Reek of Putrefaction

Carcass is undoubtedly one of the most important and influential bands in all of extreme metal. Their influence is managed to shape and influence two major styles of metal, that being goregrind and death metal. Especially in the goregrind section, because Carcass was the first true goregrind band. They started a style of grind that would be worshipped and imitated by so many bands, some maybe even doing it better than Carcass did. But when it comes to “Reek of Putrefaction”, you can’t get much gnarlier than this.

This whole record has a very unique and deranged atmosphere that screams pathology. The lyrics detail many concepts of gore and forensics to an extreme medical degree. Hell, even the classic album cover was created by a bunch of photos from medical textbooks. Showing off an abhorrent and disgusting cover of real dead bodies/autopsies. The album cover alone inspired countless goregrind bands to follow in its footsteps.

Now on to the music. This album is fucking disgusting. Filled with some of the most brutal music ever committed to tape. The production is ungodly muddy and awful, with the bass being extremely rumbly in the background. The drums sound like someone beating mashed potatoes with a goddamn mallet. And that’s why I love it, it fits the extremely primal and energetic burst of goregrind displayed here. The thing that’s the most transparent and prominent if you even wanna call it “transparent” is the guitars. All of these elements combined created one of the most disgusting mixes ever. When it comes to how bad you can make the production some bands have gotten close. But nobody has even come close to this level of nastiness. And that’s why it’s so awesome.

When it comes to songwriting across these 22 tracks it’s very straightforward in its attack. Bashing you over the head with groovy rhythms, blasting drums, and obnoxiously guttural vocals. With all three band members doing vocals on this record. You have Bill Steer on guitars doing a more low-pitched growl, while Jeff Walker the bassist does a more high-pitched raspy snarl. And of course, you have the drummer Ken Owen delivering the insanely gut-wrenching pitch-shifted vocals. It sounds like some demon projectile vomiting and eating innards, it’s perfect for this record. This record also does a good job of balancing all these different vocal tones, layering, and switching back and forth perfectly. Adding to the disgusting atmosphere and intensity.

Throughout the album, it may seem overwhelming because of all the madness that is going on. A lot of the songs may blur together due to how short they are. But for me after listening to this album so many times so many songs are standout and hooky. I can remember at least 6 songs off the top of my head whenever I think of this album. Maybe it’s due to a killer groovy hook or maybe a vocal pattern that was especially nasty. One of these songs is the opening instrumental “Genital Grinder” which perfectly opens up this album. Having a very ominous intro and build-up that sets the tone for this record immediately. And it contains one of the best riffs across this whole album.

Each song is littered with that classic goregrind groove. Which is something every single Goregrind band took influence from. Each song has very intense riffing and grooves that’ll crush your brains into oblivion. It has a very blast beat dominant and mid-paced feel to it that is the trademark flare for every goregrind band. The riffs also aren’t just your simple power chords and abrasive tremolos. The album is filled with chaotic rhythms and solos as well as different switches in chords and riffing. It’s not just a blur of forgettable mud. There’s also some interesting alternate picking and crawls going on as well, which is another great example of how different the riffing and soloing can be.

While everything is simplistic and very straightforward that’s the charm of this album. Ken’s blast beats and drum performance is also something special. His blasting is very VERY fast and ruthless, but he’s not afraid to throw in a fill or a more mid-paced beat here and there. His blasting style is something again, a LOT of future goregrind bands would take the influence of and imitate. The gore is everywhere on this album and took the whole gore concept to another extreme. These guys along with Cannibal Corpse are some of the pioneers of that really explicit gore lyrical content.

Now my favorite song on this album is EASILY “Pyschopatholigst”. It has the most memorable lyrics and grooves on the whole album and contains the best vocal patterns and sections. With Ken’s pitches shifted gutturals shining brightly on this song, and man does he sound nasty. The lyrics on this song also managed to inspire the legendary Dutch band Last Days of Humanity. Who took the line “The sound of rancid juices sloshing around your coffin” and made it their debut album title. Which is another fantastic album in the goregrind genre. Some other favorites of mine on this album are “Regurgitation of Giblets", "Pyosisified (Rotten to the Gore)", "Fermenting Innards", and "Vomited Anal Tract".

Carcass shaped an entirely new genre with this album. Which would only be topped by their sophomore album “Symphonies of Sickness” a year later. It’s still mind-blowing to me that an album this gore-induced and brutal came out in 1988 before a lot of pioneers in the brutal death metal scene. I love everything about this album from its lyrics to its music. “Symphonies of Sickness” would do this style ten times better, but “Reek of Putrefaction” is also a perfect extreme metal release to me. Check this monster out if you're new to grind and goregrind. A classic album.

Carcass, one of the most important representatives and pioneers of the goregrind style, without whom it's possible that the contemporary version of this extreme music would look much different today. Interestingly, the genre merits of this band do not end there, but let's not anticipate the facts - more about them later in next reviews. The beginnings of Carcass date back to 1986, although the germ of their first genius only two years later. It was then that Jeff Walker (bass/vocals), Bill Steer (guitars/vocals) and Ken Owen (drums) released their debut album entitled "Reek Of Putrefaction", which included music like the one on the cover art - disgusting, hideous and sickening.

Under this appetizing description there are 22 (!) equally repulsive and extremely rotten songs. Most of them oscillate around a minute or two (the record holder "Festerday" climbed to twenty-two seconds), but all of them have one thing in common - to be as ugly, noisy and repulsive as the stench of a decaying corpse. The debut of Carcass, of course, fulfills this task perfectly. "Reek Of Putrefaction", just like "Scum" released a year earlier, crosses the border of the then understood extreme, breaking the classically metal standards towards radical and outrageous forms. To put it simply, "Reek..." is completely wild music characterized by muddy and ugly production, a large dose of cacophony, a surgical-pathological atmosphere, frantic vocals (screeching by Jeff, low and gutturals by Bill, as well as occasional, distorted on Ken's part) and playing, in general, very impulsive and quite devastating. There's not much that stands out from this brutality, with only the pathological-sounding intro of "Genital Grinder", the extremely catchy "Pyosisified (Rotten To The Gore)" (it's not surprising that they later recorded a better, new version of it) and the crazy solo from "Vomited Anal Tract", although that's not the point of this one records. First of all, "Reek Of Putrefaction" is an album from a series of albums that focus to overwhelm you with the noise and intensity generated, rather than attracting attention with individual motifs or contrived virtuosity.

These three vegans from Liverpool presented their vision of the goregrind with great taste. "Reek Of Putrefaction" is an excellent example that even for such one-dimensional and chaotic music, precious and inspiring albums can be created. The debut of Carcass is one of them, and only a year later it turned out that the trio was able to raise this level much higher - despite the satisfactory content of the first one.

Originally on A bit of subjectivism...in metal

At the moment I'm writing this review this album is one of my biggest obsessions, I can't stop listening to it, and the truth is that it's a work I've known for quite some time and I've never held it in high esteem until very recently. And although Reek of Putrefaction is a release with its flaws, the truth is that I am unable to understand why I had this album in such low esteem, because right now everything I appreciate in it is simply fascinating on many levels.

When one refers to Carcass' career, it is impossible not to include the word pioneers in their biography, and this is a tendency since their debut, undisputed foundational pillar of grindcore and the later subgenres of deathgrind and goregrind, to the point that, 35 years later, there are still clone bands of this style that Carcass developed in their early days. But there is not only that one influence, I have rarely read about it but it is undeniable that Reek of Putrefaction has to be one of the most influential albums for the development of the war metal trend, it is no surprise to anyone the impact of grindcore on that particular subgenre, but the amount of elements that are appreciable in this release that would later be vital in that musical line is exceptional.

And that's because this album has one of the greatest atmospheres ever made in a long play, but unlike many other works where the atmospheric elements are used in a preciosist way, here they reinforce one of the most rotten and nauseating atmospheres imaginable, it's not only that the cover and the lyrics are filthy, it's that the music is too, a totally dirty and raw sound to unsuspected limits, hard to believe that this is an album from the 80s. The production is bad and is far from what the members of Carcass intended, but the final result is perfectly suited to the style that the young british band showed, the speed and forcefulness of the songs, coupled with vocal performances that directly seems to vomit the lyrics instead of delivering them, causes them to become at times a powerful sonic ball that destroys everything in its path, dancing between an intelligible mass and brutal and groovy riffs that remain forcibly embedded in your memory for its effectiveness when breaking into the composition, being good examples of this Pyosisified or Psychopathologist, but there being many more.

