From the same coalition that brought us the excellent Sickening Horror release, comes another phenomenal technical death metal release from a part of the world you would not usually expect, this time in the form of the full length debut from New Zealand’s Ulcerate.

Though not quite as experimental as the Sickening Horror release, Of Fracture and Failure is an elite tech death metal offering and a must have for fans of Spawn of Possession, Anata, Psycroptic, Capharnaum and their ilk; technical yet brutal and intelligently crafted, Ulcerate seem to meld the crippling heaviness of Cryptopsy and the surgical cluster bomb intricacy of Origin all with the confidence and skill of their peers mentioned above.

Armed with the razor sharp production that’s neither too dirty or too pristine, and a drummer in Jamie Saint Merat that delivers an admirable Jamie King/John Longstreth like performance, Ulcerate ravage and slice their way through 9 tracks of technical death perfectly executed and balanced metal precision, with the only respite being the oddly paced almost atmospheric track “Failure”, that would have been better suited as a album ending breather. Tracks like “To Fell Goliath”, “The Mark of The Satyr”, “Becoming The Lycanthrope”, “The Coming of Genocide” and “Defeaca” (well, basically every track except “Failure”) deliver criminally complex yet savage moments of orchestrated chaos or twisted segments of scrawling, almost Deathspell Omega like unearthly discordance that requires your full attention, then some medication.

My only gripe would be with vocalist Ben Read, who also sings in melodic death/thrash band 8 Foot Sativa and it shows, as he isn’t nearly as menacing, forceful or commanding as the music, preferring a mid range rasp that never really matches the intensity of material.

[Visit the band's website]

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