It’s the weekend! What better way to get it started than with the latest installment of “Funeral Doom Friday”. This weekly column looks to shed some light onto some of the darkest, most depressing, and discordant metal out there. Funeral Doom stems from the deepest depths of Death-Doom and Dirge music. Each week, the goal is to highlight some of the newest music or rediscover classic works from some of the earliest bands and originators such as Australia’s Mournful Congregation, United States’s Evoken, UK’s Esoteric and the Finnish Thergothon. Feel free to share your opinions and suggestions in the comments!
Weird Truth Productions has been mentioned in the past in this column. If you remember way back towards the beginning of 2016, a band called Funeral Moth was featured for their newest release, Transience. The main member of that group, Makoto Fujishima, is the founder of Weird Truth and possesses a strong knack for funerary talent. When this week's feature, Hong Kong's Hyponic, released their latest effort through Fujishima's label, the chances were that 前行者 (Former Monk) would be quite a treat.
Hyponic is a duo comprised of Wah on guitars and vocals and Roy on drums and the group has been active as a Doom Metal project since the mid-nineties in multiple iterations. The group has released three albums during their time, their newest effort coming more than a decade since 2005's The Noise of Time. 前行者 saw its release on August 10. This six-song album showcases a psychedelic twist on the Funeral Doom genre. This does not mean that Hyponic has abandoned their Death Doom origins. On the contrary, this release embraces these moments by juxtaposing them to somber segments of near silence and atmospheric lulls. It ultimately culminates in full-blown ruptures of Doom Metal from the scaffold of Funeral Doom and psychedelia that pummels the listeners in sullen instrumentation.
Take a look at the album for yourself. Hyponic's new album is the accumulation of years of fine tuning and tinkering. They have moved away from a pure Death Doom mold and have embraced a Funeral Doom model. It is a riveting release that gives a very intriguing twist on a genre filled with crippling sorrow. Contribute to Hyponic and Weird Truth Productions by naming your price for 前行者. As always, feel free to share your thoughts below!
