Customer Reviews

Necroticism / Descanting the Inasalubrious

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Man, I've been listening to metal music since I was 13, and since then many records have been cranked up (more than 17 years in this patch), and I can honestly say this work from Carcass still holds for me as their best, and one of the milestones of heavy music, not very often one may find an album that has such a distinctive sound and song structure. Many other bands can presume of being skilled, but they lack interest or sense of melody; others may say they are brutal and fast, but are boring and repetitive. Carcass here demonstrated they were VERY good musicians, that they could come up with catchy yet melodicaly varied songs and calm the blood thirst of any consumated death metal fan. Those of you reading this review may not like the album, perhaps not even the band, and that's ok, we all have different tastes, but nobody can deny these guys were (and still are) well ahead of the pack.

Michael Schenker once said that when Punks finally learned to play their instruments, the music would be called Metal. Whether he was being facetious or remarkably astute, he was correct. Carcass, with roots firmly planted in the fledgling mid-80s Grindcore scene, created `Necroticism: Descanting The Insalubrious', an album widely hailed as one of the all time greats in Death Metal.

Because the band approached the music from a different background to traditional Death Metal bands, Carcass were not constrained by it's invisible but impenetrable boundaries, and "Necroticism..." is not strictly a pure Death Metal album, but contains a large Grindcore component. The progress in the years since the release of the bloody pulp of `Symphonies Of Sickness' and the indecipherable white noise of `Reek Of Putrefaction' was remarkable. The Punks had indeed learned to play their instruments.

Carcass' 1987 debut album `Reek Of Putrefaction' was a balls-out one-riff-per-song blast, with only one song passing the three minute mark, while many were considerably shorter, as was the old Grindcore tradition. Fast forward to 1992 and the band's songwriting and composition skills had developed to the point where songs were now six or seven minutes. Riff after riff was strung together, like a DNA double helix. Carcass adapted many songwriting conventions, like introductions, and rudimentary choruses, but part of the charm of this album is the delight they took in throwing in an unexpected blast passage or discordant solo.

Ken Owen's drumming in particular had matured from frenzied flailing, where he seemed to hit as many drums as possible as rapidly as he could, to a powerful, fluid and accurate sound, part Death, part Grind.

Part of the problem (or part of the charm, depending on how you look at it) with Carcass' first two albums was the indistinct guitar sound. It was loud and blurred, and so poorly defined it is near on impossible to hear what Bill Steer was playing, but was probably true to the band's live sound at the time. However, producer Colin Richardson reassembled Carcass' wall of noise on this album, brick by brick, so the riffs and solos shared and traded by Steer and new boy Michael Amott are crisp and clear, yet heavy and menacing. The opening passage of "Lavaging Expectorate Of Lysergide Composition" bounces along like an Iron Maiden riff on steroids.

Many bands missed the point of Carcass' lyrics and copied the gore theme while trying to be as offensive as possible. Jeff Walker's lyrics have a hidden depth to them. Yes, there are horrific gory passages, which are designed to shock. Behind the medical dictionary verbosity though, lays a witty, satirical sense of humour. Each song has a story to tell. Opener "Inpropagation" is a tale of using human remains as fertiliser. "Incarnated Solvent Abuse" is a recipe for creating glue from rendered down corpses, while "Lavaging Expectorate Of Lysergide Composition" explains how to get high from chemicals created by decaying bodies. Perhaps most repugnant is "Pedigree Butchery", in which human babies are processed as dog food, with wonderful lines like "Rheological, twisted nursery chymes/The fluxing of the defleshed/Paedophilosophical, carnage knowledge/As the illegitimate to the domesticated is fed". The lyrics are still completely indecipherable without a lyric sheet, while Walker took on a bulk of the vocal duties, rather than the three way sharing of the previous albums.

The overall sound of this album was far removed from Carcass' early albums, and quite a distance from most Death Metal bands of the time, except perhaps Bolt Thrower. Before `Necroticism: Descanting The Insalubrious', Carcass had been a bit of a cult band in Death Metal circles, too chaotic to gain wide acceptance, but their perverse lyrical bent was much appreciated. After this album's release however, all things gory and Grindy in the underground were loudly professing their love for Carcass. So imposing is this album that few bands have ever tried to imitate it's sound, and none have ever succeeded, not even Carcass.

Its hard to describe this album as anything less than incredible. I've been a metal fan for 20 years, and this CD has had more spins than any of the other hundreds of discs in my collection. No contest. I believe this to be Carcass' finest hour... the perfect compromise of the awesome brutality of 'Reek of Putrefaction' and 'Symphonies of Sickness' and the ingenious song structure of their other masterpiece: 'Heartwork'. In my opinion, this is THE death/grind album. Nobody does it like Carcass did. The guitar work is amazing, and the dual solos and vocals are just plain awesome. From the grinding opener "Impropagation" to the beautiful ending of "Forensic Clinicism/The Sanguine Article" (which is the original last track on the CD) this album never ceases to amaze me. I don't own any other CD that I've listened to so frequently and enjoy so completely as Necroticism. Its been over 10 years, and this one is still going strong. Buy this. :)

I loved this album! This is definately, without a doubt, my favorite Carcass album "Heartwork" runs a close second place. This CD literaly lived lived in my CD player for about a year. I had a hell of a time ordering a replacement when the original bit the dust. I would recommend this album to anybody who liked the Heartwork album. Chances are pretty good that you will like the "Descanting" album if you enjoy extreme metal, death metal, speed metal, heavy metal or what ever you want to call your metal. The songs on this album crush! Lots of variety, great drums and guitar riffs. Relentless speed and I love the way the vocals accent the music. I would also like to add for those of you that dont like grunty, traditional death metal style vocals...this vocal style is toned down but definately still extreme.

Lots of times this album gets overlooked. It fell between the "puke rock" days of Reek and Symphonies and the more well-known days of Heartwork. But people, this album is Carcass at the top of their art. Adding Michael Ammott as a second guitarist made a huge difference, Ammott and Steer having recognizably different and complementary lead styles. The production was cleaned up immensely, making this a far more listenable album than either of the first two. As a die-hard Carcan, this is their #1 album. Period. The music, the attitude, the sound, it's all there.

If you're into any kind of metal at all, thrash, death, black, give this one a listen. I bet it makes you go and buy Heartwork, and then you'll never be the same again.

Carcass was the first death metal band I ever listened to and I've listened to many since, but they will always remain my favorite. Necroticism: Descanting the Insalubrious is by far their best album. This is the one CD after they had refined their brutality, but before they ventured into the more mainstream sound. Don't get me wrong, their other work quite surpasses that of most other bands of this genre. Evidence of this can best be found on Wake Up and Smell the Carcass. They may now be gone, but I'm glad they left us with such a legacy of atrocity

This is the first listenable release by Carcass -- their earlier albums are perhaps the worst-produced train wrecks I've ever had the misfortune of hearing. But the nice production values on Necroticism don't compromise Carcass's brutal style and clinical menace. If you're a fan of good death metal, you'll love this complex, yet hard-driving record.

I am a 3rd year medical student in Dallas, and I needed some extra study material for my exams. This album definitely helped me to cement my knowledge of the relevant material. I must, however, object to some medical innacuracies on their track "Pedigree Butchery": I have performed a number of experiments of this nature myself, and have generated no evidence to corroborate the scenario they contemplate. It may simply be that their sample size is too small. In any case, if you enjoy this album, you probably don't like Jennifer Lopez.

This band was one of the best in grind period.With this release they got more melodic and technical than their previous efforts.The production is really good and the songs are also quite heavy.You got to love those intro samples on each song.The guitar work is really refined and catchy.No one could deny that these guys are talented even if you do not like what they are singing about.You should own this in your cd collection if you dont already have it.

This is the follow up to Symphonies Of Sickness. Jeff Walker(bass/vocals) continues to take cues off of previous recordings
by writing medical dictionary inspired lyrics like "Lavaging Expectorate of Lysergide Composition". Musically it shows progression from the previous two records. More emphasis on musicanship and second guitarist Micheal Amott(Carnage) adds more
melody to the mix as well as more noodling than the previous cds.
Still it's a brutal release not quite the all out blasting like Symphonies but there is some of that. Bill Steer and Jeff Walker still do the trading back n' forth vocal approach. To me this is
Carcass showing some maturity. The lyrics are still quite amusing whether he is talking about chopping bits of human flesh
and making it into dog food:"Pedigree Butchery", using the dead for furtilizer: "Inpropagation", or using the dead to make musical instruments "Symposium Of Sickness" it's all quite horrorfying but tongue in cheek. This is classic.