It's amazing how a work that at times borders on anti-musicality is incapable of not showing the clear talent that all the members of the band had, especially Ken Owen and Bill Steer. It was still early days and both would later develop their full potential, but here you can already see flashes of it, especially I'm a big fan of Bill Steer's sonic attacks in extremely punctual but full of quality moments, where he shows a chaotic, fast and virtuosic solo that, to a certain extent, contrasts strongly with the cavernous and mononeural style that the rest of the music displays. Also speaking of Bill Steer, his growls here are absolutely amazing. I may be wrong but I can't think of an act of even similar tremendous vocal depth at that time, the voracity of his growls is normal to us now but I can't imagine what it was like in fucking 1988, not even legendary vocalists like Corpsegrinder, David Vincent or Chris Barnes, famous for their powerful growls, could do a similar performance in their early works and that was already a few years before this release.

The intensity of the album is unparalleled, Bill Steer himself mentioned that there was no other goal than to be fast and heavy, and I think that once you get past the production (the other big "flaw" of the album) the truth is that its biggest downside is that an album so direct and crushing the truth is that 40 minutes end up being long at times, it is true that the work is full of iconic songs and full of energy that will raise your adrenaline, but nothing that wouldn't have been possible to compress in a shorter long play, but being sincere this is a minor problem that I only bring up to justify not giving more punctuation to an album that doesn't seem perfect to me like others, that reach a more subjective level for me, but being this album simply brilliant in everything that is proposed to do, it doesn't need to do anything more than what it already does, and in its own way it's amazing.

Having this album in the background while I was writing this review, one of my housemates heard the track Malignant Defecation and defined it as "not music but just noise", and I find it funny because even if we argue that a lot of this music has lost its initial punch when it comes to impacting people, the truth is that most people, 35 years later, are still not ready to listen to Reek of Putrefaction, don't be fooled, this album is still scary, still shocking, still unpleasant. It is music belonging to a time that has not arrived, and only a privileged few are lucky enough to be able to enjoy it.

Reek of Putrefaction is certified as the mixture of bass-boosted and treble-reduced guitars, inaudible bass, and the drum snare sounding like a drum tom. Most of these negative aspects are exposed vehemently on the A Side. Faecal Disarticulation is the worst side of this album in terms of production. Since the guitars are extremely buried while the bass is completely removed along with the shitty ass drum snare, there are parts where you don't know if Ken Owen is doing a drum fill or playing the snare.

This album is mostly known for its influence on grindcore's "musical" catalog rather than its filthy and raw child-beating soundtrack; it could be one of the most legendary grindcore albums if it weren't for the production. We all know grindcore is characterized by raw and mediocre production, but Reek of Putrefaction is unique in the question of poor and obnoxious production. Carcass took the word "raw" too seriously; you can't even hear some notes; it's technically saying you can't tab the songs without having a surgical precision in the ears.

The guitars is insanely filled with reverb, giving that unique cavernous atmosphere, albeit that positive points, the (de)composition of the full-length is repetitive, mostly on blast beats or fast sections, when Bill Steer plays some gut-wrenching tremolo-picking on random frets, the only rhythm that was used on less than three songs was Foeticide's intro, that was used too in Burnt to a Crisp's chorus, and the solos are a joke, they're mostly arpeggios and bends, not a problem - but the tone gives a wave of agony through the eardrums, sounds like a cat dying or screaming but with chorus or 0.2 level of auto-wah, if you listen the solo for Vomited Anal Tract, you know what I mean, but this only appears on the side A.

The bass? How can I give an opinion about the bass if you can only hear it in some specific tracks on Side B? Well, you can hear the bass (without re-mixing on some generic DAW or any program with an EQ application) on tracks like Burnt to a Crisp (second chorus), Splattered Cavities, Oxidized Razor Masticator, and Malignant Defecation; they're distorted like in the style of Dahmer's Dahmerized. What I mean is: the bass is mid-reduced and with a cranked-up bass overdrive.

The drums sound different on both sides? No, both sides have that goofy snare that sounds like a tom, the same blast beats with snare, kick, and ride, and skank beats. Well, I don't criticize too much because Ken Owen had only a drumkit with only one kick. Sadly, in the majority of the blast beats, you can't hear the bass drum, and sometimes the snare is stuck behind the wall of noise. Also, in some tracks like Pyosisified, the drums are earraped in some sections.

The atmosphere, as I said in the paragraph about the guitar, is cavernous, obnoxious, and grotesquely eerie. The responsible factor for its dark audio-visual climax could be the tuning or the harsh guitar tone with an immense reverb that makes you not hear some of the notes. Some tracks that form some highlights are the mixture outro of Genital Grinder and Regurgitation of Giblets, which gives an orgasmic satisfaction of delicacy; the intro of Foeticide, which is the point of "catchiness" of all this release; and the morbid guitar lead while the intro is still playing with one variant of the first riff.

The lyrics are all focused on gory anatomy with very difficult terms for all the medicine professions; this is the main aspect of the cacophony they spew out, also from many Carcass cock-sucking bands or the magnificant "brand-new genre" that is rising up in goregrind's community recently; Pathological Goregrind.

Overall, this album has a position more in the influence and revolution of grindcore and extreme music as a whole than its raw and brutal sound, but the shitty production kills the album. Sometimes I think the demo Flesh Ripping Sonic Torment sounds better than RoP.

I think everyone who's in the goregrind scene is well aware of this album and its rather gory cover. Carcass is highly regarded as one of the earliest pioneers of the goregrind genre with their debut album "Reek of Putrefaction", and is nowadays infamous for spawning a bunch of Carcass clones trying to replicate their sound and look. But even some of the better clones can't compare to the original album. This album has a certain charm in its messy production and intense instruments that very few goregrind bands are able to replicate, and it still remains a rather interesting album to many.

Let's start off with the instruments and production. Even after all these years, ROP still remains Carcass's most extreme album. The guitars mix from groovy grindcore riffs to noisy and insane riffs, and the drums have an inconsistent patterns that ranges from coherence to a giant beating mess. And the bass is virtually nonexistent to the barebone production. Speaking of which, the production is the most interesting part throughout this album. During recording, the engineer practically messed up the album's sound, and they only had a couple of hours to mix it, leading to the mess you hear now. While it's okay in the softer parts, when the instruments play fast and clash together, it becomes impossible to distinguish the instruments from each others. A great example of this would be in the track "Pyosisified (Rotten to the Gore)". The track's slower parts are really good, as the guitars play a catchy riff and the drums beat in a slow, anxious pattern. However, when it gets fast, it sounds like the instruments are playing all at once, and are disorganized and incoherent. While it works okay with some tracks like "Vomited Anal Tract" and "Manifestation of Verrucose Urethra", a lot of the times, the bad production ends up butchering a lot of the instruments. While the instruments play some pretty good tunes, the production is the album's biggest issue, and some people may end up not liking to it at all because of it.

But while the production is terrible, the vocals are great. All three of the band members did the vocals, and they all sound amazing together. The vocals have this really raspy voice and features a lot of gurgles. The vocals were unconventional at the time, but end up working in the album's advantage. One of the best vocal moments on this album is in the track "Vomited Anal Tract". The song takes on a more groovy tone with some short bursts of the infamous instrumental clashing, and the vocals flow perfectly to the chaotic atmosphere. The vocals also use a pitch shifter, so some of the vocals sound very deep, and they work fantastic for backing vocals. The vocals are fitting to the atmosphere, and they would be very influential for future goregrind albums.

