Swansong

Swansong
Studio album by Carcass
Released	May 30, 1996
Genre	Melodic death metal Groove metal
Length	50:50
Label	Earache
Producer	Colin Richardson
Professional reviews
Allmusic link NME 5/25/96, p.55
Carcass chronology
Heartwork (1993) Swansong (1996) Wake up and Smell the... Carcass (1996)

Swansong is the final studio album by the British melodic death metal band Carcass. It was released on June 10, 1996 in the UK for Earache Records. It is the only album to feature guitarist Carlo Regadas. This album was intended to be their major label debut, having been signed by Columbia records following the success of Heartwork, but disputes with that record company left them to return to Earache. The album was re-released on 21 July 2008 as a dualdisc featuring the 5th part of The Pathologist's Report, as well as a set of stickers in a digipak with the bonus track mentioned below.

About the album

Because Swansong continued the progression towards a more melodic style (beginning with Heartwork), it was not received well by all fans. However,^{[citation needed]} the album gained Carcass many new fans, reaching No. 46 on Billboard magazine's Heatseakers chart.^{[citation needed]} In The Pathologist's Report, drummer Ken Owen states that he considers Swansong the ultimate Carcass album.

The band had always shown a sense of humour in their song titles, and Swansong illustrated this with titles such as "Keep on Rotting in the Free World" and "Generation Hexed".

A limited edition of this album was released as a brain-shaped CD, with a bonus 2-track CD 'Somnus Pecunia Cibus'. The reason for the bonus disc was to include "Go to Hell", which wouldn't fit on the brain shaped CD (Made by Nimbus Manufacturing in Wales, UK) due to the 'cutting' into the disc required for the brain shape. This delayed the release of the disc by a week (originally planned for 3 June 1996, the same day as Metallica's Load), so an extra track, "Emotional Flatline" was included as an apology for the delay.

On the CD, you can see the "unfinished pyramid et al." from the Great Seal of the United States, but it reads "carcass" instead of "annuit coeptis", "somnus pecunia cibus" instead of "novus ordo seclorum" and "MCMXCV" instead of "MDCCLXXVI".

Track listing

• Deathrider Da is the solo section from "R**k the Vote" with screamed vocals.

2008 Reissue

The latest edition of the album, released on 21 July, comes packaged in a twelve-panel digipak with full artwork and lyrics as well as a limited edition sticker sheet with classic Carcass motifs. It also features the previously Japanese-only bonus track "Death Rider Da" as well as the fifth and final part of the extensive interview The Pathologist's Report. Later editions contain the album on a CD and the documentary on a separate DVD, and don't include the sticker sheet. The chapters for this installment of the documentary are as follows;

Personnel

• Ken Owen - drums
• Carlo Regadas - Guitar
• Colin Richardson - Producer, vocals on "Death Rider Da"
• Bill Steer - Guitar
• Jeffrey Walker - Bass, Vocals
• Nick Brine - Assistant Engineer
• Jim Brumby - Assistant Engineer
• Gee - Paintings
• Stephen Harris - Engineer
• Barney Herbert - Assistant Engineer

References

This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2008)

External links

• Carcass at Earache Records