The Bleeding

The Bleeding is the fourth album by American death metal band Cannibal Corpse, released in 1994 through Metal Blade Records. It is the last album featuring singer Chris Barnes and the first album featuring guitarist Rob Barrett. According to Soundscan numbers, The Bleeding is the fifth top-selling death metal LP in the United States, amassing over 98,300 copies sold. The Bleeding is also Cannibal Corpse's most successful album to date, and their first entry on the Billboard charts.

A re-master of this album is available and features new cover art, a bonus track (The Exorcist, a Possessed cover) and the music video of Staring Through the Eyes of the Dead.

This album signified a few changes for Cannibal Corpse, primarily the change in speed. The reason for this was because Barnes had decided that he wanted to pursue a different musical angle. For this album, he chose a more groove style similar to what he was doing in Six Feet Under, in contrast to Cannibal Corpse's previous material which focused more on blast beats and speed. Vocally, Chris had also decided to go for a more "decipherable" approach instead of his previously inhuman grunting that he had executed on previous Cannibal Corpse albums. The album is also notable for a much more technical approach for the guitar work.

The original 1994 cover art, a departure for a Cannibal Corpse album, appeared to depict a tapestry of raw flesh and muscle, rather than some sort of violent scene involving gruesome characters that fans (and detractors) had come to expect. The uncensored cover art for the 2006 reissue, however, reveals that the original artwork was merely a part of a greater whole. In the new artwork, a man is standing in an intimate gathering of zombies, rather like an orgy, with an expression of ecstasy on his face. The man has been stripped of skin from the chest down. The corpses are entwined with a veiny, blueish growth that is reminiscent of a root system. The exposed muscle and bone of the man's lower body exhibits a fresh growth of this ropey material, suggesting that he is becoming one of them. Further, his body language and facial expression, and the groping way he employs his hands, suggests that he is a willing participant in this visceral, highly sexualized depiction of undead debauchery. The original 1994 cover art was simply a closeup of the skinless ribcage and musculature of that man's midsection.