So last night, one of my chums wrote me an email asking what doom metal is and who are its most notable practitioners. That's like asking a NorCal hippie swine what reefers are and what are the best types. So, I thought I'd share the result with you Latewires. Also, c'mon and chime in if you've got some wizardy insight. Freshman remedial doom academy is in session!
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DOOM 093 - 3 credit hours
Doom metal is a genre defined by ponderously slow tempo, low despairing tones, and a dire atmosphere. In doom metal, virtuosity is of low importance compared to the ability to send chills into the listener. Black Sabbath are generally credited with founding the genre. The lyrics in doom metal (as you may have guessed) are usually cartoonish verse concerning the end of the world, the complete absence of hope, depression, profound abandonment, war, the occult, demonic topics, drug abuse (cannabis in particular), along with Dracula, goblins, witches, barbarians, and other filmic monsters.
The most significant practitioners of doom metal are :
1) Electric Wizard : paradoxically the most important and most cartoonish of the post-Sabbath doom bands. Their "Dopethrone" is flawless and the ultimate touchstone of modern doom metal.
3) St. Vitus : Genius, kickstarted the modern doom movement.
5) Sleep : The most prominent and wonderful figures in "stoner doom"
5) Goatsnake : Catchy popular doom
6) Trouble : Influential Christian doom from the '80s
7) Celtic Frost / Triptykon : Avant-garde bizarre doom metal
Candlemass : Unintentionally hilarious but undeniably accomplished epic opera doom
9) Corrupted and Boris : both great Japanese experimental doom bands
10) Sunn0))) and Earth : the endless drone doom, slow beyond belief
11) Cathedral and Pentagram : more classic early doom
Newer bands I like include the most excellent Witchsorrow, Acid Witch, and Salome. (19,922)
The icy October wind lashed at Sue’s cheeks as she made her way across the parking lot to her car. An unseasonably cold evening in which was planted the spore of an unseasonably hot romance. She had caught a glimpse of him from the coffee shop and tried to go out to him, but by the time she’d reached the threshold, he was already gone – evaporated into the gloaming.
In the brief magnetic instant that she’d seen him, he appeared loping purposefully down the sidewalk, his head turning slightly from side to side as he observed everything. His eyes were concealed behind a big black pair of sunglasses, but she imagined them to be green and intense. The collar was turned up on his leather bomber. The swing of his arms was a counterrhythm to his long stride. She could see even from a distance that he had a tattoo on his right hand.
She felt her heart crumple as she stepped out into the crisp afternoon air and craned her neck in vain to catch a glimpse of this man. She’d been harpooned with the most powerful of feelings, like this man would write the next chapter in her life, could shape her sadness into something towering and worthwhile. He was gone, though – slipped away like the lifesaving rope from a doomed mountaineer.
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Ch. 2
All the heartbreak of years past came galloping, trampling back all of a sudden. Sue’s mouth turned down like a baby’s does when it’s about to wail. She could not prevent the single hard sob that escaped her throat. A terrible wave of loss settled through her body like poison.
She bumbled heavily back to her chair and gripped the paper cappuccino cup for support. That man in the sunglasses was receding ever further from the possibility of togetherness, and dragging, unravelling along behind him a feeble thread of her hope. She could feel it pulling out of her, like the stringy guts of a bee after it’s stung you.
Sue sat in the chair for another half-hour, bruised. Then she forced herself to get up and leave the coffee shop, moping on down the street in her car, back to her apartment. She flopped onto her huge couch and stared at her blank computer screen on the coffee table. She didn’t move for two hours. Then, the leaden blanket of sleep slipped over her. It was a fitful slumber. (33,060)
Candlemass : Unintentionally hilarious but undeniably accomplished epic opera doom
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