Melodic death metal is a genre that keeps on giving, it is a relentless torrent of powerful riffs and driving beats that has ploughed forward for the last 25 years regardless of change or fads. This year has Fearancy returning with their first album since 2016 as they deliver their sophomore album ‘Dæmonium’.
‘Dæmonium’ is the sound of Fearancy returning with a bellow, they are not only wiping away the cobwebs of time between the albums, but they have learnt from their mistakes as the Austrians barrel forward with an album showing they mean business. Gone are sounds of industrial metal that was littered throughout the band’s debut album and instead there is a focus here; it still has groove metal overtones that are guaranteed to open any mosh pit, but this is album which has placed its entire energy into a melodic death metal sound. This gives ‘Dæmonium’ a rather ‘timeless’ quality, was it released this year? Was it released in 1997? Or even 2006? Who knows? Such is the nature of the genre as tracks such as ‘Rise and Fall’, ‘Agony’ and ‘Voices’ have all the appeal of In Flames competing with The Haunted, Scar Symmetry and Soilwork.
Naturally, this means that there is nothing on ‘Dæmonium’ that the listener will not have heard before. It is a solid slab of melodic death metal that accomplishes what it sets out to do without the need for frills and aesthetics.
