One of the most anticipated bands in the death metal underground, Spectrum of Delusion, are poised to release their most ambitious album to date this Friday. That being said, you can read the title, you know this is a premiere of the new album Neoconception. What you don't know is just how far Spectrum of Delusion go on this album to push the boundaries of their own songwriting and death metal as a whole in 2020.
Neoconception is a concept album, surrounding catastrophic events taking place in a hypothetical world. One person's attempt to deal with their life coming to a close, and how it's handled. The album has guest musicians, such as Nick Padovani (Equipoise, Virulent Depravity) who plays acoustic guitar on "Pointless Endeavour", "Torment of Being", "Into Another Formation", "Bringing Serenity", "Destruction", and "To Tower Over All Other". Also featured is Robbert Lol (Disavowed, Arsebreed) on "To Tower Over All". On top of all this, the album also features various sections of voice acting to help progress the story in a meaningful way.
This isn't an album about guest spots though, sure they exist, but the true beauty of this album comes from the musicianship of the band, and the well crafted and moulded lyrics and vocals. Neoconception is 13 tracks long spanning just over 40 minutes, with various short tracks and interludes. As the story becomes more dire, the instrumentals become far more technical. Early on in the album, with songs like. "Defunct Reality" there is a major focus on death metal, with tinges of tech death in there. As you reach the catalyst of the story, the instrumentals become much more intense and unpredictable, which works well with how the story works.
Discussing the album and touching on the story, Spectrum of Delusion say, "Neoconception quite literally and figuratively stands for the start of something new. Story-wise, we don’t want to reveal too much. People should have fun reading the lyrics, listening to the voice acting, and piecing all the information together themselves. To shed a little light on the story though, it is about the experience of a person whose reality suddenly turns defunct, the world events that follow, and the person in question's journey of dealing with it."
While Neoconception releases this Friday through The Artisan Era, the album is available to hear in full now below. Might I suggest picking the album up and helping these guys out considering they currently can not tour? CDs, very nice looking vinyl, and shirts are all available through their Bandcamp and The Artisan Era webshop. This is easily the most ambitious death metal album so far in 2020 and if you're a fan of death metal or tech death to any capacity, it's definitely one you need to listen to.
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