Funeral Rain Press Corps

Artwork, Track Listing And First Single Unveiled

America’s reigning kings of brutality, Cannibal Corpse, will unleash their twelfth studio offering this March via Metal Blade Records. Aptly titled Torture, the follow-up to 2009′s Evisceration Plague offers up 12 tracks of maniacally precise, soul-searing death metal. Torture was again produced by Hate Eternal‘s Erik Rutan at his own Mana Recording Studio in St. Petersburg, Florida as well as Sonic Ranch in Tornillo, Texas, and features the maniacal cover art by longtime Cannibal Corpse artist, Vincent Locke.

While Torture marks the latest progression in the band’s sound, it also witnesses a return to what drummer Paul Mazurkiewicz accurately terms “the frenzied attack of Butchered At Birth (1991) or Tomb Of The Mutilated (1992),” infusing the band’s advanced musicianship with the raw savagery that haunted their earlier releases, and in the process conceiving the definitive Cannibal Corpse record. Adds bassist Alex Webster on the outcome of the record: “We’re extremely happy with how Torture turned out. Erik Rutan did an amazing job with the production, and the songwriting and performances may be our strongest yet. We can’t wait until our fans get to hear the whole thing!”

Witness the gutting sounds of “Demented Aggression,” the band’s first single, as well as studio footage, at the official Cannibal Corpse landing page, at THIS LOCATION.

Torture Tracklisting:
01. Demented Aggression
02. Sarcophagic Frenzy
03. Scourge of Iron
04. Encased in Concrete
05. As Deep As the Knife Will Go
06. Intestinal Crank
07. Followed Home Then Killed
08. The Strangulation Chair
09. Caged…Contorted
10. Crucifier Avenged
11. Rabid
12. Torn Through

As a precursor to the release, Cannibal Corpse will perform a special one-off show at the Culture Room in West Palm Beach, Florida on January 22nd then head to the seas to take part in this year’s edition of the 70,000 Tons Of Metal Cruise. The band will get a short break before a near month-long march through Europe on the Full Of Hate 2012 tour with labelmates Behemoth.

Torture will be released in North America on March 13, 2012.

Cannibal Corpse:
Alex Webster – Bass
Paul Mazurkiewicz – Drums
Rob Barrett – Guitar
Patrick O’Brien – Guitar
George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher – Vocals

I imagine the lineup for this tour is probably something of a wet dream for anyone especially captivated with blastbeat-laden modern. For me, not so much, though I do adore classic Vital Remains such as “Let Us Pray” and “Into Cold Darkness”. I arrived late, and missed the local openers Gravenloch and Tunsafun, so I was greeted with Abysmal Dawn’s soundcheck as I walked through the door. This was my second time seeing these rising stars of Los Angeles death metal, and frankly I was not impressed with their performance in March supporting Atheist. This time around was a different story. I don’t know if it was due to better sound, my state of mind, or an improvement in the last few months on the band’s part, but their set was definitely fun to headbang through, featuring signature thinking man’s death metal tracks such as “My Own Savior” and “Leveling The Plane of Existence”.

Next to hit the stage were Providence, Rhode Island (hence their clever catch phrase, “We Are Providence”, hardy har har) death metal veterans Vital Remains. I was right up against the stage, and I tried to talk to guitarist Tony Lazaro during while the band set up, urging him to play the 90′s Vital Remains anthem “War In Paradise”, but the bastard refused to make eye contact with me! Nonetheless, I was excited until the band ordered a sound guy to crank a sample of their music to the same volume as their instruments. This was a bit off putting. Last time VR was in town, they quit after two songs because their sampler wasn’t working. I assumed it was only used for intro and outro samples, sound effects, etc. Surely Vital Remains cannot mean to engage in some kind of death metal lip sync? They finally began with “Icons of Evil”, segwaying into highlights “Hammer Down The Nails” and “Dechristianize”, playing exclusively songs from their two most recent albums. A mediocre performance overall, no matter how much I wanted to enjoy it.

Last was Hate Eternal, current project of Ripping Corpse/Morbid Angel alumni Erik Rutan. Their set was rife with problems. The sound was shit, featuring triggered drums far louder than anything else, and a muddy, ugly guitar sound. However, they seemed to be the crowd favorite, and the security had no choice but to relent to numerous rule breaking stage divers and a vicious pit. At one point,  a stage diver accidentally pulled the cable out of Rutan’s guitar, but he fluidly reconnected it without allowing the mishap to interrupt his performance. Then, someone in the audience threw an unidentified projectile at Mr. Rutan, causing him to stop playing to deathgrowl “GET THE FUCK OUT MOTHERFUCKER!” and “I’LL FUCKING SEE YOU OUTSIDE MOTHERFUCKER!” over the microphone. The humorous altercation did a little to make up for their atrocious set, but didn’t do anything to sway me in favor of Hate Eternal’s music. I’ll stick to “Dreaming With The Dead”.

Origin was also playing, headlining actually, but I’m not partial to tech-death, and after the disappointment of the last two bands I elected to leave and socialiaze with my metal brohort. Overall, Abysmal Dawn was the best band of the evening, and the only enjoyable set, surprised as I am to hear myself say that. A shame that heavyweights like Vital Remains and Hate Eternal couldn’t or wouldn’t deliver, but the younger blood definitely blew them out of the water.

US death metal pioneers Incantation have recently been added to the already stacked line up for this year’s Neurotic Deathfest, which runs April 29th & 30th in Tilburg, Netherlands. Drummer Kyle Severn gave the following statement:

“On behalf of myself and Incantation, we would like to announce that we have just been added to the greatest indoor European death metal fest line up that we have ever seen. Yes, I’m talking about this year’s Neurotic Deathfest in Holland. Incantation is honored to share the stage again with the almighty Autopsy, as well as the return of At The Gates, and other metal legends like Obituary, and new metallers of the 2K-era Hail Of Bullets. We plan to play a very obscure set in honor of this amazing line up and for our very supportive fans, old school and new alike. With a well rounded fest lineup bound together with leather and spikes, you will not want to miss this Incantation setlist, which is already a making in the metal history. We are riding the metal storm out with the same line up as we had this time last year when we successfully spread blasphemy across Europe during our headlining tour for the highly respected 7” EP Scapegoat with Alex Bouks (Goreaphobia, Master) guitars, Chuck Sherwood (Blood Storm) bass, John McEntee on guitar and vokills and myself skinsmans Kyle Severn on the drums….Kyle666″

Neurotic Deathfest 2011, featuring the likes of At The Gates, Autopsy, Obituary, Hate Eternal, Incantation and many more, is already shaping up to be the most brutal festival of the year. Keep checking in at www.neuroticdeathfest.com for information and updates.