Review by Sonny for Khazad-dûm - Hymns from the Deep (2020)

Khazad-dûm's "Hymns from the Deep" is a musical journey into the depths of the dwarven mines of Moria from JRR Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring. The lyrics are from a poem based on the chapter "The Bridge of by Khazad-dûm" written by Myrddin Evans.

Khazad-dûm are a solo project of Dan Scrivener who plays all the instruments and sings the clean vocals, with help from Matthew Surry who provides harsh vocals which are supposedly from the Balrog of Moria. Slow, melancholy and cavernous as befits the setting of this part of Tolkien's epic, the majority of the album is funeral doom metal, with some dark ambient and even a little atmospheric black metal to add contrast. It successfully portays the morbid, dread atmosphere of the long-abandoned dwarven ruin and the malignant presence of it's most infernal inhabitant, taking Tolkien away from the folksy, hopefulness of Peter Jackson's movie portrayal and planting it firmly in the sphere inhabited by Lovecraft's eldritch, dreadful Elder Gods.