Not only were the instruments and vocals influential, but so were the lyrics. While grindcore focused on a lot of themes, goregrind would take some inspiration from death metal and include some gory lyrics, but they would ramp up the gore themes a lot. Take the song "Foeticide" for example. This verse quotes:

Spasmodic convulsions of pleasure are gained
Pumping out the boiling gunge as you languish in pain
Scouring out the womb from the effervescing rot
Scrubbing-brush comes in handy to clean out all the clots

This verse goes in great details in describing pain felt in someone's body. What makes ROP stand out from most other death metal albums at the time is that the band members would use a lot of medical terms to give the brutality a more formal tone, and it works amazingly. Combine this with the feral production and crazed vocals, and they give the lyrics a feeling of a surgery going terribly wrong. The medical themes in the lyrics work spectacularly, and would later go on to be the defining style of goregrind.

Overall, ROP is great in both the right and wrong reasons. The production is a complete joke, and end up ruining some of the songs. At the same time, though, the vocals have an unique sound and the lyrics are revolutionary in providing a different way in describing the gory madness. Even if you completely despise this album, you have to admit that this album is highly influential in the goregrind genre, and is a reminder on how great Carcass really was before they "sold out" with their 1993 album "Heartwork".

Sweet debut from UK greats! This is pure gore-grind. Raw, brutal and fast are some ways to describe this album in its entirety. Both trade-offs in the the vocal department. Screams and bellows are some of the sounds of the vocals. It's a good combination. I liked this whole debut. Of course it lead up to something greater even though Ken Owen can't rejoin the band due to his massive brain hemorrhage when he was only 28. He's not to play drums any longer. It sucks because like Mick Harris (ex-Napalm Death, ex-Defecation) Ken was a grind great! All we have are his memories of this earlier albums.

The music is just all over the place, grind blasts everywhere. It's a mixture of death metal and grindcore hence gore-grind. There's actually a lot going on at once with this album. Some tracks feature the vocal trade-offs and blasts some just aggressive vocals and slower tempos. And strikingly loud lead guitar. In any case, Carcass does a great job as staying extreme here as to what's to pursue down the line in terms of discography. Bill and Jeff being longtime members put together some pretty cool music even though it fluctuates all over the place. That's alright though, it's what to beholden of them as I said in the future.

I enjoyed this whole album because it is just so sickly crazy. The tempos swing like memoirs of moods and madness which is taken from Kay Jamison - An Unquiet Mind. Imagine that being this Carcass release as being one big episode of madness. It's greatness is in its experimental sounds. The riffs are KING and the blasts are with precision. Ken makes a great effort in the drum department the whole way through. I enjoyed this CD a lot because of its universality. And unique sound vibes to it. It really packs a punch to it the whole way through. They just tear it up in the grind department.

This album IS quite raw and unique. It really goes every which direction in sounds the guitars are just a massive aneurism. And the vocals by all three of the band members are sickly. They just don't let up in trade-offs, versatile tempos and massive grind. I would check this out on YouTube if you're a newbie to grindcore or gore-grind. It's a must to listen to this in its entirety to get a taste of what raw uncensored Carcass sounds like. The album artwork is quite disgusting so just factor that into the music and well you get the idea. I like old Carcass because of what they've become. Get it and take a listen or many!

I guess this album is more relevant for its place rather than for its music. It spawned hundreds upon hundreds of goregrind acts, and it is the framework of one of metal’s vilest subgenres. Lyrically, it was groundbreaking; metal already had bands that talked about death and gore, but Carcass was probably the first one to take a strictly medical approach to the topic. The guitars are tuned down to B, an incredibly low pitch by 1988’s standards. Carcass was also one of the first bands to use three different vocal styles in one album (dry growling, distorted screams, and a creepily deep voice.)

Of course, just talking about its historical importance is not enough. The music itself is incredibly chaotic, yes, but the guitar work is actually pretty well structured. The riffs are demarcated and organized, however, this is not very noticeable due to the production. This was not intentional; the band has declared that the production job was botched, accidentally creating a truly sickening and dense atmosphere. Ken Owen constantly shifts between furious blast beats (which render the guitars completely incomprehensible) and groovy mid-paced beats. At times, the band slows down; the introductory track “Genital Grinder” kicks off with a mid-paced riff that resembles a much heavier version of Possessed or Venom. Some songs are absolute noise, such as “Festerday”, which happens to be the shortest track. The hardcore punk influences are distinctly present; “Malignant Defecation” starts off with a bass riff reminiscent of Discharge. There are some surprisingly melodic solos sprinkled here and there, too. Those are much more intelligible due to the fact that the production tends to distort the low frequencies rather than the high ones.

The music is obviously amateurish; the members were in their late teens when they recorded this album. Jeff Walker was still learning how to do metal vocals, Bill Steer’s performance is rudimentary, and Ken Owen was still infatuated with the drumming style of the hardcore punk scene. Rather than being a disadvantage, their lack of professionalism just adds to the significance of the recording. They unknowingly created a brand new sonic landscape within extreme metal. Even though “Reek Of Putrefaction” is not an accessible record, it is wholly essential and recommended for those who enjoy the rawest elements of metal music.

If you were to force me to review Reek of Putrefaction about 10 years ago, I'd have told you it was unmitigated shit and the retards who think this is the best thing Carcass ever put out need to book an ear cleaning session with Indian doctors. Even by grindcore standards, this production is damn near close to unlistenable.

Yet somehow, now....I can tolerate it. I don't know if it's that I've just been listening to all sorts of "underground" sounds these past decades and I'm more used to it, but I can tolerate it. I mean it's still quaint compared to Symphonies of Sickness, the almighty Necroticism, or even Heartwork in terms of entertainment value, but I've been reappraising it lately and wouldn't you know it, it's not a chore to get through. There's even a few solid, well-developed death metal tracks, like Suppuration, Burnt To A Crisp, Oxidised Razor Masticator and live staple Rotten To The Gore buried under the verrucose urethras and carbonized eyesockets. Plus Genital Grinder has a very memorable riff (well what you can make of it anyway) that perfectly sets the tone for the commercial freight cargo shipper full of gore you are about to be soaked with.

As an artistic statement, I will say that Reek of Putrefaction does work well, being an uncomfortable assault on the senses; wave after wave of aural images of the human body that no human eye or ear was ever meant to experience as a protest of meat. The fact that there are two separate lead vocalists here with their own distinct sounds is also a very nice touch, one that was sadly left unexploited by death metal (not to mention by Carcass themselves, as Steer slowly phased himself out of the band as a vocalist). Unfortunately, Reek has a flaw that renders the whole thing sterile, unintelligible vocals: a problem that not even Scott Burns, Erik Rutan or Colin Richardson could cure at the best of times. There's a reason Eminem was public enemy number 1 in America once upon a time: because people could actually understand him when he was rhyming about killing his wife, and most importantly they didn't need a lyric sheet to confirm it. Unless you actually have the lyrics handy, you aren't going to be able to figure out whether Excreted Alive is some commentary on the circle of life or a weekend bender with Divine and Clifford The Big Red Dog.

Grindcore is a strange, strange subset of metal, certainly not for everyone. If you're looking to get into Carcass, I personally wouldn't make this my first buy (go for Necroticism, or even Symphonies first). If you're looking to get into grindcore, I personally wouldn't make this my first buy (World Downfall, Horrified, From Enslavement To Obliteration). But it is worth taking a shot, albeit I'd recommend chasing that shot with Reign in Blood for the sake of bringing your ears back to a normal semblance of reality.

Ah yes, Carcass. I haven't acknowledged the fact that I am a fan of these guys yet. Primarily my favorite genres are black metal, death metal and thrash metal, But I also have a thing for grind if it is done right. The Reek of Putrefaction is often cited as the very first "Goregrind" release and praised as legendary. Carcass brought the elements of the noisy, gore filled grindcore and created what is now known as goregrind. This album not only is punk/grind driven and aggressive, it also had that beautiful debut with just a pinch of cringe-worthiness added into the mix.

Let's face it, no debut is absolutely perfect because they will always have some minor flaws that some people don't like about the album. The album has a very small amount of noticeable flaws within it's sound. Reek of Putrefaction is a brilliant album, especially for being released in '88. It does have a few flaws with production, although it's mostly just due to it being an older album. I personally don't think the production is bad, but I am putting it down as one of it's flaws just because some people don't like the production. I like raw and noisy production but that's just me. Another very small flaw it has is that the songs can be a bit repetitive and that could be annoying to some people, especially people new to the band and new to grind. Despite what minuscule flaws the album may have, it is still a masterpiece.

