Have you ever felt like preemptively celebrating the end of the world, and humanity as a whole? While I have discussed celebrating damnatio memoriae and preserving memory in the past, there’s something incredibly cathartic about coming to the realization that nothing matters. However, this can also cause existential dread, as you begin to wonder why you even bothered to worry about your significance in the first place. To that end, Feversea wants to show you the positive side of pessimism and how to be fine with it on their debut, Man Under Erasure.

Judging by its title, Man Under Erasure is an album that celebrates the end of humanity as we know it. It has this almost humorous way of doing so, as the opening title track seems to suggest. There’s something coy about how Feversea introduces the concept of the end of the world. It’s when second track “Murmur Within the Skull of God” starts that the party comes alive, the music dissonant and heavy, the vocals shifting between a siren’s call and screams inviting you to embrace your end. The music is also incredibly rhythmic and moving, fully immersing the listener into its sweep of fury and harmony, and it seamlessly transitions into the ballad-like “New Creatures Replace Our Names.” This track feels more like standard post-metal, complete with absorbing atmosphere, soaring vocals, and a slower tempo that indicates a sense of uncertainty underneath the celebration. There’s also a distinct Mariner influence, as if the band took cues from songs like “A Greater Call” and used it to indicate trepidation and unease. “New Creatures Replace Our Names” is where the party starts to become something else, a moment for the confused to grapple with their new reality. After all, if humanity (the descriptor) ends, then what new label would they use at this time? Why celebrate the end when they must rebuild themselves from scratch, including what new definitions to apply to themselves and the new world they will be making.

After all, as Feversea highlights throughout Man Under Erasure, the concept of Man is both insufficient and irreplaceable, and must become something else.

This is also highlighted in how Feversea approaches their music, as each track expands upon the nature of what post-metal is and can be. In a sense, Man Under Erasure offers a range of sonic elements that are episodic in nature, as while they can bleed into the other tracks, they remain under the strict confines of the established song. For example, “Decider” has a sludge feel that reminds me of bands like Glassing before heading straight into black metal territory complete with blast beats and harsh vocals. Granted, you have heard harsh vocals before, but not at the pace vocalist Ada Lønne Emberland does it. You will also find punk elements such as on the abrasive “Until It Goes Away.” This track, while polished and heavily rooted in post-metal, moves in the same way “Logic Ravaged By Brute Force” by Napalm Death – it’s fast, heavy, and blistering. The track’s dissonance implies we are approaching the final moments before eradication, and the catharsis that you experience while chanting “Until it goes away” means that you are now at peace with what’s to come. While this is not the end of the album, “Until It Goes Away” is the album’s emotional peak, preparing you for the end before the bomb goes off.

Man Under Erasure is an album that thrives in its inherent chaos, an expansion of a genre that I love dearly. While there are moments on the album that make me wish parts were trimmed so the music has more room to shine, Feversea created an immensely strong debut that will resonate even with the most hardened post-metal enjoyer. Man may be under erasure, but so is the genre, and it has the capacity to become something else, something joyous, underneath the dissonance of it all.

— Hera

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Man Under Erasure is available now on Dark Essence Records. For more information on Feversea, visit their official Facebook and Instagram.