At 52-minutes, “Moonflowers” is an eight-song affair that drives deep into the heart of Swallow The Sun main songwriter Juha Raivio’s disconsolate soul. From the dramatic “Enemy” and the grim “This House Has No Home” to the delicate “Moonflowers Bloom in Misery” and the beauteous “The Fight of Your Life,” “Moonflowers” is as rewarding and dynamic as it is accomplished and intimate. That it features Cammie Gilbert (Oceans of Slumber), Antti Hyyrynen (Stam1na), and Trio NOX - who perform a re-arranged classical version of “Moonflowers” in a Finnish church, which comes as a bonus album to some of the album formats - are more reasons to hold Swallow the Sun’s latest leap into the unknown in the highest regard.

There are few funeral doom bands out there that manage to express sorrow and despair in such a majestic and beautiful manner as Finland's Shape Of Despair. The band’s latest full-length is a product of their environment, enveloping the listener in cold, eternal darkness like a lonely Finnish winter. And much like the long, funereal winters of their homeland, the atmosphere in ‘Return to the Void’ is bleak but ethereal. The funeral doom icons do not merely offer a soundtrack to one’s agony, but also demonstrate the beauty that can often be found in misery.

The Withering is presented as a conceptual album focusing on the decadence & annihilation of humanity due the most probable causes: natural catastrophes, pandemics, humanity’s own actions, etc. Each song tells a story about one of those causes and how to struggle with suffering, death, fears, hopes and face the inevitable end.
In the musical aspect, the band grew up to a more open & progressive sound but with the original melodic doom/death parts that earned the status of “underground cult band” in the past by some specialized media & fans, with strong rhythm section and melancholic melodies accompanied by dual vocal performance, guttural and whispers. Not the typical doom band. Not the usual melodic death metal record…

In the interim between 2018’s dark jazz-infused stunner Feast for Water and the recording of its follow-up, Close, Messa guitarist Alberto Piccolo taught himself how to play the oud. The fretless stringed instrument would end up playing a central role on the band’s new album, both for its sonic contributions and its ability to serve as a kind of totemic passport that allowed them to travel from their home in northern Italy to the Middle East (and beyond.) Messa are a doom band, nominally, but they’ve never been limited by the tropes of the genre. Every song on Close illustrates their exploratory spirit. “Hollow” and “Pilgrim” highlight Piccolo’s oud playing, which to these untrained ears sounds like the work of an old pro rather than a relative neophyte. “Suspended” opens with burbling Rhodes piano, while “Orphalese” leads with smoky saxophone—both holdovers from Feast for Water, both even richer in texture this time around. “Leffotrak” is a 45-second hardcore palate cleanser, nestled between two doom epics. Frontwoman Sara Bianchin is the album’s MVP. Her powerful voice is pliable enough to pair brilliantly with any stylistic detour her band cares to take, and it can accelerate from diaphanous whisper to booming roar in a split second—and back again. It’s the best vocal performance on a metal album so far this year.

Odin’s eight-legged horse slides again by land, water and air of the Nordic underworld. On its back it carries a very precious cargo: the fifth album by the American band Flight Of Sleipnir, shortly and concisely titled V., with its atmospheric mix of Stoner Rock, Doom and Folk Metal. The Germanic-Father sends his messengers again.

Formed in Colorado in 2007, The Flight of Sleipnir have been plugging away with their blend of doom, folk and stoner metal ever since.
The Night breeze sending a gray wraith of smoke up the slopes as The Flight of Sleipnir return with their 7th album. "Eventide" is an audial rumination on the vast mysteries of nighttime intertwined by the roaring fireytones of Doom, Prog, Black Metal, Folk, and Post-Rock.

There are simply albums that never lose their charm. The debut album "Frost & Fire" of the legendary CIRITH UNGOL from 1981 is such an album. Even 40 years after the first release, the album still goes down like a good wine.

Founded in 2014 in Berlin by The Oath front woman Johanna Sadonis, the group first consisted of Cathedral, Angel Witch and Ladytron members. The debut album "Lucifer I", penned by Johanna and Cathedra's Garry Jennings and released by British label Rise Above Records, brought LUCIFER international recognition. With a shift of constellation within the band in 2016 and Johanna Sadonis' move from Berlin to Stockholm, LUCIFER were ready for chapter two. In Nicke Andersson, notable for his groups The Hellacopters, Entombed, Imperial State Electric, Death Breath among others, Johanna found a new renowned writing partner. Johanna and Nicke wrote and produced the albums "Lucifer II" and "Lucifer III" at Nicke's studio The Honk Palace in Stockholm.

An early progenitor of funeral doom, Norway's FUNERAL have returned with ’Praesentialis in Aeternum,’ their first new album in nearly a decade! The quartet bring forth a soul-rending offering that is rife with agony and pain, providing a fitting soundtrack for the times. Crushing, mournful passages and soaring lead breaks amplify its sorrowful atmosphere, and are certain to rive the heart, mind, and soul of listeners.

Over the course of the 1990s, Sweden's Tiamat evolved from a typical death metal outfit into one of the leading lights in "symphonic" black metal. A variation that aimed to keep all of death metal's darkness intact, symphonic black metal portrayed that darkness it in a moodier, atmospheric manner, often making synthesizer arrangements just as important as guitar riffs and utilizing a deliberate, Gothic feel…

"Ukrainian blackened death/doom metal offensive 1914 continue to reflect the gruesome tales of World War I, its soldiers’ fate, their death, fear and feats to be never forgotten, and unleash their new opus, Where Fear and Weapons Meet, on October 22nd, via Napalm Records. Its eleven tracks of pure historic harshness follow up to the band’s sophomore full-length, The Blind Leading the Blilnd (2018), and debut, Eschatology of War (2015), both highly acclaimed amongst critics, and create a sophisticated variety of massively brutal blackened death metal accented by dramatic and realistic audio soundscapes and disquieting melodies spiced with the approach of sludge and doom!

According to the motto No filler, just killer Paradise Lost raised a lot of dust at the Bizarre Festival on 19th August 1995 in Cologne/Germany with bangers like Embers Fire, Remembrance or True Belief.Paradise Lost's LIVE AT ROCKPALAST offers not only fans but also the members of the band the opportunity to refresh their memories. In this hot stage of our career we never missed a party. It may sound stereotype, but my memories of the nineties are still suffering, tells singer Nick Holmes a little bit grinning.