Aside from the basics of this album such as genre, sound and place in metal history, this album was very controversially and critically acclaimed at the time of it's release in 1988. The imagery of the album cover was very grotesque and disturbing to a lot of people and the explicit violent content in the lyrical themes were also disturbing and/or shocking. This album paved the way for the goregrind bands today whether they be good, mediocre or just flat out horrible, you can't have the children without the father AKA Carcass. Unlike their later material, which is Thrashy-Melodic Death N' Roll this album and their second album are both extremely dominant in the grindcore category. The term goregrind came from this album due to the graphic nature of the album and the gore-inspired lyricism, the vocals were also dirty, gurgly, aggressive and sick which was relatively new in the grindcore scene, which was why it was very innovative and unique at the time of it's first release.

I like to describe this album as "Pleasurable Leprosy", your ears are being blasted with this lovely atrocity of gore and raw aggression that it feels like you are rotting from the inside out and feeling immense, maybe even orgasmic pleasure while it is taking place. The album has a certain atmosphere to it that makes you feel sick, but like trying a powerful and addictive drug you always want more of it. At the time, there were only 3 members in the band : Bill, Jeff and Ken. They all did vocals as well as played their other roles in the band, which is very impressive considering when this was first released. Aside from it being grimy, gross and grindy it also has a sort of punk vibe to it, tracing back to their days of d-beat hardcore as Disattack, the riffs remind me of Discharge and their debut album because of the dirty sound and aggression that is displayed.

In finalization of the review, I would like to thank anyone who has the time to read my reviews because let's face it, I tend to rant and ramble on about certain things, but I still get the review done right and it's usually readable. I would highly recommend this album, it is brilliantly produced and sickeningly beautiful. The album is very raw, unrelenting and dissonant which is how grind is supposed to sound, like a diamond vomited out of an eviscerated cows asshole, this album is a goresoaked masterpiece containing roughly 40 minutes of delicious sickness and gore filled ear lust. Thank you for reading, and be sure to stay updated with my reviews. Until next time, have a nice day and stay metal!

Carcass are a band which certainly need no introduction, a band which upped the ante in the realms of the extreme metal world and quickly made a name for themselves (thanks to John Peel) in the death metal scene. This is their debut taking a theme of gore seasoned with medical jargon taken from medical dictionaries. Song names such as "Microwaved Uterogestation", "Carbonized Eyesockets" and "Vomited Anal Tract" (and the lyrics) would make the likes of Ed Gein's stomach turn. I have personally never been a fan of these kinds of lyrics and vocals (as long as they fit, I don't care), and never will be but I mostly judge music by the instrumentation anyway, the Carcass guys certainly know what to do in this theme and they are bloody good at it.

The album opens up with a masterpiece of an instrumental "Genital Grinder" with a dark, atmospheric beginning and one heck of a bloody good riff which then dives into "Regurgitation of Giblets" a very strong opening but there's one thing dragging this down from the let go and that is the production. Never have I heard of such piss poor production in my life, it sounds like it has been submerged in mud and thus affects the whole album. At many different points in the album some instruments are more punctuated above others examples include "Maggot Colony" where the snare seems to appear in random places thus giving the appearance of bad timing, the timing issue appears on other songs too for instance the intro to "Burnt to a Crisp" I can't think what but something doesn't seem quite right to me in that. The solos are very bad in places, too it's very noticeable on the likes of "Vomited Anal Tract" which is nothing but a high pitched squeal which would make you want to book an appointment with Mr. Blonde. The solo in Pungent Excruciation also appears to drown out the other instruments. The bass is highly inaudible with the exception of the intro to "Malignant Defecation" and "Oxidized Razor Masticator" which are both some of my favourites.

The riffs are pretty good overall I feel that they had some great creativity on this album but much of it appears to be indecipherable and jumpy at times ("Fermenting Innards" is an example). I especially liked the riff in "Oxidized Razor Masticator" which I am certain was modified slightly for use on the Necroticism album (might have been Incarnated Solvent Abuse or Corporal Jigsore Quandary or just my imagination) from which I can decipher of it. The riff in "Burnt to a Crisp" is another catchy, upbeat, head bang worthy mention that comes to mind although the solo yet again, sounds muffled. I also enjoyed the riff in "Fermenting Innards", despite starting off poorly. In places they slow down adding a very nice variation and break from the fast parts. The middle part of the album was a bit of a chore to get through in places (well, in quite a lot of parts) and I do feel that the production really dampens the overall enjoyment and really does drain the overall creativity and composition in a vast majority of it which is a real shame. All I can say is, this really needs a remaster I do believe that they have remastered this so I may track that down. The bad production though is probably what gave this album the iconic status it had/has in death metal but nowadays, I notice that it really gets in the way at several critical points.

This is certainly an album which has potential but as I have got older I start to really notice the poor production more and the changes of master volume changes amongst other little things.

Favourite songs: "Genital Grinder", "Oxidized Razor Masticator", "Burnt to a Crisp", "Maggot Colony" (the latter two: despite some parts sounding iffy, they are good) and "Malignant Defecation".

Carcass's debut Reek of Putrefaction was pretty ahead of its time and an extremely important album for grind music. I'm pretty sure some of my personal favourite death/grind and goregrind bands wouldn't be playing the music they play without this album, along with their next album Symphonies of Sickness. With that being said, influential doesn't always equal amazing and although I do find myself listening to this album from time to time it's undeniably flawed.

It's evident that these guys knew how to write good songs but the actual execution was done rather poorly, it just sounds like a wall of chaos. The drumming may be good but the sound of the snare is guaranteed to get on your nerves quarter way through the album and it's mainly because basically 80% of the drumming is blast beats so it's impossible to ignore. As for the guitar, I'm sure whatever Bill was playing was good but it's nearly impossible to make it out most of the time, there's a few riffs you'll be able to make out, "Burnt to a Crisp" for example. The tone of the guitar is so muddy and I blame that on the production which gives not just the instruments a muddy sound, the entire atmosphere of the album a very damp and muddy. Oddly enough you can actually hear the bass a slight bit but only with headphones, believe it or not. Jeff's vocals at times will be very low and nearly inaudible and at others time he's perfectly audible which I'm sure is due to the production or the mixing as well. I don't want to be that guy to say "it sounds like a wall of noise!!! that's all grind is!!1!!1" because I'm a huge grind fan but a large amount(not all) of this album is indeed a wall of unfocused, chaotic noise. This is what shocks me because despite all of this, I still enjoy listening to it from time to time.

As I said, you can tell these guys knew how to write good songs but a large amount of the songs have very similar parts and don't really catch your attention. But there's still quite a few standout tracks; "Burnt to a Crisp", "Oxidised Razor Masticator", "Pungent Excruciation", "Regurgitation of Giblets" amongst others(there's 22 songs on the album) but these are the ones that first come to mind. The songs really start to blend in together and sound similar mainly due to almost(or every? don't remember) each song having a verse or two where its wicked blast beats, guitar tremolo picking a power chord with Jeff growling over top, creating an aforementioned wall of chaos but I think if the production and mixing was done better, these parts would actually be pretty awesome. They are nice at first but then I begin to think half way through the album, sometimes not even half "Really? again? didn't I just listen to this?". This album definitely has its enjoyable, gory death/grind moments but its also got it's not so enjoyable boring moments. If there wasn't a chunk of good, enjoyable tracks on this the album would be straight up awful but fortunately, there's good tracks.

That's about all that needs to be said. As previously stated, despite all of the flaws it's oddly a good listen but I wouldn't recommend listening to this too often. It's their debut album so things like this are expected, their next album Symphonies of Sickness continued this style for the most part but much more focused, better production/mixing, etc. plus their song writing improved vastly, I actually consider it the best Carcass album. If you've never listened to Carcass, well first of all what's wrong with you? But seriously, depending on your taste either this (raw death-ish goregrind) or Swansong (death n' roll) are the last albums to listen to.

