Death metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music. It typically employs heavily distorted and low-tuned guitars, played with techniques such as palm muting and tremolo picking; deep growling vocals; aggressive, powerful drumming, featuring double kick and blast beat techniques; minor keys or atonality; abrupt tempo, key, and time signature changes; and chromatic chord progressions. The lyrical themes of death metal may include slasher film-style violence, political conflict, religion, nature, philosophy, true crime and science fiction.
Doom metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music that typically uses slower tempos, low-tuned guitars and a much "thicker" or "heavier" sound than other heavy metal genres. Both the music and the lyrics are intended to evoke a sense of despair, dread, and impending doom. The genre is strongly influenced by the early work of Black Sabbath, who formed a prototype for doom metal. During the first half of the 1980s, a number of bands such as Witchfinder General and Pagan Altar from England, American bands Pentagram, Saint Vitus, the Obsessed, Trouble, and Cirith Ungol, and Swedish band Candlemass defined doom metal as a distinct genre. Pentagram, Saint Vitus, Trouble and Candlemass have been referred to as "the Big Four of Doom Metal".
The Obsessed is an American doom metal band from Potomac, Maryland, led by Scott "Wino" Weinrich. Formed in 1979, they recorded a few demos and played a handful of live shows until they first split up in 1986 when Weinrich joined as lead vocalist for Saint Vitus. About two years before his departure from Saint Vitus, Weinrich reformed The Obsessed in 1989, and three studio albums − The Obsessed (1990), Lunar Womb (1991) and The Church Within (1994) − were released before disbanding for the second time in 1995. After reuniting for occasional live shows between 2011 and 2013, the band announced a permanent reunion in March 2016, and has since released two more studio albums: Sacred (2017) and Gilded Sorrow (2024).
Lars Mikael Åkerfeldt is a Swedish musician. He is the lead vocalist, guitarist, and primary songwriter of progressive metal band Opeth. A former vocalist of death metal supergroup Bloodbath, he was also guitarist for the "one-off" band Steel, and part of the collaboration Storm Corrosion with Steven Wilson.
Dan-Erland Swanö, also known as Dan "The Man" Swanö, is a Swedish musician and record producer who is currently the vocalist, guitarist, ex-bassist and ex-drummer for the band Nightingale, lately vocalist, keyboardist and drummer for the band Witherscape, as well as the owner of Unisound, but he achieved fame as the vocalist and songwriter of progressive death metal band Edge of Sanity.
Mark Andrew "Barney" Greenway is a British extreme metal vocalist who is the current lead singer of Napalm Death and a former member of Extreme Noise Terror and Benediction.
Matt Bachand is an American guitarist. He has strong death metal and thrash metal influences. He is rhythm guitarist and clean vocalist for the metalcore band Shadows Fall, and the bassist for Act of Defiance.
Swallow the Sun is a Finnish death-doom band founded in 2000 by Juha Raivio. Their death-doom style emphasizes melody and atmosphere, and occasionally steps into gothic and black metal territory. They have released eight full-length albums, one triple album, one EP, one demo, and seven singles.
Robert Lowe is an American singer.
Draconian is a Swedish gothic metal/death-doom band formed in Säffle in 1994.
Tommy Giles Rogers is an American musician, most notable for being the lead vocalist, keyboardist and lyricist of the progressive metal band Between the Buried and Me, which he co-founded in 2000. His vocal style combines death growls and screams with peaceful clean singing melodies, sometimes including falsetto. In 2005, Stylus Magazine named Rogers one of the three most versatile rock singers at the time.
Gothic metal is a fusion genre combining the aggression of heavy metal with the dark atmospheres of gothic rock. The music of gothic metal is diverse with bands known to adopt the gothic approach to different styles of heavy metal music. The genre originated during the early 1990s in the United Kingdom originally as an outgrowth of death-doom, a fusion of death metal and doom metal. Lyrics are generally dark and introspective with inspiration from gothic fiction as well as personal experiences.
Novembers Doom is an American death-doom band from Chicago, currently signed to Prophecy Productions. Along with Evoken and Rigor Sardonicous, Novembers Doom is one of the earliest American death-doom bands still active today.
Subterranean Masquerade is a progressive metal band from Israel that was formed in 1997 by Tomer Pink, who is a guitarist and primary songwriter for the band.
The Novella Reservoir is the sixth full-length studio album by the American death-doom band Novembers Doom, released in 2007. The overall sound of the album carries on from the musical direction of the previous release The Pale Haunt Departure, while incorporating some heavier and faster death metal elements than before. A special edition of this album contained an 84-page, full-color book entitled "The Wayfaring Chronicles" that features lyrics and history/explanations of the songs and albums, a sticker, a band photo that is autographed and a bag for it all to fit in.
How Like a Winter is a gothic doom metal band from Italy that was formed in the mid-1990s, although their first recording was not until much later. The band's music, which can be described as atmospheric and melancholy, is composed using violins, various classical, acoustic and electric guitars, and features male and female vocalists; the band members all use evocative pseudonyms. Male vocals are both clean and growled, whereas the female duo of Tragedy and Misery are invariably clean. Delicate violins mingle with heavy guitar riffs and are complemented by acoustic guitar solos. The band's music has been likened to that of Paradise Lost, Celestial Season, Novembers Doom, Shape of Despair, and My Dying Bride. Guitarist Mist lists My Dying Bride as a great inspiration, along with Opeth and Katatonia among others.
Deconstruction is the thirteenth studio album by Canadian musician Devin Townsend, and the third album in the Devin Townsend Project series. The album was released on June 20, 2011, simultaneously with the fourth Devin Townsend Project album Ghost, on Townsend's independent record label HevyDevy Records. The album features two drummers, Dirk Verbeuren and Ryan Van Poederooyen, as well as a number of guest vocalists. The album's choral and orchestral parts were written and arranged by Townsend using Pro Tools software. The parts were later transcribed into conventional musical notation for the orchestra.
Ghost is the fourteenth studio album by Canadian musician Devin Townsend, and the fourth album in the Devin Townsend Project series. It was released on June 20, 2011, simultaneously with the third Devin Townsend Project album Deconstruction. Townsend has stated that the album "is the mellowest and prettiest record I've done so far".
Eremita is the fourth studio album by Norwegian black metal musician Ihsahn. The album features guest appearances by several notable musicians, including Devin Townsend and Jeff Loomis of Nevermore.
Angellore is a French doom metal/gothic metal band. The name of the band comes from the title of the Tristania song "Angellore".
