Doom Metal

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Salem - Playing God And Other Short Stories (2010)

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    Hailing from Israel, Salem is a very ‘diverse’ band that plays a combination of Death/Gothic/Doom Metal and it’s pretty good at it….. until now. “Playing God And Other Short Stories” is a very, very weird album that will either get on your nerves after the first three songs or you will totally love it. We are kind of in the middle since we think some songs are good and others are dreadful.

    The first thing you will notice is the mixing on the drums is way high and makes them sound weird, plus the band does use some weird drumming structures on their songs (so we think) making it sound like a drum circle on crack. In other words, we think the percussions are extremely overdone in this release.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Year Of No Light – Ausserwelt (2010)

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    Around the same vein as Ufo Mammuth, we have Year Of No Light, and band that does great justice to its name by playing mesmerizing Ambient Doom with Shoegaze influences that will take you in a dark voyage with a considerable lack of light. Hailing from France, this band has a very crushing sound, mostly due to the fact that they have three guitar players and two drummers, one of the richest line-ups we have ever seen in a band.

    “Ausserwelt” is a 48 minute journey into a dark and desolate place that features a very rich and powerful soundtrack. With 4 tracks the band manages to create a super thick atmosphere that only a handful of bands are capable of. This album is not for the weak of mind and will surely blow yours away with every listen you dedicate to it.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Ufomammut – Eve (2010)

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    Every single time that Ufomammut has released an album and we have heard it, it has taken a bit to fully sink and be appreciated. All 6 full-length releases from this Italian trio push the boundaries of madness and Psychedelic Doom Metal, leaving them a few miles away from the competition.

    “Eve” marks the band’s 6th release and it’s a 45 minute one-track divided in 5 movements’ behemoth. You can truly note the level of genius/insanity behind such a crushing release that will leave you thinking for a while. The band has a great ability in creating exploratory voyages into their twisted minds in every single one of their releases.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Lair Of The Minotaur - Evil Power (2010)

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    With a very interesting band name: Lair Of The Minotaur, and a superb album title “Evil Power” we review today this band from the USA. The band plays a very interesting combination of Trash and Doom metal that we have only heard a handful of times. With the unconventional combination of genres comes either great or terrible music, but Lair Of The Minotaur pulls it off nicely.

    Since the first moments of “Evil Power” you can hear what the band is all about: combining Trashy riffs with Doom metal’s grinding style. And as you can expect, the band produces pure power and aggression with their 30 minutes of music divided in 11 tracks.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Ichabod – 2012 (2009)

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    With the waves of bands playing Stoner Rock/Metal with Psychedelic influences we have a hard time finding something worth listening to. Ichabod solves this problem for us with 2012, their 3rd full-length album in 11 years of existence. The band does a good job in reminding us what this genre is all about with their grooviness and heaviness.

    Hailing from Massachusetts, the band has the traditional American sound of this genre. They also do a great job in capturing the moodiness of stoner rock and making it their own. However, in whenever the band uses clean vocals they sound terrible; the singer really needs to get some lessons before attempting them again. The harsh vocals are good enough for a release of this kind.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Cathedral – The Guessing Game (2010)

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    Five years have passed since the band’s last effort “The Garden of Unearthly Delights” and Cathedral has returned with another brilliant release with “The Guessing Game”. Having been around for 20 years and evolving unlike any other band of their time, Cathedral breaks the mold of Stoner/Doom Metal music by adding more progressive and psychedelic elements to their already diverse sound.

    Lee Dorian and folks have never made a single album that had disappointed us and “The Guessing Game” is no exception to this rule. Released as a in a double CD, we have over 80 minutes of brilliant music that will surely please Cathedral fans. While the band is less ‘Doomy’ than before, they do a great job of combining Doom Metal riffs with a wide variety of instruments and sounds.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    An Autumn For Crippled Children – Lost (2010)

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    With an extremely interesting (and messed up) name, I was very intrigued by this band. After reading the release’s press information I got even more excited, since they claimed that the band mixes Atmospheric Doom Metal with Black Metal and Post-Rock, a combination that on paper sounds heavenly but in practice can be a total failure.

    So being both excited and skeptical about An Autumn For Crippled Children (AAFCC for short), I decided to dive in and take a swing at this release. Let me tell you, this album is all that it was hyped to be and even more, the music is both dense and haunting creating a tick atmosphere that will immerse you into AAFCC’s demented world since the first minute of “Lost”.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Svartsot - Mulmets Viser (2010)

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    Coming from Denmark, we get Napalm Records second Folk/Viking Metal offering of the month. “Mulmets Viser” is Svartsot’s second full-length album and their best to date. Having recorded two brilliant demos and one full-length album (“Ravnenes Saga”) the band shows no signs of losing their edge in every release.

    After 90% of the band quit in 2008, Cris J.S. Frederiksen wasted no time in putting together a group of musicians that wanted to continue with Svartsot. This bold move paid off since there is nothing lost in the quality of this band, and we would even dare to say that they sound better than ever.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Brown Jenkins – Death Obsession (2009)

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    Following their acclaimed by some (and trashed by others) album “Angel Eyes”, Brown Jenkins releases their last opus “Death Obsession”. Like it or not, Brown Jenkins is one of those bands that you either praise or despise, I side with the later.

    If you are not aware of what kind of music Brown Jenkins plays, they try to mix Doom and Black Metal with heavy Drone influence and the result is, in my opinion, a half assed approach to either of the genres.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    While Heaven Wept – Vast Oceans Lachrymose (2009)

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    While Heaven Wept is one of my favorite American bands since their Epic/Power Doom Metal is very different than other bands out there, and “Vast Oceans Lachrymose” is a worthy follow up to “Of Empires Forlorn”.

    However “Vast Oceans Lachrymose” sounds much more like the continuation of “Of Empires Forlorn” since they both have plenty of similarities in their sound. If you like the band’s previous album then you will love this new one, but if you did not then this is the problem here, the band shows almost no musical evolution between them.

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