Count me among those few people who actually think that Carcass's debut album "Reek of Putrefaction" is better than most of their later full-length recordings. In spite of the muddy production which makes some of the vocals sound like mud-monster mutterings, the music has a flowing energy and electrical vitality about it. "Reek ..." starts in grand style with a brief angel-choir tone ambience and a very metallic guitar flourish that repeats a few times before pressing down the accelerator and pounding the drums into a rollercoaster ride down to the scrabbly and chaotic "Regurgitation of Giblets". Even that doesn't last very long before we're into the next track, an equally messy traffic jam of a song in which guitar and drums fight for the title of Most Juddery Twitchy Instrument and vocalists Jeff Walker and Bill Steer trade slurpy-slurp slimeball utterances.

The album more or less continues in this way and all the songs - there are 20 of them, trying counting 'em! - can be seen as variations of one whirlwind monster metal grind in which the main constants are frequent epileptic blasts of furious scrabbling guitars that sometimes spit lightning sparks of lead string soloing, convulsive episodes of skin-bashing, bass guitar barely able to keep up with the pace and those duelling / duetting vocals that spit out gravel-flecked vomit balls. Lyrics are as lurid and laughably sick as can be, limited only by the band members' imaginations and the range of comics and medical texts and dictionaries they'd seen at the time. For all that, the instrumentals are energetic and several tracks boast very catchy and dance-worthy groove rhythms - you can hardly stop yourself from bouncing up and down in time to the beat.

I really like the squealy high-pitched lead guitar flashes that are of "blink and you'll miss 'em" duration, the way they suddenly stutter and multiply like bacteria in a frenzy, and the sloppy, all-over-the-house drumming which give the recording a manic and deranged air which suits the over-the-top lyrics. On this album, Steer and Walker share equal vocal duties: Walker's voice has a vicious relish suggesting the bass player might just be harbouring psycho-killer tendencies - he certainly delights in wallowing in all the gore his lyrics muster - while Steer has a deeper swamp-monster vocal in which it's hard to detect what he's thinking or feeling.

Amazingly after the halfway point there's no let-up or relaxation in the pace and general delivery: if anything, the vocals get more vicious and deranged and in some tracks the lead guitar is even more stuttery and some real melodies, very electric and jerky if tinny in sound, sputter out through Steer's fingers. Some recognisable songs appear with repeating riffs and definite groove rhythms near the end, though the drumming is limited in range and is a bit floppy in sound. The final track starts with a gritty and skin-abrading rhythm and continues for some time with rather bland percussion before perishing in a bonfire of fiery lead guitar licks and splutters.

For all the muddy blur which can blunt some of the band's raw style, the trio is very tight and play almost intuitively, as if the guys can read one another's thoughts - their sudden lurches into rapid-fire machine-gun blastbeats and back into a more relaxed mode, repeatedly in the one song, can leave you slack-jawed (if you aren't already at the sheer heavy brutality of the music and the blood-spattered lyrics). There are so many riffs and blastbeats in most tracks that they tend to pass in a blur and they take some effort (and several repeat hearings) to register in the brain cells but what comes across overall is the sheer energy in the musicians' playing. The music appears very improvised and perhaps most of it was done on the spot during the album's recording.

The energy and vitality may not be channelled very well and a lot gets wasted in Steer's solo outings. I almost swear, there is something inhuman in the music, filled with an electric life-force, just ... dying (erm) to get out there!

Carcass has a pretty genre defining career. They were one of the first grindcore bands, THE first goregrind band, and one of the founders of melodic death metal. Well of their genre defining releases, this one falls under the grindcore. It shows much less of the goregrind characteristics that are created on “Symphonies of Sickness” and goes for a much more straight forward grindcore sound.

The songs differ from their second album in many ways. There isn’t as much variation, like I said; this is pretty much straight grindcore. “Genital Grinder” is the opener and it is an instrumental. This song does a fantastic job in letting you know what you’re in for, pure grind. “Regurgitation of Giblets” is an amazing song that is blast beats throughout the whole song. The songs differ from other grindcore bands like Napalm Death because while they still use a lot of blast beats, they also use slower parts to change it up every now and then. It’s kind of a foreshadowing of what’s to come on “Symphonies”. Napalm Death was pretty much fast all the time with some exceptions but Carcass never seemed to go full speed all the time.

The vocals on this album are a much rawer form of the trio of Jeff Walker, Bill Steer, and Ken Owen. Ken’s pitch-shifted parts are much more out of control and sound odd, probably because of the terrible production. Bill sounds pretty much the same as he usually does. He also seems to sing more on this release, it kind of seems like he is the lead vocalist on this album where Jeff seems to take over lead on later albums. Jeff Walker’s highs are not nearly as perfected as they are on “Symphonies”. He still has his vomit-ish noises he does so well but they are much more random on this album. It kind of seems like Jeff hadn’t 100% figured out his vocal style, listen to “Burnt to A Crisp”.

The production is just awful. The production is extremely raw and not really for the better. The guitars are there but pretty quiet. The bass, when you can hear it, sounds pretty lame but honestly, it probably sounds the best out of all the instruments. The drums are quiet and just sound terrible. The snare is flat, the cymbals are quiet and sound like crap, and the bass drum seems to do random things that don’t go with what is being played sometimes. The vocals sound pretty good though. They are above the music like they should be. My only complaint is the pitch-shifter they used sounds like horrible. And they seem to use it a lot more on this album.

The riffs on this album, when you can tell what they are doing are actually good. Bill Steer is a master of the art of grindcore. Everything he does in Carcass and what he did in Napalm is pretty much pure gold, except his solos. Bill has even admitted he didn’t really know how to play solos at the time this was made, so what he does is make random squealing noises. I guess they fit with the terrible production but still, they are pretty bad. Other than that and considering the circumstances that this album was under when they made it, Bill does an amazing job.

The rhythm consists of Ken Owen on drums and Jeff Walker on bass. The bass pretty much follow the guitars. It has a few standouts, (Malignant Defecation), but doesn’t do anything to wow. The drums are very sloppy. Compared to his drumming on later albums, this drumming is shit. His blast beats seem like he doesn’t have the stamina to keep up sometimes. His fills are average at best. And there is no double bass like on “Symphonies”; but know how badly everything went while they were recording, I try not to be too hard on them. Ken really shows how good he is, just not on this album.

The lyrics are straight gore. To me, it seems like they did all the killing on this album, left the bodies to rot, then dissected and ate them on the second album. The medical pathology is still there, a lot of words I don’t understand and would need a medical dictionary to learn them. They were still intelligent but not to the levels they were on the later albums.

This album is pure grindcore. If you like “Heartwork” and later, you will probably hate this album. If you like “Necroticism”, you will still probably hate this album. If you like “Symphonies of Sickness” you might like this album. Or if you just wanna know what Carcass sounded like as a pure grindcore act, check this out.
I would give it a better rating but the production…yea, I’ve explained it pretty well.

Best tracks – “Regurgitation of Giblets”, “Vomited Anal Tract”, and “Splattered Cavities”

Carcass’ debut album is definitely wicked and rotten, but not in a good way: while the band did have riffs and creativity to invent a whole new genre, the album ends up failing completely. Sorry, but there are no excuses for sounding like shit, and trying to come up with euphemisms would only make the headache caused by listening to this recording worse. This album is not "muddy", it is not "raw" and it is definitely not "atmospheric". It is a structural mess, with good riffs being constantly hidden by clearly unintentional noise walls, and sloopy, unprofessional drumming never failing to ruin what the band's creativity (there is plenty of it) struggles to do. The story behind the birth of this abomination is known by basically every death metal listener: Earache gave Carcass little time to record it, and according to Steer the studio engineer ruined the finishing product. They were barely able to mix anything, and ended up being less than happy with the product they had released. Nobody liked the album, it barely sold one thousand copies, Earache did not release anything else with the band and Carcass split up.

