#ockultist

~By Svempa Alveving~

Photo credit: NASA

During this week long retrospective on the best albums of 2020, Doomed & Stoned contributors are sharing 25 of their personal favs from a year that was full of surprises, some dreadful and others delightful.  Svempa Alveving (IG: @doomsdayjesus) is the curator of our beloved compilation Doomed & Stoned in Sweden and a periodic guest on the Into The Void podcast.

Electric Hydra - Electric Hydra

Thou and Emma Ruth Rundle - May Our Chambers Be Full

Novarupta - Marine Snow

Elder - Omens

Hällas - Conundrum

Steve Von Till - No Wilderness Deep Enoug

Lowrider - Refractions

Covenspell - Circle of 13

Dopelord - Sign Of The Devil

Kvll - Death/Sacrifice

Ockultist - Festering Wounds

Occlith - Gates, Doorways, and Endings

Sleepwulf - Sleepwulf

Bonehawk - Iron Mountain

End - Splinters From an Ever-Changing Face

Huanastone - Third Stone From The Sun

Malsten - The Haunting of Silvåkra Mill

Hymn - Breach Us

Bongtower - Oscillator

Pallbearer - Forgotten Days

Slift - Ummon

Bell Witch & Aerial Ruin - Stygian Bough

Weed Demon - Crater Maker

Convocation - Ashes Coalesce

~Doomed & Stoned Debuts~

  By Billy Goate  

Devastating.   That is the first word that jumped to mind when the opening track from 'Festering Wounds' (2020) started spinning. It's the latest to grace us from OCKULTIST, a filthy threesome from out of Stockholm.

The band emerged from the slime of the underground in 2013, with roots already planted in a long dead D-beat band, its energy and savageness boiled down to a slow moving sludge machine. Within short order, Ockultist dropped two demos and then their first official release, 'Present Day Neglect' (2017).

Now, just in time for the apocalypse, Ockultist readies another gruesomingly slow and punishingly brutal fistful of dirges. Their press release says it all: "This music is best described as like going on a journey in the mind of a horribly deranged individual and coming out barely alive on the other end."

Holy hell, are you ready for that? I didn't think I was, but once I turned this hellish nightmare loose I was hooked. Festering Wounds will surround you in a thick, steely wall of sound, radiated by fuzz, with pounding riffage that proudly announces the End of Days. It's not all about being a wrecking ball, of course. There's an underlying emotion to songs like "Lividity" that I found extraordinarily sorrowful and moving.

Festering Wounds by Ockultist will see the light of day on March 13th via Sludgelord Records on cassette and in digital format (pre-order here). In the meantime, Doomed & Stoned is pleased to bring you a listen to the album in all its fullness. For fans of Primitive Man, Cough, and Serpentine Path!

Give ear...

Festering Wounds by Ockultist

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