CONSECRATION is a Doom/Death Metal band from Norwich, England.  "Fragilium," is their second full length album; they have also released an EP, demo, and a compilation. The despair sits in immediately with the sparse, clean opening notes of "In Darkened Slumber," the first track.  The notes may be presented as more peaceful than what this genre usually offers up but further exploration reveals these notes are as hard and cold as anything else in the Doom genre this year.  The track is instrumental so it serves as both a full song and a sort of intro to the second track.

"A Sentinel For The Fragile," carries on with the clean notes, albeit the music is different.  At the two minute or so mark, heavy bass drops upon the clean instrumentation, building up to a crash of drums and a frightening Death growl from Daniel Bollam and Amies leads the song with his bass but Liam carries on the Doom spirit with simple but extremely heavy riffs and even some leads.  Halfway thru the song Figueirdro kicks up the tempo a bit and this four-piece rumbling machine turns into a full battering ram.  The song is eleven minutes long, but it definitely doesn't feel like it.  Despite the length, the band has no issue crafting an interesting song.

The next track is "In Somnus Ego Morrior (In My Sleep I Die)," a track that starts out a bit hazy and sleepy as if your eyes are closing for the final time, in preparation for the impending death that latches on eventually.  This song is seriously scary and a bit creepy, in no small part to the vocals which are the heaviest I've heard in the genre this year.  The last half of the song ups the intensity before it fades out...the death finally catching up to the living.

"An Elegy For The Departed," is the fastest paced track on the album, the Doom increased just a couple of notches to allow a more Death Metal oriented sound to the proceedings but it still has some Gothic elements, especially in the melodic leads.  The song's ending is a stark contrast to what came before but a fitting in for what is a sentimental, but harrowing song.

The final track, "To Welcome The Grey," really surprised me because of the wonderfully executed lead guitar in the beginning.  The Death growls are barely above a whisper, about as quiet as they can be and still work in tandem with the bass.  Much of the track is a more laid back approach but it definitely captures the feel of what amounts to the bleakest track on the album.  The distorted riffs and and more vibrant Death growls invade the middle part of the song, putting a suffocating blanket over what was already a dying corpse.

CONSECRATION's "Fragilium," stands out as one of the darker, and often times disturbing, Doom releases of the year.  It is an album that deeply embraces its own sound and it is better for it.