Okay, Carcass did not split up. Actually, the shitty recording sold some copies, enough for the band to… Change grindcore completely. For real, no one would have expected the inaudible guitars (E-string tuned on... B) and the shitty drums to be an actual “revolution”, but a miracle happened. Behind the wall of noise made of echoes and low-as-fuck bass, some people saw creativity. As I mentioned in the last paragraph, it was indeed there: if you ignore the drums, you will see that the vocalist does his job nicely enough and that there are surprisingly varied riffs and chaotic solos. In addition, Carcass tried to make stuff that was never made before: in more than a few songs, the bass becomes the lead, and since it reaches frequencies as low as 30 Hz, these parts end up adding a sick and crazy atmosphere to the music, which was probably intentional.

Unfortunately, the completely messed up production and the poor drumming become increasingly hard to ignore as you progress through the album. It is okay to say that some songs do make weird pictures of slaughtered innocents appear in your mind, but the more you listen to the recording, the more bored you get. Carcass tried to get a point across with this recording, and they would have failed their objective completely if it were not for the metalheads that saw talent where almost no one would see. Thankfully, not everyone is as narrow-minded as I am, because if they were, Jeff Walker would be washing restaurant’s dishes for a living nowadays. I would give this album a rating of 20%, but due to its historical importance, I will increase the rating a little.

Whenever I listen to this album, I am saddened. Saddened because of what this album could have been and what it is. Carcass, pioneers of grindcore, goregrind, death metal, melodic death metal, whatever the fuck genre they feel like playing at any given time, made their debut with this album. They're playing grindcore here, and of course, doing a damn fine job of it.

First things first, the production on this album is absolutely terrible. It's not authentic or raw or gritty or any of those adjectives that people use to praise the less than pristine production on older extreme metal albums. It just really, truly sucks. It sucks enough to actually ruin your enjoyment of the album. So, unless you're sure that you are a complete Carcass fanboy, or a grind addict who can pick riffs out of the most chaotic and repulsive noise, you would do well to stay away from this. Grindcore sounds like noise to a lot of people's ears as it is, even some fans of extreme metal, and this is a grindcore album with the worst production in the world. Ever.

Bill Steer, who handles guitar duties here, also played guitar on Napalm Death's genre-defining album, From Enslavement to Obliteration (FETO). And yet he manages to sound very different from what he sounded like on FETO. His tone is a lot less harsh, his riffs much, much more varied and he even adds some solos. I can't comment on the quality of the solos because they don't actually sound like solos on the album, but high pitched noise.

Jeff Walker's bass is pretty much the ether the album is swimming in. He is mostly following the guitar, but due to the ridiculously bass heavy production, it sort of fuses with the riffs and contributes greatly to the muddiness of the album.

Ken Owen is manning the drum kit. You hear the snare and bass drums boom out clearly from time to time, but pretty much any other distinct beats are difficult to make out. The drums maintain a quick tempo in the blasting sections and there really isn't much wrong with them.

All three members contribute to vocal duties. Each er... vocalizing, because they're obviously not singing, in a different vocal range. Walker's trademark, recognizable high rasp is what drives much of the vocals. Steer contributes a lot, both in terms of quantity and quality. He growls at lower than sub bass frequencies. If you turn the volume up enough I'm sure they would cause an earthquake. He would gradually reduce his vocal contributions on subsequent albums, but he growls quite often here. Owen does distorted vocals that are slightly higher sounding than Steer's but distorted enough to sound even more inhuman.

The riffs are awesome. No question about it. There are tonnes of them and they are all catchy. You may have to strain your ears a little, but they are audible and fairly distinct and will get stuck in your head. This is why the production is such a travesty. This album is good enough to be legendary, but it is robbed of that glory because it sounds like shit. The songs also have more coherent structures than the almightly blastfest that is FETO. The lyrics and song titles are what you expect from early Carcass, complicated biological and medical terms put together for the purpose of delivering maximum disgust. The songs are very much riff-driven and there is much less blasting than what you'd expect from a grind album.

The songs are all good, and as is usual for grindcore albums, they're best enjoyed when the album is listened to from start to finish. They also rarely exceed two or three minutes in length. It is a fantastic abum. It coud have been right up there with Symphonies of Sickness, perhaps even better. I love it and listen to it often. I really, really want to give it a score in the 90s. But I can't. The production is really that bad. A re-recording would make it more accessible to a lot more people, but there is practically no chance of that happening. Enjoy it for what it is. And lament over what could have been.

With the ripples of their influence able to felt from all corners of the extreme metal scene, Liverpool, England based metal band Carcass are truly a force to be reckoned with. Formed in 1985, as a Grindcore/Goregrind band, the group from its earnest beginnings worked its way up from hometown heros to world renowned metal heros, all through the use of hard work, intelligence and ingenuity. However, before their ascension to the throne of metal, Carcass played some of the rudest, crudest music known to man, which is displayed flawlessly on their 1988 debut Reek of Putrefaction, a savage and unforgiving slab of brutal Grindcore.

Everything aspect of Reek of Putrefaction is harsh and uncompromising, from the tortured vocals of Jeff Walker(the raspier growl), Bill Steer(guttural growls) and Ken Owens(distorted growls) to the intense blast beat drumming to the cruel guitar savagery that assails the listeners ear drums. Vocally the trio's approach to screaming is utterly sickening (in a good way). While Walker's incredible larynx torturing rasp dominates most of the record, Steer and Owens own brutal delivery often make their way into the mix, making for amazing dynamics between higher pitched, mid ranged and absolutely guttural vocals. A great example of this would be fifth track Carbonized Eye Sockets ( a great name for a song if there ever was one) The drumming on this record (courtesy of Ken Owens) would now be considered fairly straightforward and simple, but in the of 1988 his lightning fast blastbeat technique would inspire thousands of blooming drummers to reach and surpass his sonic record. There are breaks from his fast paced playing however, with these beats often rooted in more groove laden pastures. The beginning of Pyosisified (Rotten To The Gore) shows the more midpaced and slower playing while also demonstrating the impossibly fast speeds at which Mr. Owens was capable of.

The guitar playing (presented by Bill Steer) ranges from fast, tremolo picked guitar, to slower chugging palm muted riffs to slow crawl guitars. On tracks like Fermenting Innards the listener gets to see the contrast between his style of playing dabbling a bit in each setting of speed. Another great dynamic of Steer's playing on this record is it's technicality. Unlike a vast majority of Grindcore bands, who just stick to playing power chords at warp speeds, Steer includes many different cadences, chord changes and solos into his playing. His solos range from Slayer inspired whammy bar fests (Festerday) to alternative picked/legato solos such as in Excreted Alive. The bass on this album is sometimes present as in instrumental Genital Grinder but is mostly unheard more often than not sadly. The lack of bass is no doubt partially attributed to the fact that the production on Reek of Putrefaction is absolutely atrocious. All instruments and vocals (except for the drums which are actually very clear) are horribly muffled as if someone put a pillow over the speakers of the amplifiers. In most cases this type of production would ruin an album, but in Carcass's case the abysmal production works perfectly. For whatever reasons, the muffled instruments and sounds manage to "complete" the sound of Carcass, making whats already intense and raw, even more so. Lyrically, Reek of Putrefaction provides content that would make even hardened veterans Cannibal Corpse gagging. Taking terms and definitions directly from a medical textbook Walker twists and turns the subjects into things of horror, and gore, that would make any voluntary fan who looked at the lyrics sick to the stomach.

While Reek of Putrefaction see's Carcass already at a mature level lyrically and musically, this debut is only the first step in the evolution of this ever changing band. With the help of Reek of Putrefaction and it's abnormally strong content, Carcass as able to evolve their sound even further, with each successive release taking giants strides forward in style and ability. The roots must not be forgotten though, as Reek... most definitely proves to be a debut worth repeated listen.

Originally posted on Sputnikmusic.com

This album is the epitome of grindcore. Dark, heavily down tuned guitar riffs played over constant hyperblasting and sloppy guttural vocals with gory lyrics and medical terms abound.

Sure, the album sounds distant and awkwardly produced, but it sounds magnificent in the same way. The guitars are nothing but low-end and distortion, and the drums are nothing more than skull-crushing and sloppily played. The vocals are distant, quiet, but repulsive and devastating despite the drums being everywhere all the time.

