My Shameful are a fairly straight ahead doom metal outfit hailing from Finland that has been kicking around for almost ten years. Their latest album and fourth overall to be released by Firebox Records, Descend further chronicles their obsession with the darker aspects of human existence.
The experiments of the past, which saw the band employ strings, keyboards and female vocals to further augment their sound, are gone, instead focusing on simply delivering slow, ultra heavy and punishing grooves wherever possible. In that regard Descend succeeds as the majority of the music here rarely rises above a funeral style march, as layers of droning, drop tuned guitars carve out rhythms that are as thick as concrete. Elements of death metal and gothic influences can be detected from beneath the wall of sonic sludge, especially in regards to guitarist / vocalist Sami Rautio's low end, growling vocals which are as effective as a cold piercing stab through the heart. If there's one thing holding the album back though it would be the fact that these songs sound basically interchangeable. I understand what the band was going for sonically on Descend and they pretty much stick to their guns throughout the course of this recording, painting an extremely bleak aural landscape with compositions that rely heavily on an agonizing slow and deliberate attack. If the aim here was to conceive an album that comes off sounding like the musical equivalent of a suicide letter then Descend should be considered a massive success. However in the end I think the average doom metal fan might have a hard time finding the inspiration to get through this one in its entirety, especially in one sitting.
Track Listing
1) Allconsuming
2) Deity of Retribution
3) This Hate
4) Of Haunting
5) Kill The Emptiness
6) Unrepentant
7) Self-Abuse
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