Carchosa – Carchosa – Album Review
Hailing from Malmö, Sweden and playing a combination of thrash and death metal, with some melodic and progressive elements liberally sprinkled into the mix, Carchosa are a throw everything (including the kitchen sink) kinda deal; embellishing their thrash/death onslaught with all manner of interludes and flourishes in order to stand out from the pack.
The irony is, it’s all a little too much to take in. With so much going on, Carchosa’s sense of identity seems to become lost along the way. There’s a further irony. In an age when the attention-deficit, listen to one track (out of context) generation are in it for the quick-fix, us ‘traditionalists’ rant on about taking the time to listen to an entire album. Hypocrisy then rears its ugly head, as this writer instantly balked when he saw the song lengths on Carchosa!
With a 9 minute track here, an 8 minute one there, a 12 minute(!) bugger looming over the horizon and not one song under 6 minutes, the initial reaction was to swallow hard, roll up your sleeves and brace yourself for a long one (so to speak)! As it turned out, initial preconceptions were unfounded as Carchosa is undoubtedly an album ripe with promise and an abundance of ideas. What appears to be required is simply some judicious editing to create a more controlled, focused beast instead of an often rambling monster.
Considering this is the work of one man – take a bow Henrik Nygren! – we need to doff our cap to his monumental effort and make one thing clear, Carchosa is undoubtedly a good album. It’s a chugging riff-fest replete with the kind of progressive noodling which would have pleased Chuck Schuldiner towards the end of his too short career but perhaps a little more of a streamlined battery is required next time we meet! 7/10
Carchosa is due for release on June 9, 2018. Head over to bandcamp and have a listen!
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