First off, I'd like to address the song lengths. While some songs benefit from the short song lengths (i.e. Festerday and Maggot Colony), certain songs would've been so much more satisfying if they were a tad longer, maybe with extra riffs (Psychopathologist and Pyosisified).

The guitar riffs are your framework for what deathgrind would be known for later on. Extremely brutal, fast, and unintelligible (I mean, they tune to B for Christ's sakes, it certainly doesn't help the murky quality of the album), but always satisfying. The tone is, as previously said, low-end heavy and covered up by bass distortion and drums, but again...strangely satisfying in that ugly way. The riffs in Pyosisified are some of the best on the album, alternating between a frenzy of scathing guitar riffs played at a billion miles per hour and a slower, churning, hateful breakdown that epitomizes deathgrind and goregrind. The solos are nothing but high-end, and contrast the riffs so well, that you dread solo time, but can't wait either.


The drums are sloppy, but still satisfying and bone-crushing, but Ken doesn't exactly have a varied list of techniques for this album. He frequently blasts, rarely stopping to do a fill or simple beat, almost always that hectic blastbeating. His skills would greatly increase by the time of Necroticism and Heartwork, notably for the better. Also, the drums are a tad overpowering, which is kind of a letdown.

The vocals are ridiculous on this album, and definitely awesome. Switching between the super gutturals (Steer), the mid-range growl (Walker), the pitch-shifted gurgle (also Steer), and the slightly higher screams (Owen) we have a barrage of vocal stylings, and all fitting to the music. Owen's harsh yells on Excreted Alive catch you by surprise but are vicious, and Walker's mid range screams are always welcome on this album, which is dominated by Steer's monstrous presence. The vocals are a bit quiet and muffled but this issue is fixed on the next album (Symphonies of Sickness).

Speaking of muffled, the production is thick, grimy, and mucky as hell. The whole thing sounds as if it was recorded in five-foot thick hummus, and is ten times heavier than what the following release would be. The production is weird, shifting from the drums being overpowering to the guitars being a slight overpowering about halfway through the album, and thus the second half sounds much more interesting and heavier than the first half.

The songwriting is pretty linear, verse-chorus-verse-verse-solo, but the riffs contained in this super straight-forward adventure are the real highlight, as was previously mentioned. One of the best examples of Bill and Jeff showing a spark for extremely catchy riffing and vocal lines is the 16th track, the album's finest as well, Psychopathologist. The song has that linear pattern, but the way it moves through the pattern with ease and astounding brutality is unmatched in today's scene.

So, it all comes down to preference on this album, as with just about anything else. If you like slimy, wet grindcore with death metal riffing and vocals thrown in, pick this up without even thinking; well, actually, do think, because if you forget to listen to this album, you are fucking stupid. This whole thing rips you in two all the way through, but in good way I guess.

Pros:

- Psychopathologist
- Hefty guitar tone that cuts through the chaotic drum frenzy
- Four vocal attacks, all well performed
- Heavy and unsettling production
- Solos are messy and chaotic
- Audible distorted bass

Cons:

- Master volumes change about halfway through the album
- Little to no drum variation
- Some songs would do better with longer lengths/more riffs

Buy this album, it's recently been reprinted, don't download this. This album deserves that $13, and is one hell of an album.

car·cass (kärks), noun

1. The dead body of an animal, especially one slaughtered for food.
2. The body of a human.
3. Remains from which the substance or character is gone: the carcass of a once glorious empire.
4. A framework or basic structure: the carcass of a burned-out building.

Carcass. A name that is seldom missed when it comes to old school Swedish/British grind and the beginnings in the melo-death scene in Sweden. Carcass started as Disattack playing hardcore punk at an early stage and as we all know, to those whom hardcore punk became too slack, founded the grindcore genre. Acts such as Napalm Death and Repulsion come to mind, but also Carcass, with their most disgusting debut of an album back in 88' "Reek of Putrefaction". And that debut surely lives up to its name in any and every way.

The basic formula for each song is a typical discharging aggression, as short and energetic as possible, with incredibly down tuned guitars. You can barely even hear them. Of course, the poor audibility of the guitars is a mixture between sloppyness, poor equipment and extremely low pitched guitars. You have some basic synthesized effects for a short solo here and there, but the fleshy structure remains the same. Punk style riffing, juiced up with some rock'n'roll with a nausea inducing vocal delivery as the cherry on top for all the sick people who actually enjoy this vile cacophony some people dare to call music. I know I do! The ultimate result of the terrible production is not only an overwhelming landslide of sonic mass, but also some really annoying audio feedback that is created. As this does not really disturb the overall enjoyment, but still is a lousy byproduct of something incredibly indecent, which is good... I think.

Now the really good part about grindcore aren't the yucky punk-influenced music, but the really good vocals. They have a great indifferent undertone to them, which is amazing. That Jeff Walker sounds like he doesn't give a damn about anything. Also seeing this guy live, spitting unintentionally while singing was very entertaining. If you like a really sloppy band, with great vocalists and gory, medical-themed lyrics, then this is the band for you! Avoid the band after 93' if you don't like the more melodic stuff, but this is material for another review, another time.

Conclusion: Highly recommended for every grindcore and old-school fan.

Many of those who have gotten into Carcass's works probably (at least in my case, anyway) were first exposed to their later works such as Swansong. Imagine my surprise when I first came upon this album and what it beheld for me.

Being relatively new to the goregrind genre, it wasn't that groundbreaking to me, and the screwed-up production didn't help much. But after a few listens, the ugliness, rawness, and over distastefulness of the album drew me in.

The opener, "Genital Grinder", is a short, fairly simple metal instrumental that draws me in every time I hear it... then from there on it becomes a never-ending onslaught of sick chaos, coupled with poor production which makes it sound as though the band is in a bass-heavy prison cell with woofers all over the cell. This barrage of drums and bass makes the guitar riffs difficult to comprehend, but what one can make out are prototypical gore riffs at their best.

But the reason this album was so influential is oh-so-obvious upon listening... it's fast, chaotic, shocking, brutal and sick all at the same. It's 33 minutes that will, if you are a fan of goregrind, will leave you satisfied.

I’m sincere, I’ve never loved Carcass too much during their first period. I must say, anyway that this band was fucking ahead for the period, featuring music that was hard to understand and accept in the 80s panorama. Napalm Death invented the grindcore, but this band invented a new genre, even more brutal and gore: the gore grind. The lyrics were different from Terrorizer, Napalm Death and closer to the fathers of this genre: Repulsion.

The grindcore attitude and speed are brought in an another direction with plenty of growls and the lyrics are something unbelievable for vileness. They’re about pathology, surgery and body diseases in a mess of mutilations, wounds and infections. These guys were just sick. The music itself is not too various and is more focused on the blast beats with down tuned guitars and hyper growlish vocals.

Needless to say how groups like Repulsion and Carcass were innovators for a new music conception, nowadays brought by lots of bands in the whole world, especially in Poland and that part of Europe.
Let’s start from “Genital Grinder”: one of the highlights here that features morbid atmosphere and the unmistakable cold, chirurgic way of playing. There’s no mercy and the drums are heavy like a machete crushing the bones.

From now on, the band is always fast as a train with inhuman blast beats and hyper sick vocals. They are almost like animalistic groans. The few mid paced parts are something unbelievable for putridity and stench. There’s nothing left to say, also because it’s useless to describe the songs here: they are all a brutal mixture of grind madness and gore atmosphere.

All in all, this is not an easy album to listen to and it’s recommended to any lover of these sonorities out there. This is anyway a big influence for the modern gore grind groups that “infest” our panorama.

Along with Fear of God, Repulsion, Impetigo and Napalm Death, Carcass were one of the first bands to play the grindcore genre. Unlike many of these bands, though, Carcass took it to a whole new level. Their music was heavy, down-tuned and were probably the FIRST grindcore band to use a pitchshifter. The lyrics much more grotesque, vile and violent. These songs weren't about zombies, nor were they about politics. These lyrics were all about the human body and the grossest things that can, and have, happened to them. With songs like "Carbonzied Eyesockets", "Vomited Anal Tract" and "Microwaved Uterogestation", even the biggest gore fan will feel like vomitting his own gizzards to the floor.


