Fossilisation emerges from its slumber.
Created in 2020 in Brazil by V (guitar/bass/vocals, Jupiterian, ex-The Black Coffins) and P (drums, Jupiterian, Riffcoven), the band announced their debut album Leprous Daylight in 2023, on Everlasting Spew Records.
André Neil (guitar, Gulag, Infamous Glory, ex-Laconist) and Tonhão (bass, Infamous Glory) accompany the duo at their live shows.
Archæan Gateway lets us slowly enter this universe of oppression and heaviness, already revealing the first riffs, followed closely by Once Was God, which immediately unleashes all its power via a massive, explosive rhythm section. The cavernous vocal parts fit in perfectly with the frantic accelerations or the more majestic passages, just like on the suffocating, dissonant Oracle of Reversion, which couples screaming leads with waves of raw rage. The atmosphere remains very dark and ominous during the slower moments driven by heady harmonics, then the sound gradually dies down before flaring up again on At the Heart of the Nest and its putrid Old School roots fed by aggressive blast and disturbing sounds. The permanent saturation allows the band to bury us under its tenebrous tones before allowing us to breathe with the final, followed by Leprous Daylight which returns almost immediately to aggression and savagery before slowing down to welcome a few terrifying choirs in the background to accompany the vociferations. The Night Spoke the Tongue of Flames unleashes the musicians again, but the misty break is never far away to temporize the rhythm and slow it down while letting it thicken, before exploding again, leading us to Eon, which offers an extra dose of heaviness, even during the fast passages. The guitars lay down tortured passages that fit in perfectly with the morbid howls, while letting heady influences shine through, and then Wrought in the Abyss summons the dark forces of Death/Doom one last time to close the album with the same darkness and greasy power with which it began.
Fossilization has no equal when it comes to burying us under a mountain of heavy macabre riffs. Leprous Daylight leaves nothing to chance, chaining massive, cavernous sounds together to crush us as the screams fuel the oppressive atmosphere.
90/100
