Band:	Carnacain
Album:	The Dead Suffer A Restless Sleep
Style:	Brutal death metal
Release date:	2005

01. For You To See
02. Suffering As One
03. Children Of Nod
04. Scourge Of God
05. The Narrow House

This is the second demo of this US brutal death metal band formed in 2002. It supposedly features 10 tracks but for some reason I received a promo cd with only five songs. So I'll review the part I know.

The Dead Suffer? proves to be an interesting demo. There's nothing new or really outstanding, but all the ingredients that make a decent technical brutal death album are here: blastbeats, good growls and shrieks, furious and brutal riffs, the occasional acoustic breaks (just to catch your breath, you know), mid-paced bridges and overall excellent technical skills - with a special mention to the drums, truly amazing - and the most important of all, catchiness.

So after a short and virtually useless intro, the album kicks off with the blastbeats of the standout track, Suffering As One, that immediately sets the standard for the rest of the demo. This song mixes tunes inspired from the old school death metal scene with the more modern brutal death metal. Beside the enjoyable although quite regular music, the most important feature of this demo is the evil, gloomy, almost miserable atmosphere Carnacain have been able to create. This really throws a personal touch in the mix. I don't know if it is due to the music itself or the bad sound though.

Yes, you got it, the main reason for the rating not being higher is the lousy production. I don't want to be too harsh for this is self-produced, but when I first heard this, I thought "Man, I'm not going to review that? Can't hear the music!". Actually, if you don't really pay attention, all you can hear is the vocals that cover the rest. The instruments themselves sound like muffled, fuzzy, distant, and clearly lack power. Too bad because once you've separated the music from the fog, it sounds good, technical and all - but still not powerful enough for such brutal music.

To end on a positive note, these guys are clearly talented musicians and as far as the music is concerned, I can't blame much: this is a good release from a relatively young band. But the sound is just so bad it takes a lot of the pleasure away from this experience. Hopefully I'll be granted the opportunity to hear something from them with a decent production.