Track Premiere: Fragarak’s “Fathoms of Delirium”
Way back in early 2015, I praised a little known progressive death metal band from India called Fragarak for deftly blending thoughtful instrumental passages with barbarous riffage. Today, I’m pleased as hell to check back in on Fragarak and to give you a chance to hear their new tornado of a track, “Fathoms of Delirium.” Their sound may have changed a bit, but that heart for killer death metal still beats true. Get in here to have your face melted!
Fragarak’s previous record, Crypts of Dissimulation, saw the band filling the Opeth-shaped hole in our hearts while hammering us into a fine powder with old school ferocity. While I enjoyed the winding song structures and heinous vocals, I was a little underwhelmed by the record’s anticlimactic finale and felt the whole thing could benefit from more concise musicianship. Thankfully, this new track from the upcoming A Spectral Oblivion takes everything I loved about Crypts of Dissimulation and cranks it up to 11, even adding in a healthy dose of tech!
“Fathoms of Delirium” seems to hint that A Sprectral Oblivion, the band’s upcoming second full-length, takes a number of hints from the emergent school of tech death that incorporates melodic death metal riffs and long, twisting passages of tasteful harmonies. The new Nevermore-esque leads have more crunch and crispiness to them than those heard on Crypts of Dissimulation, and the whole production this time around is geared to let you hear each and every one of those cascading notes assaulting your ears.
My favorite part of “Fathoms of Delirium,” however, is the choral-accented blast section around the 4:45 mark. Details like this remind us that Fragarak is still very much a progressive death metal band, one unafraid to make use of sparse clean vocals, acoustic passages, subtle melodic leads, Indian Classical vocals, and a wide variety of drum styles. Thankfully, the band’s songwriting skill is on full display in this track, and none of those disparate elements ever feels jarring or disconnected. At nearly 8 minutes, “Fathoms of Delirium” is an oddly engrossing track from start to finish, one that reminds me of the very reasons I fell in love with this genre so many years ago.
“Fathoms of Delirium” is thrilling and does exactly what an advance track should; I can’t wait to hear the rest of this record.
Fragarak (Photo VIA)
A Spectral Oblivion drops October 30th via Transcending Obscurity. You can hear more tracks on Bandcamp here. Make sure to swing by Facebook and thank the band for being so rad.
