| Vile | |
| Type: | studio |
| Artist: | Cannibal Corpse |
| Cover: | Vilecannibalcorpse.JPG |
| Alt: | a green corpse with stitches on its chest, a mutilated head and face, and no lower body with maggots pouring from its innards. The corpse’s penis appears to be lying in front of it. |
| Released: | May 21, 1996 |
| Recorded: | January 1996 |
| Studio: | Morrisound Recording, Tampa, Florida |
| Genre: | Death metal |
| Length: | 37:40 |
| Label: |
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| Producer: |
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| Prev Title: | The Bleeding |
| Prev Year: | 1994 |
| Next Title: | Gallery of Suicide |
| Next Year: | 1998 |
Vile is the fifth studio album by American death metal band Cannibal Corpse, released on May 21, 1996 through Metal Blade Records.
It is their first album to feature vocalist George Fisher and the last album featuring guitarist Rob Barrett until 2006's Kill. It was also the last Cannibal Corpse album to feature Scott Burns as producer.
The album was re-released in 2006 with new liner notes and a bonus DVD (titled "Vile Live") featuring a full concert from the Vile tour, during which many songs from the album are performed.
Vile is the band's first album to use Bb standard tuning, as opposed to Eb standard tuning on all prior releases (although a few of the album's tracks are in Db standard).[1]
Vincent Jefferies of Allmusic noted Vile's album art and song titles, while "gruesome and extreme to the max", are "toned down" in comparison to previous releases by the band.[2]
Vile was originally titled Created to Kill (which is featured in the Cannibal Corpse Box set) and had partially been completed with Chris Barnes on vocals. Before the album was released, Barnes was dismissed from the band due to creative differences. To replace Barnes, the band hired Monstrosity vocalist George "Corpsegrinder" Fisher to re-record the former's vocal tracks, with the rest of the band sharing duties rewriting the lyrics. Webster commented,
Fisher recalls feeling extremely nervous during his first vocal tracking sessions with the band. He said,
During the Vile sessions, "The Undead Will Feast" from Eaten Back to Life was re-recorded with Fisher on vocals. This version of the song would first appear as the only bonus track on a Japanese import edition of Vile and then on the Worm Infested EP in 2003.
Allmusic wrote "Fisher brought a vocal dynamism and character that livened up the band's six-year-old sound. Fisher's ability to match the musical intensity and rhythm of Vile's more complicated assemblages of riffs created a more sophisticated yet equally tortuous essence."
Vile was the first death metal album to appear on the Billboard 200 chart, debuting at No. 151.[3]
Several of the songs from the finished album were written while Barnes was still in the band, and were recorded in demo form with his vocals. These tracks were collected for disc three of the 15 Year Killing Spree box set. They are: