RIGOR SARDONICOUS

Apocalypsis Damnare

Paragon
rating icon 5.5 / 10

Track listing:

01. Exmordium
02. Apocalypsis Damnare
03. Pandemic
04. Human Rot
05. Saprophyte
06. Holy Suicide
07. Misery
09. The Deathless Sol


Christ, this is about as uplifting as a post-genocide funeral procession. I mean there's doom and then there is RIGOR SARDONICOUS. "Apocalypsis Damnare" is a re-recording of an album that was originally released in 1999. Original members Joseph J. Fogarazzo and Glenn Hampton got together with former EVOKEN bassist Steve Moran to perform the ceremony.

The organ composition "Exordium" that begins the disc is the only time that you're not suffocated in slooooowwww crawls with low-end riff scraping and looooowwwww death growls, punctuated with drum accents, double bass parts, very slight pace changes, and lots of fuzz and distortion. The guitar tone actually reminds me of early GODFLESH. The drumming (including the all-important ritualistic cymbal crashes) provides the only real accent to these otherwise droning hymns of dementia. The one exception is the more involved "Misery" and its moments of excursion into mid-tempo territory, although we're talking in very relative terms here.

"Apocalypsis Damnare" is not a CD meant for one of those Sunday afternoon drives in the country. It's also not one you'd slip in to "get this party started!" It would however work well as background music for Chinese water torture or hooking up with a group of your friends, getting baked out of your gourd, and sitting in a circle with only a solitary candle for light. This one is for the truly dedicated doom fan, someone that can stand long bouts of repetitive bottom feeding. This is about mood creation, not compositional depth anyway. I can appreciate the album for what it is, but I'd sure as hell have to be in the right mood for it. As it turns out, I find it to be good musical accompaniment for the PBR and Rolling Rock hangover I'm currently waiting out. Who knew?

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