet? (Audio CD)

Oh my, this is impossible, they topped all their other albums! This is by far the BEST Carnal Forge CD yet! Brutal Thrash Metal played fast and aggressively. Sounds like a heavier version of older Slayer. It is absolutely amazing. Century Media is a lable known for amazing bands and release the best of the best and this is by far one of the best cds i've listened to all year. I say this is an absolute must buy!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars yes!, September 27, 2004

By 

Blaise Bailey Finnegan "Ryan" (Calgary AB, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Aren't You Dead Yet? (Audio CD)

okay, I wasn't expecting a followup to The More You Suffer so early, but this album is AMAZING. it's another step in their evolution from Firedemon to The More You Suffer. there's way more groove in this one, it's not quite as heavy, but it's faster than The More You Suffer, it's simpler and more like Firedemon in a lot of ways, but it has a ton of groove. basically it's a more evolved version of Firedemon. the songs are shorter again, there's 10 tracks on this album, and it's barely over 35 minutes. and that's the Carnal Forge I love. it's something I can't make myself get bored of. I've listened to it once or twice a day for the last 2 weeks, and this album still won't quit on me. the standout songs are Decades of Despair, the single released on the Century Media site for download, and The Final Hour. the next best is The Strength of Misery, it's the last track, and has the most groove and melody of any song on the album and possibly any song in their catalogue. it's too bad they lost Jonas though. I hope Jens can carry the torch and they make another wicked album after this.

4.0 out of 5 stars Good, if often criminally-underrated thrash, July 31, 2011

By 

A. Stutheit "Teyad" (Denver, CO USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Aren't You Dead Yet? (Audio CD)

Carnal Forge formed at pretty much the exactly wrong time. They debuted ("Who's Gonna Burn") in many years ago, in 1998, although, technically speaking, they were actually born in `97. Either one of these years was during a rather unfortunate period for the band. See, the mid-to-late 1990's marked a substantial uprising in thrash metal (and old-school-esque thrash, at that). Hence, the scene became flooded with old-school thrash revitalists such as God Forbid, Shadows Fall, Burn The Priest, Dew Scented, Hatebreed, Caliban, Machine Head, Ringworm, Pig Destroyer, Soulfly, Nailbomb, Himsa, and Indestructible Noise Command (to name only a few). Granted, all of these bands are, overall, quite a bit better than Carnal Forge, and they certainly are a lot more popular, too. They do possess a few qualities that would otherwise be considered fairly distinguishable, but none of them ultimately helped their causes. For starters, they weren't the first or finest product of the Swedish speed metal circuit (The Crown and The Haunted have got `em beat.), The Crown have them beat). Next, producing a melodic death metal-influenced thrash didn't help matters at all, seeing how those were not hard to come by in the Nineties, either. (See also: At The Gates, Arch Enemy, Vomitory, In Flames, etc.) And, subsequently, there were countless groups (i.e. Hatesphere) that followed who drew so heavily from the Gothenburg playbook that it is sometimes impossible to discern the fine difference between who is actually a Swede (i.e. Hatesphere), and who isn't (Killswitch Engage). Plus, not even having black metal-tinged vocals do much in the way of innovation (Children Of Bodom, Dark Tranquility, and God Dethroned - among others - all do that.) Finally, to make things even worse, after only a few years time, the genre once again boomed with popularity. This resurgence in popularity was a precursor to the massively popular metalcore genre; and it found new millennium thrashers like Lamb Of God, Chimaira, Sworn Enemy, Trivium, Grimfist, Dragonlord, Terror, Unearth, Watch Them Die, Superjoint Ritual, Impaled, Bleeding Through, Gojira, and High On Fire quickly rising to stardom.

As you can see, Carnal Forge could in no way compete with such popularity, so they eventually got kind of swallowed up in and pushed aside by it. But the point I am trying to make, here, is that C.F. are a pretty darn good, and very solid band, no matter how underrated and overlooked they may be (they are easily one of the Nineties' frontrunners in that category).And their music usually well-worth checking out for anybody that has more than a passing interest in thrash and/or speed metal. "Aren't You Dead Yet?," their fifth proper record, is no exception.

This 2004 release hits the ground running. "Decades Of Despair" would not be at all mismatched coming off of The Haunted's first two records. Jonas' larynx-shredding screams lead the charge over blistering, rip-roaring guitars, continuously strong hooks, hard-rocking rhythms, and machine-gun drums. This frenetic pace is briefly down for "Burn There Alive", a fairly restrained number with tasty and well-placed melodic soloing. But things never miss a beat, thanks to the inclusion of later tracks like "Waiting For Sundown,", which has brisk and propulsive thrash pacing, a decent solo, memorable choruses, and cool, Black Dahlia Murder-lite vocal patterns. The succeeding "Sacred Flame" is yet another blood-gushing fist-pumper, and a heavy, Megadeth-ian ripper backed by fiery, headbangable chugging, and a good, shout-worthy chorus. Granted, though, it does lose a few points for having metalcore-copped attitude and song structures. Later, we get "Final Hour In Hell," with its rock-solid riffs and hook-laden adherent grooves, brings to light Carnal Forge's ample "Heartwork"-era Carcass influences. (It makes little room for doubt about where the band got their moniker from). The song after this, "Totally Worthless," stands out, only not for the reason you might think. it is quite a bit different from most of the rest of the material. It tosses in a few arrangement changes into the mix by offsetting the usual Slayer-esque mayhem with surprisingly mid-tempo and heavy (and sometimes nearly crushing), densely lumbering, ominously repetitive, and darkly doomy power chords in the beginning. It all wraps up in suitably strong, and thoroughly aggressive and exciting fashion: "The Strength Of Misery" is a scorching epilogue backed by extra great and busy riffing and blazing, King/Hanneman-worthy wild, shred soloing.

Granted, it cannot be said to be a complete grand slam, and it may often be criminally underrated and/or overlooked by most thrash fans, but let the record show that "Aren't You Dead Yet?" is a good album nonetheless.