The Funeral Doom Metal Thread
Esoteric - "Metamorphogeneis" (1999)
Birmingham's finest funeral doom merchants unleash three epic pieces of mind-warping psychedelia & cosmic exploration. This release is not for the faint-hearted but patience (& a good quality set of headphones) will be rewarded with an almost transcendental experience.
4.5/5
Ok, so I've completed my now regular Top Ten list for the week & this time I decided to take on the challenge that Sonny joked about a couple of weeks ago by attempting to collate my Top Ten Funeral Doom Metal Releases of All Time list. Here's what I came up with:
01. Esoteric – “Paragon of Dissonance” (2011)
02. Esoteric – “Metamorphogenesis” (1999)
03. Evoken – “Atra Mors” (2012)
04. The Howling Void – “Shadows Over The Cosmos” (2010)
05. Thergothon – “Stream From The Heavens” (1994)
06. Monolithe – “Monolithe II” (2005)
07. Ea – “Ea” (2012)
08. Ea – “Au ellai” (2010)
09. Remembrance – “Fall, Obsidian Night” (2010)
10. Black Wreath – “A Pyre Of Lost Dreams” (2009)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/132
There ended up being a lot of releases & bands that I haven't been able to include due to the long periods of time since I last revisited them (Shape Of Despair & Mournful Congregation for example) but the list is about as good as I could come up with for the moment & I'll continue to improve it as I listen to additional releases. Frustratingly, Mournful Congregation's 1994 "Weeping" demo would have come in at number two on the list but was ineligible due to not being eligible for inclusion on the site.
Now we're talking! This is the toughest top ten for me, I have so many albums I'd love to include, but being ruthless and keeping it to ten, here we go:
1. Evoken - Quietus (2001)
2. Esoteric - A Pyrrhic Existence (2019)
3. Ahab - The Call of the Wretched Sea (2006)
4. Tyranny - Tides of Awakening (2005)
5. Bismuth - The Slow Dying of the Great Barrier Reef (2018)
6. Bell Witch - Mirror Reaper (2017)
7. Esoteric - The Maniacal Vale (2008)
8. Skepticism - Lead and Aether (1997)
9. Colosseum - Chapter 2: Numquam (2009)
10. Worship - Last Tape Before Doomsday (1999) - although my version is Last CD Before Doomsday from 2004.
Nice to see some love for Ea on your list Daniel. They seem to be overlooked by many funeral doom devotees. They would certainly have featured on a top twenty list for me, but I just couldn't boot any of the above out of a top ten in favour of their Ea taesse or A etilla albums which would likely be my choices.
I'll do a "no order / only one release per band" list, as I've haven't listened to a lot of these in a long time. Plus the list would be dominated by Shape of Despair and Esoteric too.
Thergothen - Stream from the Heavens (1994)
Esoteric - Pernicious Enigma (1997)
Skepticism - Lead and Aether (1997)
Worship - Last Tape Before Doomsday (1999)
Shape of Despair - Angels of Distress (2001)
Evoken - Quietus (2001)
Tyranny - Tides of Awakening (2005)
Monolithe - Monolithe II (2005)
Ahab - The Call of the Wretched (2006)
Bell Witch - Mirror Reaper (2017)
Esoteric - "The Maniacal Vale" (2008)
Jesus Fucking Christ! Birmingham-based funeral doom metallers Esoteric's 2008 fifth album "The Maniacal Vale" is utter genius. I'm absolutely blown away by it & think it might actually be the finest example of the subgenre I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing. Don't let the 100 minute double-album format put you off because the band cover a surprising amount of ground for an artist of this type. The post-metal influence is beautifully incorporated without ever sounding forced & the vocal performance is nothing short of spectacular. What a production job too! Look, I won't bother going into it more than that as Sonny's review sums up my feelings splendidly. Let's just say that Esoteric are comfortably the greatest funeral doom metal band of all in my opinion & this may just be their finest hour.
For fans of Evoken, Thergothon & Skepticism.
5/5
Here's my updated top ten:
01. Esoteric - "The Maniacal Vale" (2008)
02. Esoteric – “Paragon of Dissonance” (2011)
03. Esoteric – “Metamorphogenesis” (1999)
04. Evoken – “Atra Mors” (2012)
05. The Howling Void – “Shadows Over The Cosmos” (2010)
06. Thergothon – “Stream From The Heavens” (1994)
07. Monolithe – “Monolithe II” (2005)
08. Ea – “Ea” (2012)
09. Ea – “Au ellai” (2010)
10. Remembrance – “Fall, Obsidian Night” (2010)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/132
"Let's just say that Esoteric are comfortably the greatest funeral doom metal band of all in my opinion... "
Amen to that!
My updated list:
01. Esoteric - "The Maniacal Vale" (2008)
02. Esoteric – “Paragon of Dissonance” (2011)
03. Esoteric – “Metamorphogenesis” (1999)
04. Ahab - "The Call of The Wretched Sea" (2006)
05. Evoken – “Atra Mors” (2012)
06. The Howling Void – “Shadows Over The Cosmos” (2010)
07. Thergothon – “Stream From The Heavens” (1994)
08. Monolithe – “Monolithe II” (2005)
09. Ea – “Ea” (2012)
10. Ea – “Au ellai” (2010)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/132
Esoteric - "The Pernicious Enigma" (1997)
When I first heard English funeral doom masters Esoteric's highly regarded sophomore album "The Pernicious Enigma" back in the day I found myself struggling with various different elements. There's no doubt that the production job could have been much better & that was my main obstacle however I also found the continuous wave of layered vocals & the extreme length of this release (i.e. a 115 minute double album of funeral doom metal can be daunting at the best of times) to be a challenge. Since that time Esoteric have become one of my absolute favourite bands though & this revisit has seen the penny finally dropping for me with everything the band were trying to achieve now being hungrily lapped up by this fussy ol' bastard.
That's not to say that "The Pernicious Enigma" is a perfect record(s) by any means. The occasional use of more up-tempo sections are nowhere near as effective as the rest of the material with the short industrial death metal piece "At War With the Race" failing to meet expectations. There are a few attempts at off-beat drumming that don't really stick the landing either & the fact that they've had to resort to using a drum machine for a few tracks tells a pretty clear story about fill-in drummer Anthony Brewer's talents. Nonetheless, the consistency with which Esoteric are able to deliver wonderfully monstrous masterpieces of psychedelic depravity is unprecedented & one needs only take a cursory glance at the likes of "Dominion of Slaves" or "Sinistrous" to realise how all-encompassing that idea can be when all the planets align. The incorporation of a diverse array of influences also helps to free the band from the strict stylistic confines of the funeral doom metal genre with Godflesh style industrial moments & slowly building post-metal build-ups proving to be invaluable assets here along with Esoteric's inimitable penchant for mind-expanding psychedelia.
Esoteric are untouched in their field & even a thin production job where the rhythm guitars have nowhere near the weight that they deserve is not enough to stop them from looking down on the competition from their funeral thrones while we bask in yet another glorious procession of unwavering doom.
For fans of Evoken, Thergothon & Skepticism.
4.5/5
My updated list after revisiting Esoteric's "The Pernicious Enigma" over the last couple of days:
01. Esoteric - "The Maniacal Vale" (2008)
02. Esoteric – “Paragon of Dissonance” (2011)
03. Esoteric – “Metamorphogenesis” (1999)
04. Ahab - "The Call of The Wretched Sea" (2006)
05. Esoteric - "The Pernicious Enigma" (1997)
06. Evoken – “Atra Mors” (2012)
07. The Howling Void – “Shadows Over The Cosmos” (2010)
08. Thergothon – “Stream From The Heavens” (1994)
09. Monolithe – “Monolithe II” (2005)
10. Ea – “Ea” (2012)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/132
The Funeral Orchestra - Funeral Death - Apocalyptic Plague Ritual II (2022)
The Funeral Orchestra are a Gothenburg funeral doom three-piece that features Runemagick's Leif Nicklas Rudolfsson on guitar and vocals. I do have some familiarity with the band, but I have only previously heard their debut, Feeding the Abyss, which I dug quite a bit. Funeral Death - Apocalyptic Plague Ritual II actually comprises only one new track which is opener Funeral Death (The Rite Of Winter). The rest are re-recordings of earlier tracks and as such the band consider this not to be an album proper.
Anyway, on to the music itself. It's not the slowest example of funeral doom that you will ever hear, but the sound is pretty massive and it does a good job of crushing and smothering the listener with it's huge, sinister-sounding chords and oppressive atmosphere. There is an occult-laden ominousness to their sound that niggles away at the edge of awareness in an exceedingly effective manner, reinforced by chanted ritualistic-sounding vocals, such as during the superb Flesh Infiltrations or Apocalyptic Trance Ritual. The main harsh vocal sits somewhere between death and black metal, but doesn't sound especially abrasive despite that and the drums have a deep, booming quality that gives the impression of tympani percussion and sound like they are issuing from deep beneath the earth. The overall impression is one of a sinister cult performing forbidden rites in long-forsaken subterranean caverns, beseeching primordial deep-dwelling pit denizens to do their bidding.
I have got to admit to being a little disappointed by this year's doom metal output so far, but The Funeral Orchestra have certainly upped the ante with this and despite the fact that the band don't consider it a full album per se, it is still a stand-out in a fairly mediocre year for the fan of everything menacing, slow and crushing. I'm really looking forward to their next endeavour after this.
4.5/5
Until Death Overtakes Me - Prelude To Monolith (2008)
For my money, funeral doom metal is possibly the most primal of all metal genres. The immense crushing weight it conveys speaks of the unimaginably massive forces that shaped our world and, indeed, the universe itself back in the furthest aeons of time. There is also a form of funeral doom that is less heavy but, in a way, is almost spiritual in what it calls to within those willing to receive it. When I say spiritual, I don't mean in a, for want of a better word, "god-centric" way. This type of spirituality predates any man-made anthroporphism of the forces at work and instead speaks to an interconnectedness with the flow and essence of these inconceivable forces and energies that is buried deep inside all of us.
Until Death Overtakes Me's Prelude to Monolith is exactly one such release. It's iteration of funeral doom is not going to leave you gasping for air like an Esoteric or Ahab album, for it's touch is not quite as pulverisingly massive. Rather, it draws on dark ambient for inspiration and weaves it throughout it's sixty-eight minutes with the effect of leavening some of the sheer weight with lighter, more ethereal threads. There is a "booming" nature to the drum sound that is suggestive of tympani drums and that always adds an esoteric (small "e") atmosphere and that is reinforced by the sometimes barely perceptible rumble of the vocals. Overlaying this is a thin keyboard drone that is reminiscent of Thergothon's Stream From the Heavens. The whole effect makes for a remarkably relaxing-sounding album that cradles and croons rather than overwhelms the listener, allowing them to touch the infinite, if only for a mere heavenly hour!
4/5
My updated list after revisiting (& finally rating) Esoteric's "A Pyrrhic Existence" over the last couple of days with Ea's self-titled 2012 album being the unlucky release to drop out of my top ten:
01. Esoteric - "The Maniacal Vale" (2008)
02. Esoteric – “Paragon of Dissonance” (2011)
03. Esoteric – “Metamorphogenesis” (1999)
04. Esoteric - "A Pyrrhic Existence" (2019)
05. Ahab - "The Call of The Wretched Sea" (2006)
06. Esoteric - "The Pernicious Enigma" (1997)
07. Evoken – “Atra Mors” (2012)
08. The Howling Void – “Shadows Over The Cosmos” (2010)
09. Thergothon – “Stream From The Heavens” (1994)
10. Monolithe – “Monolithe II” (2005)
10. Ea – “Ea” (2012)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/132
Bell Witch - "Mirror Reaper" (2017)
It’s interesting that I’ve held a decade-long relationship with Seattle-based funeral doom metal duo Bell Witch now but are still yet to submit a rating or review for one of the releases. That’s not all that unusual as I tend to listen to a lot of new metal releases while doing other things & have a strict policy of only rating/reviewing releases that I’ve invested a minimum of three active listens in. The reason that it’s a little unexpected with Bell Witch though is that I tend to put the effort in with artists that are this widely praised & that begs the question of why I haven’t with “Mirror Reaper” which is very highly regarded, particularly with the regulars on our wonderful online platform. Is it because I find the prospect of an 84-minute single track funeral doom metal album a daunting prospect? I think it might be to tell you the truth but I’ve decided that it’s about time that I bit the bullet because I remember “Mirror Reaper” being a very engaging release & besides… that pearler of a cover is surely justification enough, isn’t it?
“Mirror Reaper” sees Bell Witch returning with a slightly different lineup to that of their 2015 sophomore album "Four Phantoms" following the tragic death of drummer Adrian Guerra, an event that seems to have played a major role in the direction of their third album. Founding member, vocalist & bass player Dylan Desmond (formerly of funeral sludge metallers Sathothrace) has subsequently recruited Jesse Shreibman (current drummer with Portland death metallers Autophagy) to replace his lost brother in arms & together they continue to expand on Bell Witch’s unique take on funeral doom which famously excludes any guitar work whatsoever. That’s right ladies & gentlemen, Bell Witch don’t have a guitarist & most people probably wouldn’t pick it up if they didn't read about it in the media as they use the bass in a layered fashion that ingeniously mimics a traditional guitar but also gives their sound a slightly different feel. This fact alone makes a band like Bell Witch a very intriguing prospect of course but once you get through your first listen you'll find that you soon get over it & get on with your enjoyment of the band’s music as a whole.
Bell Witch’s unique brand of funeral doom metal is both highly atmospheric & quite sombre & introspective in nature. It’s certainly crushingly heavy at times (particularly when Desmond’s super-deep death growls are brought to the foreground) but the duo choose their moments to bring out their more savage side. More often we find them directing their focus towards the listener’s emotional side, regularly utilizing stripped-back post-rock sections to great effect with the predominant use of bass guitar & a whiny-ish indie-style vocal delivery giving them a depth that other artists don’t generally touch on. That word “depth” is actually a very good reference for a record like “Mirror Reaper” because it’s an undeniably deep album but depth isn’t the same thing as substance & I’ll elaborate on that a little bit because it’s an important factor in my final scoring. Bell Witch have absolutely nailed the execution of their craft with “Mirror Reaper”. In fact, I’d be very surprised if it’s not exactly what they envisaged when going into the studio with the production perfectly capturing the mellow atmospherics. What’s missing for me is the melodic hooks to take me from really enjoying an album to levels of utter worship. Perhaps the lack of traditional guitars contributes to that as I don’t feel there are enough melodic hooks for me to latch onto & I find myself craving some lead guitar work at various stages throughout the run time.
Regardless of this, Bell Witch have produced a high quality, emotionally-gripping release that portrays the band’s grief very well. It’s not the heaviest funeral doom record you’ll ever hear & perhaps that’s been to the Bell Witch’s detriment when it comes to appealing to someone with my personal taste profile but I find it very hard to pull my gaze away from what’s going on here, despite the album being undeniably self-indulgent in it’s scope. I think some of that can be put down to the fact that the piece is structured in a way that sees it slowly evolving into several quite different sections which gives the album a memorability that’s not always evident on single-track funeral doom records. For all these reasons, I don’t doubt that funeral doom nuts will go bonkers over "Mirror Reaper", especially those with a penchant for artists like Germany’s Ahab, Nashville’s Loss or fellow Seattleites Un.
4/5
Here's my updated Top Ten Funeral Doom Metal Release of All Time list with Monolithe's very solid "Monolithe II" being the unlucky one to miss out on this occasion:
01. Esoteric - "The Maniacal Vale" (2008)
02. Esoteric – “Paragon of Dissonance” (2011)
03. Esoteric – “Metamorphogenesis” (1999)
04. Esoteric - "A Pyrrhic Existence" (2019)
05. Ahab - "The Call of The Wretched Sea" (2006)
06. Esoteric - "The Pernicious Enigma" (1997)
07. Evoken – “Atra Mors” (2012)
08. The Howling Void – “Shadows Over The Cosmos” (2010)
09. Bell Witch - "Mirror Reaper" (2017)
10. Thergothon – “Stream From The Heavens” (1994)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/132
So, here is my revised and extended funeral doom list with my top 30, none of which I have scored at less than 4.5/5.
1. Esoteric - A Pyrrhic Existence (2019)
2. Evoken - Quietus (2001)
3. Ahab - The Call of the Wretched Sea (2006)
4. Tyranny - Tides of Awakening (2005)
5. Esoteric - The Maniacal Vale (2008)
6. Bell Witch - Mirror Reaper (2017)
7. Skepticism - Lead and Aether (1997)
8. Shape of Despair - Angels of Distress (2001)
9. Worship - Last Tape Before Doomsday (1999)
10. Colosseum - Chapter 2: Numquam (2009)
11. Vin de Mia Trix - Palimpsests (2017)
12. Evoken - A Caress of the Void (2007)
13. Bell Witch - Four Phantoms (2015)
14. Arcana Coelestia - Le mirage de l'idéal (2009)
15. Ahab - The Boats of the Glen Carrig (2015)
16. Ea - Ea taesse (2006)
17. Shape of Despair - Return to the Void (2022)
18. Thergothon - Stream From the Heavens (1994)
19. Monolithe - Monolithe II (2005)
20. Slow - V - Oceans (2017)
21. The Funeral Orchestra - Funeral Death - Apocalyptic Plague Ritual II (2022)
22. Evoken - Embrace the Emptiness (1998)
23. Tyranny - Aeons in Tectonic Interment (2015)
24. Bell Witch - Longing (2012)
25. Loss - Horizonless (2017)
26. Monolithe - Monolithe I (2003)
27. Mournful Congregation - The Monad of Creation (2005)
28. The Slow Death - II (2012)
29. Ea - A etilla (2014)
30. Atavist - III: Absolution (2020)
Skepticism - "Stormcrowfleet" (1995)
Ben & I became involved with the debut album from this highly praised Finnish funeral doom metal outfit very early on in their recording career however we've always been quite divided on the merits of "Stormcrowfleet". My younger brother claims it to be an unmitigated classic in every respect while I've never been able to see past a few obvious failings that have prevented it from ever eclipsing the status of a passing interest. This revisit hasn't seen that changing as I still struggle with the poor production & performances. The fuzzy guitars sound like they're in another room from the rest of the band while the ultra-lethargic drumming is regularly out of time which makes the album sound more like a cheap demo than a proper release. The fact that there aren't technically many genuine guitar riffs doesn't help either with most of the melodic themes being presented by some pretty cheap sounding synthesizers.
Despite these obstacles though, there's something mysterious about Skepticism's sound that manages to keep my interest in 2023. It's an ethereal quality that's not dissimilar to those found on lo-fi atmospheric black metal releases & it's this element alone that sees Skepticism offering me enough reward to justify my continued attention. The lengthy tracks that bookend the tracklisting are the best examples, particularly the marvellous closer "The Everdarkgreen" which has surprised me enough to see me now calling it a classic example of the funeral doom metal sound. "Stormcrowfleet" may never come close to reaching any of my top ten lists but I'd suggest that it contains an unusual aura that may appeal to fans of Thergothon, Profetus & Pantheist.
3.5/5
Gonna post three Evoken reviews here. Third one will come after these two shortly.
Evoken - Embrace the Emptiness (1998)
Genres: Funeral Doom, Death Doom
Evoken seems to be considered as essential to funeral doom metal as Esoteric. They're one of those bands that many say has never made a bad album. The debut left an impact on the metal world for helping to cement a darker side of funeral by combining it with the death doom of bands like My Dying Bride and Katatonia. So when you combine the two, I would expect the result to be something even darker than the norm. But for a debut, how well could it go the first time?
From front to back, atmosphere was their strongest point, and in the context of the funeral sound, that's exactly what they needed. This careful balance between the sombre classical sound of funeral death and that malevolent sense of fear and anger that death doom is known for is carefully handled. One of the biggest pros of the album is the variety of vocals, going from low growls to despairing cries to black metal pitches. So we get the a very healthy doom experience that covers a lot of ground for the fans of the sombre world of doom, and not the psychedelic Sabbath lovers. The guitar tone has a fairly gothic touch to it to bring out more of the funereal vibes Of course, this is a funeral doom metal album. There's a general flaw that's apparent in so much doom metal, especially the funeral brand: the length and sameyness of the songs. A couple of these would be five-star songs if I couldn't tell what was gonna happen next.
For a debut it was nice. The atmosphere was more than what I asked for and much more impressive than what a debut album generally says about the act. But as far as structuring a song goes, these guys are pretty standard. They got the mood just right and left the idea of variety and uniqueness out the window, but at least they nailed what they focused on.
81
Evoken - Quietus (2001)
Genres: Funeral Doom, Death Doom
Now that I'm more serious about exploring doom metal, Evoken has become a top priority for their high reputation in my least favorite doom genre: funeral. Evoken bridged the gap between death doom and funeral doom on their debut, already making a name for themselves as one of the darkest bands on Earth since the debut's atmosphere was perfect, although the variety was low. Let's see what they can do with death and funeral this time.
There's a stronger structural touch which is a bit more unpredictable and organized at the same time. That drumming in Burning really added another layer of depth to an already deep and seriously atmospheric song. Thanks to an thin-layer of general creepiness akin to a Blut Aus Nord album, there's a unique touch to this album without losing the deathly vibes of their debut, which makes the vibe of the first two tracks more ghostly than anything. After having heard and loved In Their Darkened Shrines after the second playthrough, I've been itching for more "ghostly" metal. The vibe of Withering Indignation, however, is totally different. The snailish doom has a serious rasp to it akin to stoner metal or a good Boris song. The droning creates a perfect vibe as dungeon-synth backdrops occasionally make their way into the mix. It's a great combination of psychedelic noise and neoclassical ambiance. Tending the Dire Hatred starts by following the same vein as before, but when it switches to a faster tempo, we get a raw heavy metal vibe that switches to tribal drumming like in a Neurosis album. But eventually it calms down into a very dungeon-grounded song when the metal becomes equal to or second to the synth via atmospheric focus. And Where Ghosts Fall Silent seems to switch through several of the previously established vibes in a manner similar to My Dying Bride until settling on a slower death doom sound. The title track builds itself on louder drums and synths for a more menacing approach to its own reverb. But Embrace the Emptiness is pretty much a shameless rehash, even more so than Quietus, even though it was still a good doom song. Thankfully, the final track goes into softer alternative territory while maintaining that reverb-based sadness of the album.
I think this album really showcases the band's willingness to push forward everything that made the first album so good. And while there is still a little sameyness attached, for the most part this highly hypnotic sophomore album proves that Evoken are more than willing to grow so that they can be seen as one of the best in doom. For the most part, I was very pleased with the band's sense of atmosphere, experimentation, emotion and improved variety. This is easily much better than the debut.
95
Evoken - Antithesis of Light (2005)
Genres: Funeral Doom, Death Doom
What with doom metal being my new primary focus, I'm becoming more determined than ever to perfect a proper chart of it all because my overall knowledge and experience of its various subgenres is actually minimal. I've only heard 17 death doom albums and 11 funeral doom, including only three Evoken albums. Thankfully, Evoken can add to both to help, so I have a foundation for either genre. I already reviewed two other Evoken albums over the past couple of days, and I was more impressed with the atmospheric focus of their second in comparison to their good but generic debut. I had no idea of knowing what was going to happen.
After our creepy intro of noise and wails, In Solitary Ruin covers a freakishly heavy blackened death background molding with structural and atmospheric aspects of the previous album, Quietus. The band wasn't afraid to teeter-totter between slow, middle and fast paces in order to keep the song's specific mood original and to keep the layout challenging. This one song is an incredible combination of doom, death, post and even black, aurally turning hell itself into a cold and desolate winter world with a few instances of hypnotic gothic guitars.
Now that I've written a good paragraph about the 10-minute intro and the first epic, let's head to the next song: Accursed Premonition, which sets up a slightly more classical vibe with hypnotic, aquatic dripping of noise and some choral vocals. It starts out much clearer than In Solitary Ruin, and the atmosphere is more gothic and funeral, and slightly less death to make room for a little more black. This song doesn't take a lot of time to speed up, either, even going into some much lighter moments and switching to heavily blackened ones without ever losing its hypnotic presence.
The Mournful Refusal is deathlier in its backgrounds, but includes clearer and higher-pitched guitars digging into some more melodic territory, bringing back the hypnotic gothic picking as well, and including the speedy and tamed drumming of In Solitary Ruin. Every bit of slower or faster pacing is used sparingly, and normally only by one instrument at a time to help the middle-pacing of the song's primary focus. Even for the longest song on the track, the atmospheres are always shifting in consistent ways, relying on the occassional metal solo, molding perfectly with the vibe and giving us another unique track to the album.
Pavor Nocturnus throws us right into the middle of neoclassical darkwave paired with loud guitars, increasing the melody factor. The synths give us a strangely heavenly approach, like the lamentation of seeing a spirit of a beloved one rise to the sun shining beyond silver clouds and entering Heaven. Pavor Nocturnus shows a perfect layout where each and every shift is carefully built up to and flows with incredible consistency. Eventually it evolves into a storm of black riffage with flawless atmospheric riffage, but even that devolves into another doomy outro.
And now we enter the title track. We have quiet synths leading us into the gloom of gothic doom metal, slightly romantic but just as scary as before. But this song also gradually gets more extreme and less gothic overtime until it returns to the gothic behavior during the outro. What we have here is a patient and sometimes progressive outlook on many of the elements that made previous songs so special, using length in unpredictable manners.
The final track is The last of Vitality, and it doesn't hesitate to start us off with a snailish stoner riff bereft of any of the black and death influences the album boasted about for so long. And we get our most haunting dungeon synth backdrops to go with it, acting much more upfront. But we soon get into a ferocious blast of bestial black speed and fury, almost creating a feeling of riding a motorcycle through a massive graveyard. But we return to the gothic synths and our singer's growls turn into whispers. This song is taking us all the way across the world of death: above the graveyard, six feet under all the bloodied dirt, and straight into heaven with no regard for sanity. Our most haunting synths and backing vocals are featured here, creating what I believe is a perfect ending.
It is so true that these songs are very long, but for once in my life I came across a doom album that managed to keep these lengths generally inventive and creative. A large part of it was the fact that this is one of the most deathly and metallic atmospheres I have ever heard, relying on a number of metallic elements like black and goth as well as non-metallic elements like dungeon synth and darkwave to get a very strong hypnotic vibe. This is the kind of album where many of the songs will switch out the same elements every so often, justifying such a move by applying different levels of focus to both different moods and different genres, so it's an incredible challenge to predict what's going to happen.
I have never heard a doom metal album like this. Antithesis of Light gave me more than what I ask for from a good album. This is the first funeral doom album that passed the fifty minute mark and didn't feel too long, because its atmosphere, emotional core and presentation are all superbly well thought out. Each brand of hypnosis is similar yet shifting. Very diverse and intense, depending on my future moods this could very well be the best doom metal album I've ever heard.
Sorta Magora - Nič (2019)
Sorta Magora is yet another project from our prolific old friend, Belgian multi-instrumentalist Déhà who, aside from the many releases he has put out under his own name, also issues material as Imber Luminis, Slow, Aurora Borealis, Yhdarl and Clouds to name but a few of the many aliases, side projects and bands he is involved with. Sorta Magora sees him team up with Slovakian vocalist Veronika Madžová, aka Dryáda, who contributed vocals to Imber Luminis' 2019 Same Old Silences album. To date, Nič, also released in 2019, is the only material released under the project's own banner.
