CARCASS – Heartwork Review

CARCASS – Heartwork (1993)

Earache Records

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I’ve purposely overplayed this album because it’s melodic death to the core. Michael Amott giving his best possible lead guitar work ever here. And with CARCASS, you would expect death/grind as in their earlier days. You’re not getting it here. Jeff Walker is solely on vocals, no backups by Bill Steer. This, to me, is the best CARCASS release ever. I like all their material though, so I’m sort of biased, but in a good way. The guitar on here is phenomenal. It’s classic CARCASS playing amazing.

That’s the whole gist of this album is that every single song is memorable. I especially like the title track, but I favor all of the songs. They are playing mostly melodic death on here like I said but the music is with B-tuned guitars and the leads are solely blues based a.k.a. Amott. Steer shreds on here. Great follow-up from “Necroticism”. You could kind of tell their style changing or I should say evolving into what it is today. A shame about Ken Owen though, he can’t even play anymore.

The music is so catchy each song is not without praise. When I used to play the guitar, my goal was to learn all of the songs on this album. I was totally immersed in the songwriting. I’ve never been able to relate to their lyrics, but the music and production here are phenomenal. I never knew that music like this was possible coming from a death/grind band. The musicianship is more than quality. You’ll find every song to be as it is, heavy, but catchy. Very catchy. And with soul.

I like all the musicians here are at their musical peak here. They really took a good 2+ years to write this one and decidedly so. No compromise, but so darn amazing. The music is what stole it for me. I think this album is probably a perfect score no matter what anyone says. I’ve been following CARCASS ever since this release was out. Not to say that I’m old, but this album is what drew me to the band along with their earlier work such as their first release “Reek of Putrefaction”, then “Symphonies of Sickness”, “Necroticism” and I even enjoy their follow-up from this “Swan Song”.

No album in the history of melodic death has come close to topping this one. I mean not even AT THE GATES – “Slaughter of the Soul”, DARK TRANQUILLITY – “Projector”, et al. This just annihilates its opponents. That I say with firm conviction even though CARCASS isn’t even my favorite band to date. But here, they’re just amazing. The music, vocals, production, songwriting, etc. just hits home with me. A classic that’s never forgotten!! If you don’t have this in your archives, get it now!!

Ryan  “Death8699”  Fanuccchi