Bury Me in Blasphemy

Carnifex out of the kindness of their hearts presented the world with a nice "free" EP to help sell the new single they added to their live sets. The whole EP is actually a pretty dynamic and diverse little run despite being like 4 songs and clocking in at just under 20 minutes. Each track sort of brings its own thing to the table and given there's 4 it feels worth doing a brief track by track.

Bury Me in Blasphemy is the new single, that could have easily been pulled off of Slow Death. It focuses on Scott's low growls, groovy chug riffs and a symphonic backing to give it an atmospheric touch. If you liked anything off Slow Death this will be pretty up your alley.

The comes the Nine Inch Nails cover, which seems like a curveball out of left field, however maybe a month and a half before the EP was announced I remember an interview where Scott said he wanted the next album to have a Nine Inch Nails influence. This certainly doesn't make me excited for that album idea because this kind of sucks. The drum bit at the beginning and the chorus did not transfer well to Carnifex's deathcore style, nor did the percussion break. The synth line translated into a pretty groove riff with a squealy that would be right at home on any of Carnifex's post Hell Chose Me material. There's really nothing that remains though that screams "industrial Carnifex" because it all got the industrial vibes were gutted. It sounds and feels like a deathcore song and I don't particularly like that.

Then comes the Slipknot cover, not a surprise to hear since their live cover they were touring with for Warped Tour 2017 and through out their various 2018 tours was pretty well recieved. If you're unfamiliar this song features a thrashy circle pit worthy riff on the verse that alternates with a nu-metal jumpy riff on the chorus with a nice catchy phrase for the chorus. The whole song is sprinkled with double pedal and the second verse introduces a second thrashy riff that gets cut up into a stop and go riff to make a breakdown. Carnifex plays it true to the original.

Then comes the Head Like a Hole remix which actually reinvigorates my interest in the idea of an industrial Carnifex, because I actually think this remix hits the nail on the head quite well. The vocals are processed through a filter and pushed further back in the mix allowing the instrumental to poke through more clearly. Then the drumming sounds way more mechanical, I'm not sure if a drum machine was used or not but it actually really captures the feel of the original song where the drumming on the other cover didn't. There's a synth line added to the chorus that helps add atmosphere. The riff gets looped, again capturing a more industrial feel than it did on the first cover and gets hit with an effect that sounds like when a CD starts skipping right before the chorus that actually bridges the transition really well. I can understand why people prefer the first cover, its way more up Carnifex's alley and would fit right in on a deathcore comp, but this is where Carnifex actually experiments and gets creative and I think the payoff was worth it.