The album takes the form of a single, forty-minute track that melds together those most comfortable of bedfellows, funeral doom and atmospheric black metal. I think these two styles of extreme metal are perfect complements to each other at the best of times, and here Déhà expertly weaves them together into a cohesive and encompassing piece that is overflowing with atmosphere and mood. Now, I have never been the biggest fan of ambient music, for some reason it usually, bar a few rare instances, fails to connect with me. Yet, whilst listening to Nič, I suddenly made that connection, despite the fact that this isn't an ambient release. The genius of it is that it uses the dual-barrelled extreme metal approach to achieve a very similar effect to the best that ambient music can offer. Within this single piece of music you can be bouyed-up by a heaving swell of sound, only to later be dragged down by the irresistible tug of murky undercurrents and smothered by a cloying tsunami of crushing, doom-laden chords. Of course, these changes don't occur quickly or jarringly, but are generally glacial in their transition from one to the other, as if luxuriating and revelling in their sheer physical presence and shedding or gaining energy in a deliberate and organic manner.
The swelling tsunami of instrumentation is complimented and contrasted effectively by Dryáda's furious howls of anguish that pour forth in an almost cathartic litany of distress. Déhà himself also contributes vocals, his being a deeper, more nether-demon sounding performance. The lyrics, written by Dryáda in her native Slovak, are dour and grim, heralding the final days of a dying world and the protagonist's longing for that ultimate darkness. This is a release whose music is shorn of hope and is relentlessly bleak, the music intended to be as overwhelming and irresistibly bleak as the final unavoidable fate of a world devoid even of light, let alone life and is a prime example of blackened funeral doom that deserves much more attention than it has so far received.
4.5/5
Convocation - No Dawn for the Caliginous Night (2023)
Finnish duo Convocation inhabit that sector of the metal Venn diagram where the arcs of funeral and death doom overlap, which also happens to be one of my favourite shades of metal. For latest album, No Dawn for the Caliginous Night, they lean more towards the funeral doom side of things, ultimately taking a leaf out of the mighty Esoteric's book. One danger of funeral doom that these Finns avoid is in overcooking things and allowing tracks to drag along without much variation, producing arse-numbingly long albums in the process. Convocation rarely go beyond the 12 minute mark for individual tracks and their longest album is fifty minutes, this one clocking in at forty-eight. They also like to bring in some textural and tonal variation, whilst still maintaining the slow, funereal pacing from whence the genre derives it's name.
The production is excellent, allowing the heaving chords to provide a huge wall-of-sound which towers over and threatens to smother the listener with sheer sonic immensity and even though there is an undoubted crushing power to the tracks, there is much more to them than just that, with string accompaniment and vocal and guitar melodies providing a striking countepoint to the fundamrntal heaviness of the instrumentation. Opener, Graveless yet Dead, features Shape of Despair's Natalie Koskinen as second vocalist, whose soaring, angelic vocals provide perfect contrast to Marko Neuman's bellowing roars as he rails against his fate as a cursed, undying soul, fated to forever wander the Earth. The album features another couple of guest vocalists, Corpsessed's Niko Matilainen on second track, Atychiphobia, and Dying Fetus / Misery Index singer Jason Netherton guesting on closer, Procession (which also sees Ferum's Samantha Alessi providing a spoken narration).
The eye of the album's storm is the instrumental track Between Aether and Land which sits at the heart of the album and which has a less dense feel to it, being woven through with a nice melodic thread that makes it sound less despairing and hopeless than the opening twenty minutes, allowing a shaft of light or a glimpse of open countryside to infiltrate the ominous and despairing atmosphere of the remainder of the album. Naturally this is short-lived and Lepers and Derelicts hits with the full crushing force of a tsunami of hopelessness, sucking all air and positivity out of proceedings and feeling all the more forceful for it's contrast with the preceeding track, Marko Neuman's howling roars sounding increasingly desolate as he bellows the protagonists hatred of his own existence as a torturous demon, bedevilling mankind. On closer, Procession, Convocation really reveal their hand with a track that has a massive epic quality to it, with superb compositional and atmospheric flourishes, from guest Antti Poutanen's cello accompaniment to Samantha Alessi's narration and the melodic guitar work that threads it's way through those hefty, intimidatingly massive chords. Ultimately the track (and by extension, the album) sheds it's horrors and ends with a much more serene feeling as cello and picked guitar along with the closing narration seem to offer the consolation that eventually all horrors must pass.
With No Dawn.. Convocation have truly cemented their place as one of my absolute favourite funeral / death doom bands and I would claim this as a classic of the genre, making them fit to take up their place alongside genre greats like Esoteric and Evoken.
