SEA OF SNAKES ~ The Serpent & The Lamb (2022)

The Serpent & The Lamb the new album from Sea Of Snakes is one of the snappiest albums I've heard so far this year. The album is lathered in groovy, fuzzy stoner riffs, lubed with AiC like sleaze and swollen with Sabbath influenced doom often blemished with a darker, funerealistic taint.

BRETHREN HOGG ~ Relative Swine (2022)

There's nothing soft and mushy about Brethren Hoggs's brand of stoner. Fuzz has been stripped away leaving rusty bare metal that rocks hard. Each face Brethren Hogg shows us is uncompromising, stoner riffs have a grungy groove, forays into doom are lean and heavy with slow paced thrash like riffs laced with a faint whiff of Mastodonish prog.

LORD OF CONFUSION ~ Evil Mystery (2022)

Haunting doom alchemy from Portugal. I reviewed Lord Of Confusion's 2019 EP Burnin' Valley earlier this year and their new album, Evil Mystery isn't too dissimilar, however there are some stellar improvements. On Burnin' Valley the keyboards of  Carlota Sousa who also provides vocals, dominated the ep but on Evil Mystery guitar and keyboards stalk each other in perfectly layered harmony alongside the chants from the coven of Carlota to chilling effect. This album is like the sudden tap on the shoulder in an empty room, or a nightime walk in a fogbound cemetery, crawling with dark places and creaking, rusty iron gates.Be sure to bear an Apotropaic mark to ward off unwelcome spirits when you listen to this excellent album. 

The greatest compliment I can give to Lord Of Confusion is that, although the band is Portugese, Evil  Mystery has earned a place among the standard bearers of classic Italian style doom.

MONASTR ~ On Your Knees (2022)

Typical of a lot of 2 piece bands, Monastr sounds like a 10 piece such is the noise that eminates from the debut full length On Your Knees. The album follows the usual post - metal formula, moments of quiet, brackish reflection before the sludge kicks in. I was going to describe the change in tempo as 'detonate' but this implies an upward explosion whereas the sludge riffs in On Your knees are too weighty to rise above ground level. A lot of post- metal bands are tagged with sludge, some disappoint but Monastr  deliver granite riffs of ground shaking proportions.

File under B for Bleak

DEATHRATTLE PODCAST ~ Dirty Dozen (August 2022)

August 'Best Of' suggests that the Podcast is taking an ever increasing shift into more extreme metal territory considering the sparse number of hard /classical rock bands that are featuring during the last few months. Having said that, sludge bands are having to expand their sound to get a look in after years of listening to this type of music and becoming somewhat numb to the monotony of a lot of this genre. This has been demonstrated by The Master Of Suspense by Sithter becoming my Sludge album of August due to the fact that, although there is definitely an element of Eyehategod worship going on here, there is sufficient punk/crust overtones married with a raw guitar sound to make this album stand out. 

I guess similar could be said about the other bands that made the list, Stone Nomads for example could easily have been my Doom album of the month, such is the constant shifting between doom and stoner influences within their Fields Of Doom album, however I had to go for the enormity of the droning sounds of  Morbid Evils to fill that particular slot. 

Stone Nomads ~ Fields Of Doom

The sons of Sabbath, raised in the Texas fields of doom, we are STONE NOMADS... Experience an amalgamation of Doom, Southern Sludge, and all things Metal on a stoned out Sabbath trip...

Morbid Evils ~ Supernaturals

Helmed by the Rotten Sound vocalist Keijo Niinimaa, Finnish band Morbid Evils give us their own dark, twisted and unbearably heavy interpretation of death/doom/sludge metal music which is both awe-inspiring and riveting.

Nightbearer ~ Ghosts Of A Darkness To Come

 Nightbearer do not only stick to the harsh sound and trademarks of the Old School Death Metal they love but give it a decent modern twist. They take the listener for a phantastic, yet bloody and brutal journey through the world of Robert Jordan's "The Wheel Of Time

Eruption ~ Tellurian Rupture

Fast, guitar-based and infectiously melodic metal, with pounding drums and soaring vocals.

Sithter ~ The Master Of Suspense

Japanese band Sithter's newie is an ungodly tapestry of Eyehategod style sludge and the begrimed punk of Buzzov.en, crudely stitched together by feedback contaminated riffs sounding all the more brutal due to the excellent mix.

Omen Stones ~ Omen Stones

US Stoner/sludge

Early Moods ~ Early Moods

The self-titled full length debut of Los Angeles quintet Early Moods is a marriage of classic underground doom like Candlemass, Witchfinder General, Pentagram, Trouble and Saint Vitus, paired with traditional “big box” Heavy Metal melodies and song structure.

Old Tomb ~ Phantom Hour

Stoner doom from Slovakia

Hellgrav ~ Rottomatic

German death metal with a relentless HM-2 sound that grinds you to your knees. There's nothing new here and I'm sure Hellgrav couldn't care less, I certainly don't while I sit here listening to the album in all its downtuned, blood spattered glory!

Consumption ~ Necrotic Lust

Death metal is not dead yet and it’s gruesome, yet fascinating future is here in the form of Consumption!

Swarn ~ Whispers From Beyond

Dream-infested hallucinatory

death metal

Autonoesis ~ Moon of Foul Magics

Thrash/Death/Black metal band

GOATROACH ~ Plagueborn (2022)

Finnish deathsludge consumed by bilious hatred. Songs of darkness stalk a path of bleak terror from your speakers to eventually infest the Tympanic Membrane of your inner ear before inducing coma. After the global pandemic, Plagueborn from Goatroach is a new, more virulent strain of sludgy death evolving from track to track adding elements of doom, black metal and crust into an already highly toxic viral load.

File under G for Grim

MAD SHADOW ~ Mad Shadow (2008)

Mad Shadow is a British Columbian band that has released 3 records as far as I am aware and, I suspect, is named after the 1970's Mott The Hoople album of the same name. 

The band has frequently been compared to Led Zeppelin, by and large I can see why as there are hints on some of the tracks especially 'Long Road Blues' but listening to this album in depth after many years I detect a smoother blend of  classic, melodic blues rock with hints of metal in some of the songs. Whoever these guys sound like, they can certainly play, licks are coated in sufficient sleaze to ensure the album doesn't sound too polished and the vocals are excellent, delivered with bluesy angst.

Note ~ The 2013 album 'Heavy Blues' is HUGELY influenced by early Led Zeppelin. Awesome blues influenced tracks, has by and large, enveloped the classic rock feel of the first album.