AN NCS PREMIERE: FOSSILIZATION –“EON”

Fossilization refers to the very slow natural process in which organic material becomes mineralized, eventually transforming it into stone. It takes a dead thing and makes it deader.

In some ways it makes sense that the Brazilian band Fossilization (whose members are also a part of the stupendous sludge/death/doom metal band Jupiterian) chose that name. Their music is stone heavy and stone hard, and the specter of Death looms large over their lyrics and their music –which is a particularly grim and devastating form of death metal.

On the other hand, the music itself is very far from a cold dead thing. Both its pacing and its effects on a listener proceed much faster than the transformation for which the band are named.

Like the specter of Death, Fossilization have a debut album looming on the horizon. Entitled Leprous Daylight, it’s set for release on September 8th by Everlasting Spew Records. So far, two tracks from the album have been revealed, and today we present a third one — “Eon“.

Lyrics don’t always mean much to fans of extreme metal, but it should be said that Fossilization‘s wordplay is several cuts above the norm. The subject matter tends to be stunningly bleak, often painting portraits of end-times, but those portraits are vividly harrowing.

In the case of “Eon“, the words speak of nameless protagonists who once fought for hope but found only misery, death, and ruination “beyond the bound of eternity”, “lost within a labyrinth” that is endless, lit by torches that lead them nowhere.

The music is equally devastating and hopeless. The frenzied riffage creates a sizzling harmony of madness and despair while a massive bass moans from subterranean depths. The drums seem to echo off catacomb walls, pounding, booming, and battering with cold ruthlessness in their attack, and the guttural vocals sound monstrous.

The guitars also slowly wail and writhe in pain, until the pain burns again through feverish tremolo’d chords. When the pace becomes a steady march, the guitars swirl upward with even more wrenching intensity, glimmering like phosphorus. Chords of towering but harrowing grandeur rise up like a black monolith of eternal doom, but they’re met there by convulsions of deranged violence.

We mentioned that two other singles from the new Fossilization album have previously been revealed. We premiered one of those, “Once Was God“, and it was followed by “Oracle Of Reversion“.

The lyrics of the song we premiered narrate the vengeful execution of the Almighty and all his heavenly minions. As you’ll see, the music is every bit as malevolent and murderous as the lyrical theme, and it revels in its slaughtering, but it also draws us into lightless pits of degradation and death.

Fossilization again amplify the music’s raging malignancy with raw, ragged guttural bellowing and gagging, but also break up their high-speed battering and voracious swarming with dismal diversions, slower moments where the drums pound, the bass heaves as it chews through gravel, and the guitars become abysmal in their mood.

Eventually it also becomes apparent (as in the song we’ve just premiered) that at high speed the riffing somehow gleams and soars despite how necrotic it also sounds.

The other previous track, “Oracle Of Reversion“, portrays “Mother Extinction” usurping “the throne in the skies and stars”. “Bathed in Neptunian Blood / The land is drenched in everlasting gloom / The hourglass is broken”. There the oracle presides over an “empire of ash”, wearing “a crown of disgust” in a “lightless domain”.

Perhaps needless to say by this point, the music is viscerally powerful and viscerally unsettling. It’s fast and barbarically scourging, and whirls the listener through the kind of raging vortex of sonic depravity that kicks a listener’s adrenaline into overdrive. But it also wields hammers and administers a brutal beating, and it’s also eerie, unearthly, and drowning in wretchedness.

Everlasting Spew Records calls Leprous Daylight Fossilization‘s “most crushing and brutally wrenching release — 8 new savage tracks soaked in doomy despair”. As a further preview we also have this statement by V, the band’s guitarist, bassist, and vocalist:

“I started working on Leprous Daylight right after the recordings of the split with Ritual Necromancy. I knew I wanted to take a different direction with this full length album, it had to be faster and brutal as much as I could but without compromising my songwriting. I think Leprous Daylight is Fossilization‘s most violent effort so far but still full of the melancholy and sadness you have been used to with our previous releases.”

The album features a frightening cover illustration by Rio Oka, and it will be released by Everlasting Spew on multiple formats: CD, tape, and digital, with vinyl editions coming in late 2023. They incisively recommend it for fans of Dead Congregation, Krypts, Spectral Voice, and Incantation.

BUY PHYSICAL: https://bit.ly/44eqAKK
BUY DIGITAL: https://bit.ly/3O0yoKz

FOSSILIZATION:
https://www.facebook.com/fossilization

One final bit of news: Fossilization will be embarking on a tour of Europe in September with label mates Altars:

31.08-03.09 – Copenhagen, DK – Pumpehuset / Kill-Town Death Fest IX
04.09 – Copenhagen, DK – Day off / available
05.09 – Kiel, DE – Alte Meierei
06.09 – Wolfsburg, DE – s.v. Jugendhaus Ost
07.09 – Kassel, DE – Goldgrube
08.09 – Wermelskirchen, DE – AJZ Bahndamm / NRW Deathfest
09.09 – Arnhem, NL – Willemeen
10.09 – London, UK – Black Heart
11.09 – Namur, BE – Belvédère Namur
12.09 – Paris, FR – Le Klub
13.09 – Bordeaux, FR – Salem Bar
14.09 – Bilbao, ES – Estudios Groove
15.09 – Madrid, ES – Sala Silikona
16.09 – Barcelona, ES – Sala Zow1e
17.09 – Day off / available
18.09 – Milan, IT – Barrio’s Live
19.09 – Rome, IT – Traffic Club
20.09 – Bologna, IT – Freakout Club
21.09 – Münich, DE – Backstage
22.09 – Halle (Saale), DE – Hühnermanhatten
23.09 – Warsaw, PL – VooDoo Club
24.09 – Berlin, DE – Reset Club