Doomed For Metal Reviews

Hanging Garden is a melodic death/doom/Gothic metal band from Finland, who formed in 2004. I discovered them with their “ Into The Good Night ,” album when I reviewed it during my tenure at Metal Temple—and I’m very excited to be able to review their latest, and ninth overall, full-length album, “ Isle of Bliss ,” on this blog.  “Isle of Bliss ,” sounds amazing, both in terms of songwriting and production. The album’s overall sound is loud and full, packing quite the punch during the heavier moments and providing a bottomless depth during the melodic ones. The vocals are particularly well produced—the growls and screams are visceral and the cleans shine through with emotional clarity.  " Isle of Bliss ,” continues the trend of what any Hanging Garden fan knows: the band does what they want and each album sounds a little different than before. Although rooted in doom and Gothic metal, this album isn’t afraid to explore faster tempos or more nuanced soundscapes. Across t...

Perhaps one of the coolest collabs I’ve heard, funeral doom metal bands Pantheïst and Dauðaró have teamed up to release this massive album titled “Af holdi og malmi,” a concept album exploring the philosophical tension between humanity and artificial intelligence.   If you don’t know who the legendary Pantheïst are, then do you even like doom metal? They have been putting out some of the most expansive and intelligent doom for a long time now and, thankfully, show zero signs of slowing down. Dauðaró is one of my favorite modern doom metal bands and the one-man project has been steadily building his own legend with a butt load of great albums behind him.   What I like about this album is that it is, for the most part, SLOW. I know doom doesn’t have to move at glacial speed but the best kind does. This collaboration feels like a love letter to both the styles of each band and for funeral doom, in general. If this style is your jam then prepare to dive into qui...

Prophets of Thwaites is a doom metal band, based in Friesland/Groningen, formed in 2024. After a demo and a couple of live studio recordings, the band is ready to drop their debut EP “ Vulnerant omnes ultima necat .” The album’s title translates “All things wound but the last kills” which, in turn, is a reminder of our mortality–each passing hour brings us closer to death. Hell, even the band's name is a sign of our never ending march off a long cliff: the band takes its moniker from the melting Thwaites Glacier—a sign of never being able to turn back damage. But even as your body continues to crumble to dust as your mind collapses into madness, I think you should still spare 14 minutes of your impending doom to check out this short but sweet (well, not really sweet since this is doom after all) EP. It is always quantity not quality--and these Prophets definitely bring the quality. The band plays a dynamic sound on the two songs. There are definitely elements of psych and stoner ...

  Alkhemi is a black metal band from France, who are releasing their second full-length album “Häxen.”  The album’s sound incorporates a lot of melodic and atmospheric elements but in a very smart way.  These elements expand the album into an epic sound that remains rooted in the cold, frightening side of black metal.  In essence, the melody/atmosphere highlights and exposes the raw nerves of the band’s sound without compromising an inch of what makes black metal so powerful and dangerous.  There are a lot of layers to this darkness and I have found “ Häxen ,” to be an album that gets better and better every time I listen to it.  It isn’t necessarily a complicated or convoluted album, but it does have a lot of depth, so it is rife with wonderful discoveries, and each listen feels like a different journey.  The production/mix is exactly how I like my black metal.  It has a raw feel to it without actually being raw but it's certainly dense and rough...

Dissentience is a melodic death/thrash metal band from Pennsylvania, who formed in 2013.  Their latest release is the EP “ Kaiju .”  They have also released a demo, another EP, and one full-length so far.   This is my first experience of the band, but this short but tight EP has convinced me that it won’t be my last.  Across four songs and a runtime of just under 24 minutes, this is a rousing blast of energetic metal that is easy to burn through multiple times. Their Metallum tag of being melodic death/thrash is pretty damn accurate too.  It is full speed ahead most of the time, but the guitars still manage to throw in catchy, melodic passages that go a long way in fleshing out their thrash-based sound, for a full experience that is as high quality as a full-length. It’s a very modern production and I find that is what the songs need, as it makes the melodic aspects stand out yet the album feels very weighty and dense.  The first song, “ Obsidian Tomb ...

Winter Eternal is a one-man black metal band from Greece, who formed in 2000 as Unveiled NightSky but changed to the current moniker in 2011. The musician behind all this is Soulreaper , also from Without Guidance and formally of Convixion , Nightbreed , and Regulus. Winter Eternal ’s black metal is cold and bleak but also melodic and surprisingly infectious.  With 8 songs and a 30-minute runtime, it is a focused album that knows exactly what it is going for.  A lot of the melodic guitar is memorable across this frozen landscape, but the gritty speed of the genre’s foundations is just as present, so this album packs quite the punch within its well-written songs.  It's pretty groovy too but not in the usual way but because the riffs and melodies go so well together. As they play off one another, each song builds up a wall of sound. As the harmonies grow towards the rising action, the songs pour on their melancholic leanings but never forget the power a blackened riff hol...

Dense Fog is a one-man black metal band from China, who formed in 2022.  After releasing two demos, the band has released their full-length, self-titled album.  It was originally released in October of last year in digital but 2026 will see it getting physical formats.  The band plays an atmospheric style of Black metal that has as many quiet, beautiful moments as it does blackened ones. The liminal spaces in between the softer notes offer a stark contrast to the otherwise bleak, distorted passages of the album. With that being said, the light and dark elements have a regal interplay between each other. Clean keys get just as much playtime as heavy riffs and rapid-fire drums.  The songs aren't very fast but that doesn't stop the drums from giving it their all. I appreciate that the album is heavy and extreme without being truly aggressive.  It is also highly melodic, but more in an atmospheric sense than in a catchy or bombastic way. It is a very even album that...