Process of Guilt – FÆMIN (2012)

Hailing from Portugal today we have another entry into the Sludge/Doom Metal category with Process of Guilt and their latest opus “FÆMIN”. Featuring a few ex-members of Doomsters Before The Rain, we thought this band will move past the traditional Sludge/Doom approach, but they just manage to replicate what bands like Year of No Light, Bison B.C, etc. achieve with their heavy distorted guitars and mid-tempo spurts of anger.

“Empire” starts with some nice feedback and then it goes into the endless repetitive loop of riffing and drums that most Sludge bands opt for, but the band never seems to really get out of this funk. While we understand the genre dictates for something like this, we can’t really see any value or different between the previously mentioned bands. “Blindfold” is a bit faster paced, but it also quickly drowns in repetitiveness and dulls the listener into submission. The band wrote 5-6 riffs and they just stick to them for the duration of this release.

The funky bass guitar line of “Harvest” makes this song a bit more bearable, but it still feels pretty old and cyclical. “Cleanse” is the only track that tries to be a bit more different with a more elaborate build-up and some nice speed-up sections. The monolithic “Fæmin” delivers 11 minutes of very well crafted aggression mixed with the typical Sludge shenanigans, and while this track is also pretty decent, it is hard to really say that the whole release is very good. This song reminded us of Year of No Light, but with a different edge and more elaborate riffing, showing that Process of Guilt has some potential.

Overall, we can’t completely say that “FÆMIN” is bad because it does have its moments; however, the band needs to mature musically and create less repetitive and more compelling songs. The last two tracks are pretty solid and with a few more of those, this would have definitely been an excellent release. If you like Sludge and you don’t mind a band going a bit too far with their repetitive sections, this release might be of interest for you.

Release: June 11th, 2012

Country: Portugal