残害 / Mayhem

I find it extremely likely that 腐尸 Cankered Corpse chose the English part of their name deliberately so that it was as close to that of Cannibal Corpse as possible, as well as pretty close in meaning and in the alphabet. Other than that, I don’t think they would have been noticed, since being from China and releasing music very slowly isn’t the best way to get yourselves known. I was introduced to them by a local friend who likes rap, punk, and metal whose English name is Bart because he like The Simpsons. He was selling me a bunch of other CDs and tried to slip this one in for free. I paid for it anyway, so he gave me a different one for free. Maybe that's an indication of his opinion of Mayhem.

Anyway, the sound of this demo is actually not very close to New York’s finest death metallers, having much more of brutal death to it and being also a great deal more atmospheric. The recording quality is a little weird, quiet at first and with very trebly lead guitar that doesn’t have much distortion. The rhythm tone is crunchy and over-distorted by contrast, while the other instruments are fairly normal. Vocally, low death grunts prevail.

The songs are actually pretty long for a demo and that’s because of the atmosphere that the five-piece try to add to cuts like ‘Bloody Corpse’ and ‘Deathly Stillness’. A large portion of those songs is taken up by sudden quietness and creepy clean instrumental sections that certainly set a mood but don’t really do anything with it, showing little development and just switching back to heaviness after a minute of calm or even vaguely jazzy bass noodling. These breaks in the action give the demo its own sound though there’s nothing special about the riffs or arrangements. ‘Annihilation’ is a decent shout for best song, featuring some decent mid-paced riffing and a better-integrated clean section.

There’s not too much reason to bother with Cankered Corpse’s demo unless the quiet sections appeal to you, while you might be able to get hold of it as bonus tracks on their vastly different debut album. I’m not terribly bothered about either, but this does make a change every now and then.


-- May Diamhea's feat of 100 reviews in 7 days remain unbeaten --