Year: 2019
Total Time: 46:06
Label: ViciSolum Productions

The Swedish Death/ Metallers CARNAL FORGE return after many years. Specifically, the Kuusisto brothers, along with the other members of the band, had released their last album “Testify For My Victims” back in 2007. They have since disappeared, and their fans have been waiting for many years to see if this new album is worth the wait.

   CARNAL FORGE’s sound is the embodiment of Thrash and Death metal music, heavily influenced by the Melodic Death metal sound on the one hand, while bolstering it with a mix of aggressive Thrash metal. Their sound contains a mix of melody, aggression and energy. They often grab you by the throat, cutting it right into the aggressive Thrash element. The vocals are the classic vocals one would expect, similar to the vocals of Tomas Linberg of AT THE GATES quite a bit (the same applies to their music), but unfortunately without the necessary feeling we are used to and would expect on this idiom. The production is great, like many productions nowadays; the songs are decent, with some nice melodic solos, the necessary aggressive feeling, and with a groovy feeling at times. When the tempo lowers down at times , the music is allright also (though we’d love them to lower the tempo a bit more, as we’ve had enough of the super aggressive, fast Thrash / Death metal songs). After all, a good band stands out when it comes to lowering their speeds, as this is where their quality is being shown. Not that we are bothered by the fast, aggressive songs, on the contrary. It’s just that during the 46 minutes duration of the particular album, one might get the feeling that it lasts much more than it should, since in this particular genre, it is not that common to have longer than 40 minutes albums. 

   A both strong but at the same time weak element of the record is the lack of a “better” or “worse” track. On the one hand, there is not a single filler song, on the other there is not even one which is clearly better. There is also not enough evolution in the band’s sound, but mostly there is not the required atmosphere we would expect to hear.

   For the band’s – genre’s lovers, listen to this album. It’s fine, though it could last a bit less. For non-band – genre enthusiasts, if you listen to it, you might be wondering “when will it end”?

Rating: 4.5/10
George Kourou.
Related Link: CARNAL FORGE – Official Page