Track By Tracks: Architectural Genocide - CORDYCEPTIC ANTHROPOMORPH (2020)

First off, creating this album was a lot of fun, and it pushed my boundaries in writing lyrical content, as well as refined my grotesque vocabulary and prose. I’ve been an avid fan of metal since I was 10 years old, but I only recently started pursuing the metal band life. I’ve been growling to my favs in my car for over a decade, butI’m relatively new to creating and performing for an audience. The name of the album is Cordyceptic Anthropomorph. Cordyceps are a fungal strain that thrive on infiltrating and controlling living hosts. After the sheer violation, the cordyceps eventually destroy said hosts. While most hosts are insects, I was thoroughly intrigued by meshing this idea with human hosts. Iwanted to make a concept album based on a creature Ideemed the Cordyceptic Anthropomorph, whichwas inspired first by the song “Cordyceps Humanis” by one of my favorite bands, Cephalic Carnage. With an urge to learn more, I watched adocumentary about cordyceps repeatedly to gain inspiration and a better understanding of the fungus. Video games are a constant in my life, and it would be foolish for me to not also reference The Last of Us as another means of inspiration.With those influences, I put my pen to the paper and wrote Cordyceptic Anthropomorph, about a human subjected to horrific experimentation with cordyceps. Asthe experiment goes wrong, the anthropomorphic is driven to spread its fungal infection, eradicate the human species, and bring forth a new era of existence. Each song takes a different perspective on how the infection and world domination transpires.

1. Spires of Mangled Tissue:

Cordyceps release airborne spores that put its victims into a zombie-like state. After inhaling the mind-controlling fumes, victims walk to their dying location. The fungal being builds a kingdom with the remains of its victims. The dead are collected and used to build itspalace of annihilation. Picture a Medievalcastle with pavilions, grand hallways, and towering spires, but instead of being built of the traditional brick and mortar, it is constructed with muscle, skin, and bone and secured with human fluids! Even the ground on which the anthropomorphic walks is covered in human remains. This is the gore forged palace, the cordyceptic paradise.

2. Hallucinogenic Demise:

This song was named by our drummer, and the concept isabout a mushroom trip that brings about mass death.We here at AG cannot confirm or deny personal experiences influencing the lyrical direction of this song *wink, wink.*As mentioned in the previous track, the cordyceptic anthropomorph possesses the ability to release airborne spores. In this situation, the spores are hallucinogenic in nature. As a consequence, masses are captivated by their rising levels of serotoninwhile their minds slip into an eternal hell that ultimately leads to their death.This is one of my favorite songs both musically and lyrically; it’s an all-around banger.

3. Dominate and Proliferate:

Dominated by the cordyceps, the humans are forced to take the alien seed.Humans are used to breed a new alien species into existence. Unfortunately for the humans, the cordyceps do not buy dinner and a movie before forcing them on the floor and pollenating their orifices.The humans are repurposed and left as slaves with gaping holes,as they are the vessels by which new cordyceps are usheredinto the world.This song is all about being fucked by an alien, which, I didn’t know until recently, is a popular fetish. Watch out, ladies; this song is known to stimulate and invigorate. This is one of my favorites to perform live because of the slam at the end. 

4. Cordyceptic Anthropomorph:

The infamous title track. The theme and some of the passages of this song were originally written about five years ago, and they were the foundation for the concept of thisalbum.

In this song, a human undergoes the definitive experimentation that creates the cordyceptic anthropomorph. This is the conception of the beast. As an unknown feeling sparks throughout the creature,the flesh simultaneously mutateswith fungal attributes. All the while, the brain receives the host. This leaves only a few strands of human DNA left in the monstrosity. Once the physical form takes shape, instincts are redefined, and the beingis drivenby the desire to propagate the cordyceptic species and eradicate the human race. One of my favorite lines in this song reads, “A parasitic mutative germinating monstrosity.” This quote not only sums up the song but the entire album. That’s why we had no choice but to name this song the title track. That, and it’s brutal as FUCK!

5. Gorge on Deceased:

This is an endless lust to consume the human remains.The cordyceptic anthropomorph has reproduced and made an army of its kind. This army needs to eat! The beasts devour the dead; these humans are nutritious and finger licking good, too. The taste for blood becomes addictive, and each bite brings these monsters closer to ecstasy. It’s like an eternal all-you-can-eat buffet, except humans are on the menu. Hope you’re hungry for some death metal,because this song exceeds the daily recommended serving of brutality. 

6. Pleasure Induced by Agony:

I have watched Slither many a time over the years, and I feel like this is my homage to the cult film I have loved so much.“Pleasure Induced by Agony”is driven by the idea that a singlemonstrous beingcan telekinetically control multiple organisms and feel the pain of its victims. Fallen victim to the alien fetish myself, I enjoyed illustratingthe idea of this creature having a massive alien bonerand ejaculating while feelingthe excruciating pain itinflicts upon its controlled victims.It savors the suffering. As it eviscerates their bodies,the anthropomorph is overcome with a sense of euphoria. This is the deepest feeling of exhilaration this monster can experience. It becomes addicted to it!

7. Abolishment of Human Existence:

This was one of the first songs I wrote lyrics to, and at the time, I was listening to “In the End of Human Existence” by Abominable Putridity, hence the name and idea for the title. It is written from the perspective of the anthropomorph, as a manifesto of sorts. I tried toshed light on the intentions and feelings the monstrous being has developed. Seeing the humans as a primitive nuisance, the anthropomorph brings forth the cordyceptic army. A monumental onslaught commences, and the anthropomorph fulfills its own prophecy by eradicating the human raceandcreating its own autocracy with the cordyceptic species.

8. Burgeoning Necrosis:

This is the album closer.I wanted to convey the growth of the cordyceptic species, the final form so to speak. Thesegiants are planted as seeds into the crust of the Earth and deplete the Earth’s resources while germinating.These fungal seeds grow into enormous destroyers of worlds. They are apex predators that spread death, just as the original cordyceptic anthropomorph promised. Burgeoning necrosis, or more simply put, growing death,is what this album and band are all about. I mean c’mon, we are Architectural Genocide, after all. We build death!