The music itself is fucking brutal. Not only will it knock you on your ass with the pure adrenalin and speed of the music, it'll keep you in shock with the horrifying vocals. As I said before, Carcass were one of the first to use a pitch shifter, and it makes the music a whole lot better.


This record layed the foundation for every and all goregrind/pornogrind record ever made since it was released. It is among the most influential death/grind records of all time, up there with Autopsy's "Severed Survival", Napalm Death's "Scum" and Fear of God's "Pneumatic Slaughter". Buy this as soon as possible and let bile fill your throat with glee!

I only use 'stinking' in the most loving, fond, caring way. Never has an album title been so apt a description of the contents that lay therein. These songs sound like they were written during a stoned drinking binge, submerged in a drainage ditch, shotgunned to pieces, stuffed in a mortuary drawer and forgotten for a couple of weeks, finally buried, then exhumed (to consume teehee) three months later. Thats all a good thing in case you were wondering.

It's weird to hear musicians, in this case, Bill Steer revert musically. At first listen, his work on the 'Mentally Murdered' EP sounds epic compared to this. After repeatede listens it becomes aparent there is a surprising degree of sophistication in his playing. The presumed primitiveness of this record is more due to the production on this record rather than riffs. A close listening with headphones caused this to become apparent to me.

Something I noticed (or it could be imagined) about this album is that the production seems to improve as the album progresses. I imagine the band in some tiny styrofoam and egg-carton lined room recording the album live, with Paul Talbot adjusting the levels and fiddling with the knobs all the time the band is playing, finally stopping at arouns track 12 when the songs stop sounding like a talking asshole. Not that the intro song, Genital Grinder is without a charm and sludgy sensibility all its own.

One thing that finally convinced me of this albums genius and solidified it's jellied guts as a classic to me is the solos. They have names. Names that have something to do with the song it's in. For example, the solo in 'Excreted Alive' is called 'Pulsating Sphincter'. And I'll be damned if it doesn't sound like my own sphincter pulsating as it unleashes it's wrath on the world. To me that little gimmick, and it's not even a gimmick, but a novelty, just screams brilliance and is just another touch that makes this album a complete audio-visual extravaganza.

Everyone knows that this album is the blueprint for every good and every shitty goregrind band that followed blah blah, so all I can say is buy (NOT download) this album (with original gore artwork) or forever be a posing little BITCH.

I am being highly charitable in thie review instead of giving this the review it deserves ( a big fat goose egg), because after all, this is a pioneering release. There, I said it. Now for the honest truth part; this sucks out loud.

The production is shite to say the least, a distorted blur of downtuned noise and muted drums--this was one of Colin Richardson's first productions, if memory serves and it shows. Some would consider this cool, but even an underground release needs a little more fidelity than this.

Once past the sound quality or lack thereof, the lack of playing ability comes into the picture, most damningly on Ken Owen's part, as it sounds as though he had just started playing drums a few months previously, and enthusiasm only counts for so much. Bill Steer's riffs all mush into a wall of mud with wet shit-tone bass flowing underneath them, and the vocals are blatantly effected out. The few solos are no more than chaotic whammy bar squalls and noises, Kerry King/Rick Rozz worship at its more blatant. Incomprehensible medical terminology for lyrics and hey presto, (AOL VOICE) you've got grind!

I can't say I really can single out any good tracks on this album, because they all are pretty much interchangeable. This is for completists and gore grind fanatics only, honestly. And I am not really either one of those two most of the time. The following album, "Symphonies of Sickness" was far, far better than this mess, and I can at least listen to that one and enjoy it.

Carcass' first full length feature comes in the form of "Reek of Putrefaction", and it shows Carcass utterly at their roots - a bona fide grind band. Delightful song titles greet us with each track (Genital Grinder and Vomited Anal Tract being my person favourites). Most of the songs begin in a calm fashion, with the instruments being easily identified. The issue arises however, when the drums begin blasting on top of the guitar, bass and dual vocal tracks, then it usually becomes a total wall of noise. However, the band remains tight, even in the midst of some of the shittiest production this side of Mayhem.

Genital Grinder opens up this slice of subatomic sludge in grind fashion, with a heavy as fuck riff plodding along with sewage drums of doom...(whatever that means). Then it's basically 30 minutes of gutteral vocals, lightning fast riffs and surprisingly melodic solo breaks. The lyrics are great, much better than their later stuff and evoke an image of a few young men flipping the pages of a medical dictionary in search of the most grotesque words possible.

Notable tracks include Carbonized Eyesockets, which has a more "together" feel than many of the other tracks, "Burnt to a Crisp", featuring very strange opening vocals and "Fermenting Innards", for having some excellent riffage going on. "Execreted Alive" has some additional nice riffage packed into it's short length along with some Demilich style vocals.

If you like Swansong/Heartwork and haven't heard any other Carcass, don't get this yet. Start with Necroticism, as this is probably the most different of their work, even more extreme than the slightly more deathy "Symphonies of Sickness".

This review will be short. I called this album a classic because it is. However, you might seem sceptical with it getting only a mere 75.

That's because this motherfucker IS IN DIRE FUCKING GODDAMN NEED of being remastered. Music's all groovy (as compared to most grind), and has alot more catchy leads and fills, but it all sounds so horrible, it's like no budget was even used.

Now, maybe it won't be so short. The vocals are kind of brutal, and if you're a fan of new Carcas (ie only Swansong) you're gonna hate this. This is not the melodeath they sold out to. Not the melodic death that Heartwork was, nor the death of Necroticism. This is grind. Shorter songs, more brutal, but kind of.. funky.

Riffs sound clunky. Refuckingmaster. But once again, looking past that, it's awesome shit. The drumming is too, generally forming nicely tied in blastbeats, or popping in nice fills.

Ok, this review's pretty much over. Get it, because it's really great music. However, if they should remaster it at any time, it would definatly be in anyone's best interest to pick that up too, even if you own the old version.

PS: All Carcass artwork sucks.

This is where goregrind started. This album is still one of the most brutal and extreme releases ever to hit the ground. The great meaning of it meaning of it is evident – many bands tried to copy the sound and the manner the album is written in. Carcass were the first to introduce medical terms in songs, and to write anatomical, medical lyrics.
The songs on the album differ from each other; almost each of them has some catchy riffs or some memorable moments, many tempo and rhythm changes, changes in vocals. Music changes from ultra fast to simply fast paced and to mid paced, no slow numbers on this album. All this makes album non-monotonous and less boring then Symphonies of Sickness. Many tempo changes as there are, the fast and ultra fast tempos are the dominant.
Guitars are down tuned and heavily distorted (it is not Black Metal’s wall of noise, but still), riffs
below vocals tend to be alike in the most of songs. However, when no vocals, a wide variety of riffs can be observed.
Solos tend to appear randomly and to be rather chaotic. They are usually fast and lack any kind of melody so they sound rather “noisy”.
Bass is also down tuned and distorted like in Black Metal. Bass work on the album is very good – it is not drowned behind the guitars and drums, but can be clearly heard. In definite places bass takes the lead. Intros for two songs are also bass (Genital Grinder and Malignant Defecation).
Vocals, range from guttural growling to “crepation” and screaming. From time to time effects as pitch shifting and distortion are used. There are two vocalists in carcass so they sort of “duel” with each other (like Priest’s guitar duels, but in singing): one vocalist takes up growling and another takes “crepation”, screams and other vocal techniques of higher range.
Drums. Lightning-fast blastbeats, blastbeats and again blastbeats.The usage of bass drum is very good in here.
Lyrics on this album are full of anatomy, gore, rotting and of course maggots. In general they sound quite insane, because of the detailed way they are written in. And as I already mentioned they are filled with medical terms.
And now some words about production: it’s raw, dirty with dominating low frequencies but still all instruments are heard pretty well.
The Album’s Highlights include : Genital Grinder, Pyosisified (Rotten to the Gore), Feast on Dismembered Carnage, Splattered Cavities, Burnt to a Crisp, Oxidized Razor Masticator, Malignant Defecation.
Recommended as a prefect start into goregrind and grindcore in general.