Despised Icon, Carnifex, Suffocation, and Gates to Hell

Taking their name from the Old English Latin word for ‘executioner’, Carnifex wear their death metal influences pretty firmly on their collective sleeve. Their current lineup currently comprises just two original members - frontman Scott Lewis and drummer Shawn Cameron - as well as rhythm guitarist Cory Arford, bassist Fred Calderon and lead guitar player Jordan Lockrey. They formed in Fallbrook, California, and went onto release their debut album, ‘Dead in My Arms’, in July 2007.

That album sold over five thousand copies, despite enjoying no real widespread publicity, and that achievement in itself was enough to gain them a three-record deal with Victory Records, who would go on to put out ‘The Diseased and the Poisoned’ in 2008, ‘Hell Chose Me’ in 2010, and ‘Until I Feel Nothing’ a year later, in October of 2011. Musically, they’ve adhered pretty close to the deathcore crossover sound that characterized their early work, which in turn lends a genuine intensity to their live shows; they were part of the Never Say Die! tour in Europe in 2013. In 2014, they released their fifth studio album, and their first on the legendary Nuclear Blast - ‘Die Without Hope’. Signing to a label so important within their own genre is clear evidence of Carnifex’s current upwards trajectory.

I guess we can let the state of New York off the hook for not giving us as much great death metal as places like Florida, Gothenburg and Stockholm. In between Patti Smith, Talking Heads, The Velvet Underground, Jay Z, Biggie Smalls and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, I think they’ve earned the right to be lacking in one or two genres. Even then, they’ve still given the world two of the most respected and well known death metal bands in the world in the form of Cannibal Corpse, and the band that pioneered the technical death metal style, Suffocation. In fact, if it wasn’t for Frank Mullen’s vocal style on their album “Effigy Of The Forgotten”, then we probably wouldn’t have death growl vocals as we know them today. Needless to say, Suffocation are a very important band.

The first incarnation of Suffocation was put together by Mullen in 1988, however only he and bassist Josh Barohn lasted into the bands classic line-up after they first formed. The classic line up came when Mortuary, a local band who had been playing a few gigs with the fledgling Suffocation , split up. Their guitarists, Terrance Hobbs and Doug Cerrito, along with drummer Mike Smith got in touch with Mullen and the classic line up was formed. By 1991 they had signed to Relapse Records and had released their first E.P, called “Human Waste”, already their brand of extremely technical metal blackened by grindcore influences was unlike anything many fans of extreme music had heard before, but none of them could be prepared for what could come next.

Their debut, “Effigy Of The Fallen” was released the same year and hit the metal scene, that was already in the rudest health it had ever been in, like a meteor. To this day it’s cited as holy text by most death metal bands, and deathcore groups owe most of their existence to it. The band released two further albums, “Breeding The Spawn” and “Pierced From Within” and toured relentlessly around it before internal friction and tour exhaustion made them split up in 1998, after releasing one last E.P in the form of “Despise The Sun”. However, they weren’t going to stay down for long and triumphantly reunited in 2003.

After a comeback album released the year after, the band went on to play to audiences bigger than they ever could have been originally. It was a textbook case of a band being more influential in death than they were in life, and their comeback tour took in playing to over 33’000 fans at Germany’s Wacken Festival that same year. Since then the band left their original home at Relapse to join up with Nuclear Blast, they’re still touring like there’s no tomorrow and creating new music despite some line-up troubles. They’re an inspiration to any heavy metal fan around, and come highly recommended.