CANCER
“SHADOW GRIPPED”
Album Review by Dark Juan

6/10

Cancer are:

Ian Buchanan – Bass
Carl Stokes – Drums
John Walker – Guitar, vocals

I am unsurprisingly drunk. I have cooked chilli with lashings of jalapenos and I am not looking forward to the ring of fire I will inevitably suffer on the morrow, when I have to drive to far flung places such as Huelgoat (nice lake, but the Broceliande where it is co-opts the Arthurian legend for its own ends…) and Dinan (a very picturesque medieval city with a fine array of bars and other watering holes…) in order to facilitate the exhibition of the art of Mrs. Dark Juan around Brittany. Although she has just been asked to exhibit in Cartwright Hall in Bradford (the hellmouth where rats over a foot long have been captured alive and more than a little pissed off…) and Hull. The only good thing ever said about Hull is that a well known man of letters said that it was very flat and therefore good for cyclists… Anyway, I am being poisoned slowly by the emanations from the arse of Igor The Evil One and amused myself this afternoon by chainsawing wood, until I discovered that I have actually managed to fuck up my chainsaw by way of causing the chain guide to seize up. How the hell I am supposed to survive the zombie apocalypse without my chainsaw I don’t know. At least I still have my large axe. I also bought Mrs. Dark Juan a Sans Permis. For those of you that don’t know, a Sans Permis is a hilariously tiny car driven by teenagers, people who CAN’T ACTUALLY DRIVE and pissheads who have lost their licence. It is a tiny 600cc diesel that appears to be made out of the kind of fibreglass Reliant Robins would reject and has suspension made out of RSJs and granite. They also don’t have to be CT’d (French MOT) and there are several around my area that appear to be held together with spit, shit and prayers. They also don’t go faster than 50km/h, which is both a boon and a benison considering Mrs. Dark Juan is an artist and is therefore distracted by anything and everything including brightly coloured birds and interestingly shaped clouds. Also, at 50 km/h she can’t really hurt anyone or anything when she inevitably stuffs it into the scenery, requiring me and the Anti-Popemobile to fish her out of it…

Anyway, Cancer are a bona-fide classic British death metal band hailing from Ironbridge, near Telford. Been going off and on since the 80’s they have, and this album, Shadow Gripped, is their latest, after their second reformation. Musically, they are an amalgamation of a slower, less punky Napalm Death, a LOT of Bolt Thrower and the Kam Lee fronted Massacre. John Walker sounds remarkably like the Florida death metal legend. Interestingly, although an acid and gravel gargling growl is utilised by Mr. Walker, the lyrics are clear and understandable, which makes a change for extreme metal, which generally sounds like this; “Grrrrrrooooowwwwlll, grunt, grunt, howl, screech, roar, squeal, cheesy Hammer Horror style laugh, sccccccccccrrrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeammmmmmmmmmmmm.” Even if the lyrics tell you that there are actual words. They generally lie.

Cancer’s sound is rooted in the glory days of death metal, when Deicide, Morbid Angel, Death and the Morrisound wave was at its height. Ground breaking this album is not. Enjoyable it is, in an almost nostalgic kind of way. The record makes me feel the same way Bolt Thrower’s Warmaster did. Or Morbid Angel’s Blessed Are The Sick. Back when I was a mere neophyte and learning the ways of corruption and the basics of black magic and overthrowing the realm of God, and the deflowerment of virgins in the most blasphemously possible way, this would have been a tremendously exciting record. In reality it is twenty years too late although it has to be said that this is death metal of the highest order. The guitar sound is very satisfying, being rather more polished and thicker than the usual waspish snarling that constitutes death metal guitar, the bass is solid and rumbles like your arse after half a fuckton of habanero chillies and a shitload of porridge and the drumming is solid and easily heard and the clarity of said pummelling of skins is remarkable. Every single beat of drum and cymbal is clearly and richly heard and the whole experience is enhanced by this. Too many death metal records ignore the powerhouse drumming that gives this style of music its percussive impact, to their detriment. Outstanding songs on this record are the charmingly named Ball Cutter and the faintly prophetic (if you’re talking about me) Half Man, Half Beast, both of which are speedy and satisfying slabs of classic death metal. Surprisingly, Cancer opt for quite a lot of mid-tempo bludgeoning rather than high speed flaying, but it is quite effective on the heaviness front. Sometimes slow and steady is crushingly heavy. Sometimes going back in time is curiously satisfying. This Cancer record is like being back in Rock City in Nottingham in the early nineties and raging across the dance floor. It’s good, but it is not going to set the world on fire.

The Patented Dark Juan Blood Splat Rating System is on another nostalgia trip back to the nineties. Cancer earn 6/10 for a pleasing, if average, record that brings absolutely nothing new to a genre that appears to be on its last legs. Shame, because I fucking love Cancer.

TRACKLIST

Down The Steps
Garotte
Ball Cutter
Organ Snatcher
The Infocidal
Half Man, Half Beast
Crimes So Vile
Thou Shalt Kill
Shadow Gripped
Disposer

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