Get down to the basement and join the rehearsal which may make you def and frozen. Here are six bands dealing with the sludge, the fattest but not the fastest metal sub-genre.

1. Megalith Levitation – Void Psalms (2021)

🇷🇺 We are starting from a triple point where doom metal and stoner are sharing their powers with sludge. As expected, each of the three components enhances the action of the others. Megalith Levitation, a trio from Chelyabinsk uses this magical property in their rituals, plunging the audience into a hypnotic state. Pulling the hoods of their robes over their faces, the guys launch heavy waves from the stage that avoid any protective mechanisms. The second release by the band united the proclamations which the trio addresses to the crowd and to the higher forces.

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2. Remote Viewing – Modern Addictions (2023)

🇬🇧 The British quintet is treating us to a wild pumping sound interspersed with elements of post-hardcore, punk and related phenomena of the heavy scene. This stuff is carefully packed into tracks of moderate volume. The tempo is somewhat slow for metal in general but quite nimble for typical sludge. Such a “weighted” approach has to itself immediately. Tons of sound falls from the above, and the machine is grinds you to the core. No need to speed, however. But no regrets and complaints, right?

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3. They Grieve – To Which I Bore Witness (2023)

🇨🇦 In Ottawa, we will meet these guys who describe themselves as a drone-gloom duo. Their compositions are covered by ashes and dust brought by merciless wind. They cover the post-metal core with a touch of dense gnashing noise. It gives way to extended distorted melodies, and from time to time pure beauty peeps out from under them. Perhaps, sludge is the least of all here, it comes in its less characteristic faction.

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4. Escombro – Escombro (2022)

🇪🇸 The eponymous release from two Spaniards which appeared by pure chance. Ivan, the first of them, recorded a test of his pedals, and the video fell into the hands of the future duo’s second member, Willer. He decided to add his own drum parts to the riffs. Eventually, being at opposite ends of Spain, the guys moved towards a full-fledged record, having done everything with their own. Their sludge has a fair amount of technical groove and sliding into post-metal. And desperate vocals comes over darkness and heaviness.

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5. Pé Roto – Tormento (2023)

🇵🇹 We leave for Braga in neighboring Portugal. And here the sludge intersects simultaneously with the doom and the ghost of Max Cavalera. Avoiding analogies and labels, let’s admit the fact that the band’s style is not alien to eclecticism. By the way, the current album significantly differs from the previous one, which was released back in 2016, in sound, although it remains in the same outline.

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6. Drune – Drune (2021)

🇺🇸 This album is drowning in a haze of slow doom, from time to time switching to something blackish, accelerated and nervous. Listening from the very beginning or from inside the first tracks, you can not distinguish sludge at all. But it returns, rolls with the viscous wave and freezes the blood in your vessels. Step be step, sound by sound. Somewhere in the middle of “I Watched the Woods March to War” there is a risk to freeze completely. Greasy bass and clean vocals make exceptional pair there. Thaw out and continue the way.

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