Carnival in Coal
Fear Not

Nonsense, dark humor, a world of somewhat macabre but amusing little fairy tales, surrounded by grotesque dolls that, in their own way, know how to be charming, that's how I imagine the world revolving around this crazy French duo, I'm referring to Carnival In Coal.

Born in Amiens in 1995, these two ugly men managed from their first "Vivalavida" dated 1999 to stand out from the crowd and distance themselves from the classic world of metal, opting for a much more personal path, sometimes risking seeming excessive in their choices, but always remaining true to their somewhat crazy and unusual way of living their music. After an album not quite splendid like "French Cancan," it was with the advent of 2001 that CIC made the big leap, releasing "Fear Not Carnival In Coal," a mature, sophisticated, and excessive product like few others, from which a strong sense of defiance and indifference towards the listener shines through, making ostentatious elegance and compositional refinement its strength.

Consisting of nine pieces of never excessive duration, "Fear Not" from the first notes tends to emphasize the desire to propose something odd already from the first track "Yes! We Have No Bananas", not so much for the musical base, a mix between progressive death metal and something else undefined between progressive and a sort of more violent new age, but what astonishes is the lyrics in which they appear in this precise order: Pokemon, salsa, rumba, and these blessed bananas that our guys don't have! The impact at the end of the song leaves one bewildered, because if from the purely musical side we are faced with something refined and extremely elaborate, from the lyrical side one is faced with a writing that leaves the impression of either being in front of two playful pranksters or in front of two types completely out of their minds.

After recovering from the shock, you can press the forward button and move on to the second song titled "Cadillac", once again extremely elaborate and disorienting: musically we are faced with a decidedly successful mix of progressive death and black metal, framed by a splendid, hilarious text that talks about a poor loser who, while trying to achieve personal success, always finds someone to put him down, but at this point, he gets his revenge with his new silver Cadillac. Once again, one remains a bit disoriented reading the lyrics, but if you still have the desire and strength to move forward, the best tracks await you.

The next is a cover of Supuration titled "1308.JP.08" and presents itself as a piece of dark electro of little note, which brought to mind the four vampire/clowns from Rome, Theatres Des Vampires.

With "Exit Upon Void" and "Don't Be Happy", our guys offer something a bit more serious, as musically they continue with the continuous mix of progressive, black, and death, the lyrics move away from the less serious themes (albeit really entertaining) of the first two tracks, preferring themes of another background, such as redemption (which still seems not so serious) chosen for "Exit Upon Void".

We thus arrive at the true masterpiece of the album, "Gangbang", a song whose lyrics go like this:

There's a gang bang on my screen
And I watch it till it aches
My only pleasure is to watch you
When sweat melts with your skin
If you want it, do it
Call me Mr. Obsession

What to add??? Well, certainly musically we are facing yet another upheaval, C in C now enjoys mixing Arno's scream with a dance base interwoven with guitar lines of clear progressive influence.

Here... what follows is as idiotic or intelligent as has ever been conceived by the human mind, namely the splendid, cacophonous, useless, fantastic (other adjectives just don't come to mind) "Daaahhh", a piece lasting just over a minute and a half composed of three chords, an electronic base on which the scream once again recites an Oscar-worthy lyric, but sitting here writing the words would be as incorrect as I could ever do, that's why I invite you, indeed I obligate you, to go read it, you will be mesmerized.

The work concludes with "Ring My Bell" and "Fear Not Fear", which continue more in the wake of "Exit Upon Void" and "Don't Be Happy" adhering more to a certain technical death metal that brought to mind the slightly more classic works of Hieronymus Bosch or the like.

What else to say??? Well, from a technical point of view, the two Frenchmen, assisted by Pierre Antonik on guitars, Romain Caron on guitars and backing vocals, Timmy Zacevic on keyboards and El Worm again on guitars, do great, they are precise, capable of proposing a songwriting of great depth, elaborate, eccentric but always elegant and refined, but in my opinion, this album should be taken much more lightly, without paying too much attention to the purely musical aspect, instead focusing on the lyrics, the true focal point of the work. That said, giving a rating to this album is really pointless since some will consider it a masterpiece and others an immense flop, but I believe in both cases, listening is useful, at least to hear something that goes a bit outside the box.