Daylight Dies

Daylight Dies aren't the most prolific metal artists. A Frail Becoming is only their fourth full-length album in a career that's spanned well over a decade, and it's been a four-year wait since their last one (Lost to the Living). Rather than producing substantial change, this slightly extended timeframe has allowed the band to further hone the intense precision of their powerful, but melancholic gloom. If doom metal is Daylight Dies' niche, it's still doom of the melodic kind, with an inconstantly ponderous weight building as the album progresses. This slow, restrained brutality is veined with rhythmic contrasts, from the quick lightness of guitar countermelodies to delicate interludes, moments of heavy groove or unrepentantly "heavy metal" leads. These variations are mirrored in the vocals ― a mostly refined growl interspersed with brief sections of soft singing. Medium-heavy is the predominant vibe, with extremes in either direction all the more poignant as a result. It's not a new Daylight Dies we hear on A Frail Becoming, but a band accomplished and confident in the "rightness" of their warmly desolate sound.