Babes in the Abyss

Nàda were a Lucerne, Switzerland outfit (active 1992-1997) fusing sludge/doom heaviness with industrial clang and tribal/neofolk percussion, earning Terrorizer coverage in 1994 and comparisons to Neurosis, Swans and Einstürzende Neubauten. Their two albums, 'Celmètra' (1994, Licht & Blindheit/Common Cause) and 'Ùr' (1997, Licht & Blindheit), are murky, ritualistic slabs built on layered percussion and detuned riffing rather than conventional song structure. A largely forgotten act of 90s European experimental sludge, tangential to any scene rather than embedded in one.

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Lochrian Poem is the solo project of Romanian multi-instrumentalist Andrei 'Solomonar' Oltean (Sibiu), billed as experimental atmospheric doom metal. Debut LP Snow (2019) is a short, bleak meditation on the grey, static urban-decay landscapes of Sibiu's Guşteriţa suburb, built on droning, dissonant doom guitar (Bandcamp tags it 'phasing') under a heavily atmospheric mix, with tracks stretching past sixteen minutes.

A Finnish outfit, founded by bassists Mika A. A. Hyytinen and Topi Aarnio, built around the gimmick-that-works of having no guitarists at all — two bass players (4-to-12-string, baritone-tuned) carry all the riffing, joined by keyboards/samples and dual male/female vocals from Kari Husa and Anna Pienimäki. Their sole full-length, 2009's On Rituals and Correspondence in Constructed Realities (Season of Mist), moves from doom-metal roots into a cavernous, drone-heavy hybrid of gothic, black, and alt-rock with electro-folk and Baroque touches.

Om is an American stoner/doom drone band formed in San Francisco in 2003 by bassist-vocalist Al Cisneros and drummer Chris Hakius, previously the rhythm section of Sleep. The band is known for droning, bass-driven, meditative songs steeped in spirituality and mysticism, a marked departure from Sleep's Black Sabbath-rooted sound. After Hakius departed in 2008, Emil Amos (of Grails) joined on drums, and the group's acclaimed fifth album Advaitic Songs was released by Drag City in 2012.

Timeless Necrotears is a Barcelona, Spain solo/duo project built around Christian L. Becker (guitars, synths, vocal effects), joined on some releases by Pablo Bermejo (additional vocals). The project's Bandcamp tags itself as experimental dungeon synth, doom metal, dark ambient and 'dystopia,' and it is extraordinarily prolific, releasing dozens of thematically-linked concept albums (the recurring 'Jurzikum,' 'She-Droid' and 'Planet' cycles) since the mid-2010s alongside a couple of 1990s-era demo reissues. The sound leans on long-form synth atmospheres punctuated by slow, doom-adjacent riffing rather than conventional song structure.

A New York art-world side project active from 2000-2003, pairing visual artist Rita Ackermann with Gang Gang Dance's Lizzi Bougatsos in a ritualistic, blood-and-paganism-themed 'art + metal' hybrid — chant-like incantations and wordless vocal panting over heavy, dirge-paced guitar/bass, with Orthrelm's Mick Barr guesting on guitar for Labia Minora. Functioned as much as a performance-art and visual-art collective as a band, releasing on Captain Trip and, posthumously, Locust Music.

All Are to Return is a mostly-anonymous two-person industrial doom/noise project (credited only as 'F' and 'N') based in the Netherlands, releasing since 2020 via Tartarus Records. Their records (II, 2021; III, 2024; Limen, 2025) build colossal, FX-drenched noise-scapes from pulsing synths, doom-paced percussion, and screamed vocals, with lyrical/conceptual focus on ecological collapse and climate catastrophe. No gamelan or other Indonesian/Balinese percussion instrumentation was found in any source consulted, despite that being the scouting lead's premise — the confirmed sound is industrial/doom/noise, not gamelan-folk fusion.

Senmuth is the solo project of Russian multi-instrumentalist Valery Androsov (b. 1973, Moscow), extraordinarily prolific with well over a hundred releases combining ambient, industrial/industrial metal, EBM, and 'ethno metal' built from guitars, programming, and ethnic instruments (sitar, dutar, domra, tarka, duduk, oud). Albums are conceptually organized around ancient civilizations — especially Egyptian, Mesoamerican, and Asian themes — with the project's style shifting from guitar-driven doom/industrial metal in its early years toward increasingly sample-based, ethnically-fused, ambient composition over time.

Giant Squid are an American post-metal and progressive/doom band formed in Sacramento, California in 2002 and led by Aaron Gregory, known for oceanic and marine-biology concept records including Metridium Fields (2006) and The Ichthyologist (2009), released via labels including Translation Loss. Cellist and vocalist Jackie Perez Gratz, of Amber Asylum and Grayceon fame, joined the band in January 2007, deepening its chamber-tinged heaviness. The band shares members and a 2007 split 7-inch, 'Sutter's Fort,' with fellow Bay Area group Grayceon.

This Is Oblivion is the duo of violinist/vocalist Lulu Black and drummer Michael Kadnar (also of The Number Twelve Looks Like You and So Hideous), who began the project in 2020 and released it on Kadnar's own Silent Pendulum Records. Their 2022 self-titled debut strips doom weight down to violin, viola, piano and industrial electronics under Black's ghostly vocal, building each track from a single melodic line over doomy percussion. It reads as gothic chamber-doom seance, closer kin to Chelsea Wolfe or Swans than to conventional metal.

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