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Review: Cynic - Carbon-Based Anatomy
Cynic
www.cynicalsphere.com
Carbon-Based Anatomy

Label: Season of Mist
Year released: 2011
Duration: 23:01
Tracks: 6
Genre: Progressive Metal

Rating:
3.5/5


Review online: March 18, 2012
Reviewed by: Christopher Foley
Readers' Rating
How do you rate this release?

Rated 3.58/5 (71.67%) (12 Votes)
Review

Cynic is a band I've never been too sure on. I thought their pre-Focus demos were really something quite special and out of the ordinary, whilst I feel the widely lauded album itself is lacking and stifled; hardly worthy of the heaps of praise it receives (Pestilence did this style way more justice upon Spheres). I think Traced in Air blew Focus out of the water, as the ideas spawned on their debut were fully realized and utilized to great effect. Re-Traced was a chilled out, introspective mess and it left a lot of their fans dubious of where the band were heading.

Well, if Carbon-Based Anatomy is any sort of indicator to the future of this band it looks as though they're pushing further forward with their fusion/world music/post-rock sound – imagine Re-Traced played with more passion and very slight elements of metal. I would say Carbon-Based Anatomy is better conceived than their previous EP and if this is the road Cynic decide to head down for their next release I will probably still listen, but I don't think I will review it here.

Carbon-Based Anatomy sees the band throw down the chains of their death metal roots down, and likening this change to that of a moth pushing out of its cocoon, the band float out in an almost ethereal, glowing form. This EP is very soothing, and there is a lot of world music influence that really adds to the atmosphere. Paul's clean vocals aren't great as far as metal is concerned, and I'm not really the biggest fan of them. In fact I would have much preferred him use the vocoder throughout which would have really added to the atmosphere. The musicianship is on excellent form as always, I mean come on this is a bunch of first class musicians here.

Tracks such as "Box Up My Bones" and the title track display best the sound on Carbon-Based Anatomy the latter of which delivers the most in the way of progressive metal, but I stress that the metal elements are very subdued on this release, almost completely gone. Fans of the bands progressive death metal style are going to spit this out, and I would advise to those to give this one a miss. However fans of progressive music in general might want to check this out, as this is an interesting and pleasant exercise in atmospheric progressive rock with a slight metallic bite.

More about Cynic...
Review: Focus (reviewed by Larry Griffin)
Review: Traced in Air (reviewed by MetalMike)
Review: Traced in Air (reviewed by Sargon the Terrible)
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