A year following ConcretWeb's posting (on 08/04/2012) of a combined review (by yours truly) of this Phoenix, Arizona's based Goth'n'Thrash-flavoured Heavy Metal act's 2006 & 2009 albums Vampires In The Church and Saintanic, and its lead singer Prophet's solo album The Edge (released under the name Prophet & The Cowboys Of Apocalypse), the guys are back with a new 17-track album in which they continue their “making fun of evil” approach of music!
Well, perhaps they're not quite the same band anymore, because Prophet's current collaborators on this album turn out to be Heinous James on guitar & backing vocals, Sircyko on drums & backing vocals, and old-timer Devlin Lucius on the bass (still playing the surnames game, eh boys!?) But no, when listening to the material we can readily recognize the style of old. Other collaborators, by the way, are one Dave Cornwall, whom plays keyboards on the songs “AZ Woman” , “All I Have To Give” and the Pink Floyd cover “Comfortably Numb”, and additional 12-string guitar to the first of those songs...and one Tracy Neuman Krenz, doin' the woman's voice in the intro of “She Used To Be My Girl”. Also, the band occasionally uses vocal samples to enhance the content of their songs. The cover (a heavier version of the original, I assure you!) is done in tribute to Pink Floyd, and is not the only tribute song on the album, because there's also a cover of Metallica's “Seek And Destroy”, and eventually there's also a song specially written (and performed) by Heinous James, in memory of the band's friend and brother Mykel Geyman (about whom I however found no info on the Internet other than a memorial site on MySpace). Ooh...some additional info I found on the by-line, concerning the bands for which St. Madness has had the honour of being opening band : Van Halen, King Diamond, Monster Magnet, Destruction, Lynch Mob, Fates Warning, Six Feet Under, Death, Merciful Fate, The Misfits, Flotsam & Jetsam, Sacred Reich, Black Oak Arkansas, D.R.I., and many others. They also played at the 12th and 13th editions of the Milwaukee Metalfest.
Canonizing Carnage is St. Madness' 7th album under that name, and a natural progression/ continuation of what we had already gotten used to. I'm afraid I've found no songs off the album available for listening at either of the band's two MySpace pages (see review posted 08/04/2012), but what IS posted there will be an adequate introduction to the band's material! Check it out if you're into Thrash with a Goth flavouring!
P.S. : Along with the new album, we also got a new copy of Prophet's solo album The Edge. For that album's review, please consult what I said about it in that same review as mentioned above.