Scouse metal quintet Carcer City have very kindly offered their new album ‘The Road Journals’ to fans for the small offering of promotion on Facebook or Twitter. For a full-length this is certainly very generous and the five-piece have most definitely treated metal fans with this giveaway.
The opening seconds of ‘Introduction’ set the tone of the release: the pathetic fallacy of the rainstorm sample depicting the dark sound that you would expect from a metal record. This leads straight into second track ‘Lifeless, Awaken’ where the efforts of vocalist Patrick Pinion are welcomed after gang vocals break up the initial instrumental opening.
The vocals are a strong feature on ‘The Road Journals’ and are an element that for me that make the record a particular success. Take ‘The Constant Struggle,’ one of the many tracks that experiment with numerous vocal structures including roars, gang and spoken vocals, adding even more substance to an already technical record. That’s another reason why ‘The Road Journals’ works so well, Carcer City are a straight up metal band who work with their genre perfectly: intricate guitars, breakdowns galore, you get the picture.
Half way through the record Carcer City presents ‘The Ghost’ consisting of three separate tracks. ‘Part I: The Figure Brushed in White’ is short and sweet with a smooth transition straight into instrumental ‘Part II: The Seraph Garden.’ This finally merges into the final ‘Part III: The Messenger,’a full length track that rounds off ‘The Ghost’ very nicely, creating a rather long mid section to the record.
Album title track ‘The Road Journals’ initially introduces a much calmer side of Carcer City with piano featured in the song. This still fits in with the dark side of the album but then slowly builds to kick into the ferocious riffs that have already been present throughout. This is a potential favourite for me, it seems to be one of the most powerful songs on the record and I think that it’s the incorporation of the piano that shows that Carcer City can be diverse and explore softer sides of their genre too.
As a whole, ‘The Road Journals’ is a very commendable release full to the brim with technical, infectious tracks. Not only is it these things, it’s also free so metal fans would be mad not to check this out. Carcer City have definitely impressed me with ‘The Road Journals’ and hopefully they will impress you too!
4/5
‘The Road Journals’ by Carcer City is out now.
Carcer City links: Website|Facebook|Twitter|Tumblr
Words by Hannah Gillicker (@HannahGillicker)
