Cold Night For Alligators is a respected and forward-thinking progressive metal outfit from Copenhagen, Denmark. Their new album, Fervor came out November 9th. For the occasion, we asked the band to tell us about each track. Their commentary on the album can be seen below.

Violent Design:

This songs was an obvious choice as a single, since it is really catchy and also sort of embodies our new sonical universe, with both soaring, uplifting choruses and quirky progressive parts. It was actually written sort of backwards, since our guitar-player Roar brought the second half of the song to us first, after which we came up with the idea of opening it with a dark, heavy and proggy section.

The lyrics are about letting go of old trauma, breaking destructive patterns and letting go of the fear of allowing people to reach out and help.

Drowning Light:

This song felt almost too straightforward in its structure when we first started writing it, but it does introduce quite a lot of variety in-between the big choruses. The second verse seems like the most straight forward prog rock part we've ever done. Lyrically, this is about someone who feels exhausted, not due to anything about himself, but because people look down on what he does with his life. 

Canaille:

This song underwent a lot of structural rearrangements, but in the end the main hooks and sections are all the same as in the first edition. That's how strong we felt they were. We've referenced different R&B artists quite a lot when working on the pre-chorus, which we can see coming through in the reviews now, haha. This is also one of two “protest” songs on the album. The lyrics are about not fitting into the norm and being ostracized for being different.

Black Swan:

This is a very dark and intense song for us, which also underwent a ton of re-writes and debate about the direction of the song. We're really proud of the way it turned out, though, since it's very dynamic while retaining a melancholy atmosphere as well. The song also showcases the huge talents of Ole Bjørn from the Danish pop act Dúné, who produced the electronics, as well as cello player Laura Torp Westh, who beefs up the epic ending. This is a very personal song about watching someone close dying from a disease, which slowly changes the person you once knew and loved during the process.

Nocturnal:

This is sort of representative of all the new elements we brought to this record, while also integrating them into what we do best. It has massive synths, odd times, endless riff variations and a huge ending. It has a very emo vibe to us, which we all agree is a new but very pervasive kind of aesthetic for us on this record.

The lyrics are about not being able to open up about one's problems. It's from the viewpoint of be both the friend of a person who has experienced trauma, but don't know how to address it, as well as the person themselves needing to open up.

Entangled: 

One of two instrumentals on the record. This is a nice little break, which sort of lifts up your spirits again after Black Swan and Nocturnal, both of whom have quite dark atmospheres. This way, it serves as the perfect bridge to the next, more hopeful sounding track, "Get Rid of the Walls". 

Get Rid of The Walls:

This is by far the most uplifting and laid-back track on "Fervor". If that can be said of a prog metal song with huge choruses, breakdowns with harsh vocals, and a cool, fusiony guitar solo in the mid-section.The lyrics are about seeing people blame themselves unnecessarily for hard decisions they've had to make, even if they were right or forced upon them. 

Wilderness:

This is quite a stand-out - very melancholy and synth-focused, this track might be the most experimental one on the record. It features down-tuned, groovy drums and really intense, soulful back-up vocals from our manager Mirza, who features a lot on this record and produced the vocals. The intro is also one of two places on the record to actually feature our bass player Christian on drums! The lyrics deal with the experience of being stuck with an unpleasant feeling, moment or situation which you can't get away from. A place in which you really don’t want to be, but accepting it.

The Proposition:

Another instrumental. The analogue synths are really coming through in a great way here. We wanted to set the tone for Soulless City with an atmospheric track, which sort of gives the listener the feeling on being dropped into a spooky, parallel universe. The parts were actually taken from a full song which we scrapped after a long writing process, so at least we got to use some of it!

Soulless City: 

We wanted to take a proggy and somewhat heavy track and put the focus a bit more on the heavy elements. This was accomplished perfectly by our good friend Andreas from Danish deathcore phenomenon Cabal, who lends his brutal vocals to most of the parts. Lyrically, the song deals with being betrayed by a person incapable of self-control, whether it's through alcoholism, addiction or something else. It's about saying enough is enough and not letting someone pull you down. 

Coloured Bones:

This song underwent a ton of re-writes and was not quite so dark to begin with. It sort of starts out soft and proggy and becomes progressively more straight-forward and groovy as it goes on. There is a great variety in the vocals on this one, with both harsh, soft, powerful and more soulful vocal lines throughout. Coloured Bones is about minorities. About standing up for yourself and not being afraid, single the struggle of the individual is rarely unique. There's always a thousand others in the same situation or with a similar story.

Infatuated:

The most obviously different track on the record, as it doesn't features any guitars or electric bass, and basically starts out with a one minute drum solo, carried by floating, odd-time synths. It then goes down into a dark, moody place, where our singer sounds quite isolated in the cold electronic soundscape surrounding him. He's not all on his own though - our bass player switched to drums once more and can be heard on the last half of the track.

The lyrics are about being alone on your deathbed and not being remembered by anyone. In some weird way, the theme of this song doesn't really fit the more hopeful theme of the rest of the record. But when you've written nine songs about how other people (including yourself) should act in different situations, it felt important to end with a remark that we all have things which we can't let go of and or solve constructively.