5/5
My adjusted Top Ten Funeral Doom Metal Releases of All Time list after checking out the debut album from Sacramento duo Oromet today:
01. Esoteric - "The Maniacal Vale" (2008)
02. Esoteric – “Paragon of Dissonance” (2011)
03. Shape of Despair - "Monotony Fields" (2015)
04. Esoteric – “Metamorphogenesis” (1999)
05. Esoteric - "A Pyrrhic Existence" (2019)
06. Ahab - "The Call of The Wretched Sea" (2006)
07. Esoteric - "The Pernicious Enigma" (1997)
08. Evoken – “Atra Mors” (2012)
09. The Howling Void – “Shadows Over The Cosmos” (2010)
10. Oromet - "Oromet" (2023)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/132
Monovoth - Pleroma Mortem Est (2024)
Monovoth is the solo project of argentinian multi-instrumentalist, Lucas Wyssbrod, and Pleroma Mortem Est is the sophomore full-length under the banner. It is an album of instrumental funeral doom, comprising six tracks and with an overall runtime of a mere 38 minutes, which is slight indeed for a funeral doom release. In a nutshell that previous sentence sums up the issues that I personally have with this. First off, six tracks for a measly 38 minutes! The funereal and doom-laden atmospheres for top-knotch funeral doom require expansive build-up and layering with the extensive runtime being a pre-requisite for the sense of an inescapable, soul-crushing doom awaiting all of us at life's end. Secondly, instrumental funeral doom just doesn't work completely for me. With such downbeat and morbid instrumentation as that produced by top-tier funeral doom practitioners, I believe a human connection, such as the wholly human sound of vocals, is an absolute requirement in order to mitigate the hopelessness of the music and to place the human condition, as posited by the funeral doom ethos, into context.
The actual individual pieces here show a lot of potential and it is obvious that Wyssbrod is plenty familiar with the big names in the field, as he unleashes dizzyingly towering chords of immense weight interspersed with passages of self-reflective melancholy, but their brevity and lack of vocals suggests to me a series of musical ideas waiting to be worked up into full pieces and not actually an album of finished work. I really would like to hear these ideas expounded and expanded upon with a truly anguished-sounding vocalist on board because there is really some good stuff here, in seed-like form.
3.5/5
Ataraxie - Le déclin (2024)
Ataraxie are a french five-piece who play funeral doom metal with a large death doom component that is at once mournful, morose, agonised and crushingly heavy. Le déclin is their sixth full-length and coming five years after 2019's Résignés, they show themselves a band not to be hurried, neither in the frequency of their releases or in the execution of their artistic vision. As is usually the case, Le déclin has a massive eighty-plus minute runtime for it's four tracks, the shortest of which is a slight sixteen minutes in length, once more illustrating the band's commitment to allow their music to go wherever it will. These four tracks are the embodiment of despair, bereft of levity, the atmosphere is unrelentingly grim, with huge, towering and monolithic riffs provided by the band's three guitarists, punctuated with howls of pain and anguish. This is indeed the stuff of nightmares. While there are undoubtedly passages that are instrumentally lighter, such as the opening minutes whilst the title track builds, atmospherically this is very dark with even the musically lighter moments feeling introspectively maudling and bereft, with the protagonist sounding as if his grief has thrust him to the very edge of insanity.
I would posit from listening to Ataraxie, justifiably I think, that they are big fans of England's Esoteric. Le déclin illustrates exactly how adept they are, just like the Englishmen, at delivering punishing and crushing doom metal that not only lumbers along at leaden tempos, but can also explode into blasts of inutterably violent death metal fury at a moments notice. Vocalist and bassist Jonathan Théry also possesses a deep howling growl that sits very close to Greg Chandler's boulder-splitting vocal style, thus deepening the positive comparisons to the funeral doom legends further. Technically, these guys are top-drawer, with a precision and efficiency to their playing that makes it feel like not a moment of the eighty minutes is wasted and the production is excellent with a clarity and depth that allows free reign to the band's inate crushing heaviness without drowning out the subtle touches that help propel them to the upper echelons of the genre.
The songwriting is top-knotch. These aren't monilithic dirges, but fully-formed narrative journeys with each song undergoing progression with several transitions in atmosphere and tempo throughout their lengthy runtimes, leaving the listener (well this one, anyway) with the impression that they have just undergone a profound journey through a world of pain and suffering allowing either identification with, or some understanding of, it's fundamental effects. The simple fact is that funeral doom metal is not for everyone and even within the ranks of it's practitioners, despite it's (undeserved) reputation for simplicity, there are masters and apprentices. I'm not sure if Ataraxie could ever have been properly labelled as the latter, but Le déclin has most definitely confirmed them as the former. I don't make this claim lightly, but I would honestly have to claim this latest offering from the Frenchmen to be the finest funeral doom metal album since Esoteric's 2019 triple album, "A Pyrrhic Existence" and that is heady praise indeed.
5/5
This has propelled itself into my AOTY spot for 2024.
Oooo... that sounds promising Sonny. I've really liked everything I've heard from those Frenchmen so I'll definitely be popping this one onto my list for future exploration.
Oooo... that sounds promising Sonny. I've really liked everything I've heard from those Frenchmen so I'll definitely be popping this one onto my list for future exploration.
I don't think you will be disappointed Daniel. <Spoiler Alert> I've already got a track from it lined up to close out the January playlist (I discovered it too late for December's list).