Six-song debut from Krolg Splinterfist, Slayer of Man, Count Elric the Soothsayer, and The Wizard, who come together to form the Rhode Island trio Pilgrim. Pilgrim, through all their contextual obligations, tread heavy-footed and bold through a shadowy land of ruins without respite, their roughspun denim robes gilded not with opulent jewels but with plain patches promoting their significant lineage. For those who prefer their doom metal to put its emphasis on the DOOM, come lay down in Pilgrim’s sacred sarcophagus and embrace the endless black as they carry you on their broad, calloused shoulders to whatever desolate end their progress achieves. The riffs on Misery Wizard crawl slow and lifeless, shackled slaves on the verge of complete collapse, urged on by nothing more than the threat of punishment and extinction. Yet they make it, those riffs, withered and empty though they be, forsaken bags of bones that lay down incantations to the old gods Black Sabbath, Candlemass, and Cathedral, which drip from Pilgrim’s tongue like thick, boiling oil. This…yeah, this is DOOM.
Listen to “Astaroth,” “Misery Wizard,” and “Quest” from Misery Wizard!
No doubt garbed in the finest trucker hats and oil-stained denim, King Giant are a gang of handlebar ‘staches that play a Hills Have Eyes kind of hard rock, and the Devil help ya if you happen to stumble upon their Northern Virginia property by accident because I have a feeling you’d be staring down the barrel of a sawed-off shotgun wonderin’ when backwoods hospitality lost all its charm. While Dismal Hollow spews much of the same hog exhaust as 2009′s Southern Darkness, it’s also a much broodier ride, and all them wrecking ball riffs come wrapped in a down home doom that makes the album’s eight songs sound like a moonshine’d Danzig dragging a bloated corpse through the dirt and dry leaves. You might even say it’s dismal. And hollow. Oh, and if you guessed King Giant would be the kind of band to write songs called “Appomattox,” “Pistols and Penance,” “6 O’Clock Swill,” and “O’Drifter,” you’d be right, so welcome to the root cellar, victim.
Check out the video for “Appomattox” from Dismal Hollow!
Ancient VVisdom A Godlike Inferno
Shinebox Recordings
Yes, that’s VVisdom, with two V’s instead of a W, perhaps to denote some sort of kvlt affinity, and why not when you’re a band whose first recorded offering is a split with Charles Manson and your dark, acoustic doom is black metal played out as the Devil’s blues? Driven by a forbidden force of steel-stringed conviction and Antichrist alchemy, the Austin band’s debut, A Godlike Inferno, is more than a poor cover, fancy spelling, and men in costumed ceremony — it’s eight tracks of pagan chamber music, a melodic and catchy gush of neo-folk played by dudes in dirty denim vests. And nevermind that Ancient VVisdom contains members of the louder groups Iron Age and Integrity because this is simple, stripped down, fire-licking rock n’ soul, like Agalloch at a biker camp-out or Days of the New in corpse paint, which is actually way better than it sounds.
Check out two videos for “The Opposition” and “VVorld of Flesh” from A Godlike Inferno!
Pilgrim
King Giant
Ancient VVisdom