Human Atrophy

These days the heavy metal scene is plagued by thousands of deathcore bands who sound exactly the same as the last. In no place is the saturation of breakdowns and pig squeals more evident than in New York; but there is hope. Hidden under the slime that is the New York metal scene are a few bands who have opted to play true metal. One name that keeps coming up in this scene is Carcinogen. Carcinogen are a very thrashy death metal band hailing from long island New York and are quickly making a name for themselves, sharing the stage with the likes of Cannibal Corpse, Nile, Hypocrisy, Suffocation, Overkill, and many other legendary bands. So far Carcinogen have released a demo and 2 EP’s all of which are worth your time, even if you are the stingiest of elitists. The newest EP released is Called Human Atrophy and just as the name implies it is filled to the brim with brutal riffs, technical leads, a pounding rhythm section and powerful vocals.

The mix is a bit more raw and analog sounding than the last EP, far more appropriate for a death/thrash band. My only real issue with Human Atrophy is I wish the vocals were slightly louder in the mix, but I’m not complaining. In addition to the mix, another difference Human Atrophy has in comparison to Unholy Aggression is in it’s technicality. Unholy Aggression was fairly simple, straight forward death/thrash, while their new release is a bit more technical and borders on progressive death metal at times, this is most evident in the song Neurotoxin (my personal favorite).

Musically speaking, the sound is comparable to many of the old school death metal bands. The influence from bands such as Death, Morbid Angel, Gorguts, Cannibal Corpse and the like is unavoidable. In addition to Carcinogens death metal sound, they also have a considerable amount of thrash influence in their music, especially in their guitarwork, there is no way one can miss the slayer inspired guitar solos, and the pestilence inspired rhythm section of just about every song in their catalog.

Lyrically, Carcinogen don’t stray to far from their predecessors. Some lyrical themes depict, death, gore, hatred and paint organized religion in a negative light. Just about everything you’d want to hear from a classic sounding death metal release. In the future, I would like to hear some more variation in lyrics, and I’m sure over time they will expand. Perhaps some political themes? Ancient legends? Human history? We’ll see where they go from here I suppose.

On Human Atrophy, The listener can expect 3 original songs of hard hitting, lightning speed death/thrash, and one amazing cover of Slayer’s Postmortem.

Overall, I’d give this EP a score of 97%. I take away some points from Human Atrophy due to it’s underproduction, though I am judging these tracks based off of an advanced copy of the album, and there was some last minute production done so there may be an extra point waiting for them. Other than that I don’t have much negative things to say about this release; it's not perfect, but it does exactly what it intended to do: rip your face off and sew it back on upside down and throw you in the gutter. I absolutely recommend this EP to any one who is a fan of Death, Gorguts and Pestilence.