English death/grind legends CARCASS have set “Torn Arteries” as the title of their new album, due on August 7 via Nuclear Blast.
Title was revealed by band’s guitarist Bill Steer in a recent interview with Australia’s Heavy.
Sterr says the title of the new CARCASS record comes from a demo tape that the band’s founding drummer Ken Owen recorded when he was still a teenager.
He explained “He had a fictitious band called TORN ARTERIES and he recorded everything himself in his bedroom — guitar and he’d actually bang on boxes and kind of scream into the mic. And the whole thing was so distorted, it kind of sounded super heavy, even though essentially you were listening to a guy with a Spanish guitar and a couple of boxes.
“I think Jeff [Walker, CARCASS bassist/vocalist] appreciates the connection to the past and the fact that it was another Ken Owen classic. So that was his choice, really, and it stuck.”
Steer also added that the Torn Arteries title is an homage of sorts to Owen, who suffered a brain hemorrhage in 1999 and hasn’t actively played with CARCASS for more than two decades.
“I can’t remember when this came up, but we were doing some press conference at a festival, and I think we all kind of agreed that even though Ken isn’t playing in the band as such right now, he’s kind of involved in everything we do, stylistically, because when he was so unique — when he was playing drums, his approach was just totally different.
“Also, the riffs he came up with, they were just really far out there. They were loads of fun to learn. I still think, as a guitar player, some of the stuff was very unorthodox and it was quite a challenge. That kind of influence still runs through what we do today. Just as a friendship thing, we’re all still in touch regularly, and it’s just been great to see Ken‘s life stabilizing. Basically, he has a good standard of living and he’s a happy guy.”
CARCASS’ latest single “Under The Scalpel Blade” is a taste of what’s to come from the band’s long-awaited 7th full-length album. It follows the release of several classic albums over the years, including Decibel Magazine “Hall of Fame” inductees Heartwork and Necroticism – Descanting the Insalubrious, and their influence has changed the face of extreme metal with every consecutive release.
