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Ride the Flatline (feat. Jami Morgan & Code Orange) (2024)
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Evidence (2023)
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Agamemnon (2025)
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31 bands found
Dopethrone are a Montreal sludge metal band whose sound is filthy, slow-burning, and deliberately abrasive. Formed in 2008, the group developed a DIY identity rooted in stoner doom, sludge, and a grimy sense of humor, with albums such as Demonsmoke, Dark Foil, III, Hochelaga, Transcanadian Anger, and Broke Sabbath building a devoted following among listeners who like their heavy music raw rather than polished. Dopethrone fit metal scope directly through down-tuned riffs, crawling tempos, blown-out bass, harsh vocals, and the oppressive atmosphere of doom and sludge. Their songs often feel less like compositions arranged for radio than like fumes rising from a basement amplifier, but the band has a strong instinct for groove under the grime. The Montreal setting, especially the Hochelaga reference point, gives the music a local character: dirty, stubborn, and proudly outside clean mainstream rock manners. Dopethrone's appeal lies in commitment. They do not chase elegance or technical display. They make heavy music that sounds sticky, hostile, and physical, turning repetition and distortion into a kind of low-end punishment.
Down are a New Orleans heavy metal supergroup whose music turned Southern sludge into a landmark sound of the 1990s and beyond. Formed in 1991 by musicians connected to Pantera, Corrosion of Conformity, Crowbar, Eyehategod, and other heavy acts, the band brought together Phil Anselmo, Pepper Keenan, Kirk Windstein, Jimmy Bower, and later Pat Bruders and other members across different eras. NOLA remains the essential statement, blending Sabbathian riffs, bluesy Southern atmosphere, swampy tempos, and Anselmo's raw vocal presence into songs that felt both massive and lived-in. Down II, Down III, and the EP series continued the band's mix of groove, heaviness, and regional identity. Down fit metal scope directly through sludge metal, Southern metal, and heavy metal, with a legacy that shaped countless riff-focused bands. Their best work does not sound like a side project despite the famous resumes involved. It sounds like musicians translating a shared landscape into weight: humidity, sorrow, addiction, camaraderie, and defiance all pushed through amplifiers. Down's riffs feel carved from New Orleans heaviness, slow enough to sink and strong enough to endure.
Employed To Serve formed in Woking in 2011 and grew from abrasive underground hardcore into one of the United Kingdom's most important modern heavy bands. Early releases such as Greyer Than You Remember and The Warmth of a Dying Sun established a violent, chaotic sound built around Justine Jones's caustic vocals and Sammy Urwin's dense guitar writing. Eternal Forward Motion widened the band's reach without sacrificing disgust or urgency, while Conquering pushed the riffs into a more openly metal direction, using groove, thrash muscle, and anthemic choruses to make the songs larger. Later material kept that expansion moving while retaining the band's core contempt for stagnation, burnout, and social pressure. Employed To Serve are firmly metal and hardcore at once: breakdowns, blast-adjacent momentum, sludge weight, and shouted hooks are all part of the vocabulary. Their connection to Church Road Records also matters, because the band helped shape a wider ecosystem for contemporary heavy music. Their best work feels angry but not careless, turning frustration into disciplined impact and making growth sound like escalation rather than compromise.
Ethereal Tomb formed in 2021 between Barrie and Toronto, developing a sound they describe with the street-level force of sludge, doom, and hardcore. The project began around guitarist and vocalist Alexander Senum, with early material combining massive low-end riffs, slow-motion heaviness, and a raw political charge. Their self-titled debut brought together doom metal weight, hardcore abrasion, and death-tinged grime, while later releases such as Death Of The Indian, When the Rivers Dry, and Life Beyond Oppressor's Brutality sharpened both the band's sound and its message. Ethereal Tomb's music is heavy in more than a sonic sense: the songs confront colonial violence, social neglect, environmental collapse, and survival, using repetition and distortion to make those themes feel oppressive and immediate. The band can move from crawling doom to crusty hardcore momentum, but the core remains thick, angry, and grounded. Ethereal Tomb stand out because their heaviness is inseparable from lived anger; the riffs are not just dark atmosphere, they are vehicles for resistance and grief.
New Orleans' Eyehategod are the definitive sludge metal band, dragging blues-soaked doom through a swamp of feedback, distortion, and misanthropic fury since 1988. Mike IX Williams' anguished howl over Jimmy Bower's crushing, tempo-shifting riffs on 'Take as Needed for Pain' and 'Dopesick' established the blueprint that inspired countless sludge and doom acts. Their sound is as much a product of New Orleans' oppressive heat and hard living as any musical influence, making them inseparable from their environment.
Eyes of the Sun is a doom and sludge metal trio from Brooklyn, New York, formed in 2007 by vocalist/bassist Jeff Blanchard and guitarist Miguel De Jesus Jr., with drummer Chris O'Neil completing the lineup. The band endured significant setbacks when Hurricane Sandy destroyed their rehearsal space at Translator Audio in New York and wiped out their equipment, but ultimately signed to Metal Blade's Blacklight Media imprint and released their debut Chapter I (2018). Blanchard is also the owner of the Brooklyn metal bar Lucky 13 Saloon, a venue closely connected to New York's underground doom scene.
Floor formed in Miami, Florida in 1992 and developed a distinctive two-guitar, no-bass sludge and stoner metal approach built around severely down-tuned strings and extremely loose low-end techniques — including what critics described as a "bomb note" — that gave their sound unusual sonic weight. The band released a self-titled album and the EP Madonna before disbanding in 2004, with guitarist Steve Brooks going on to co-found Torche. A reunion beginning in 2010 and a fuller reformation in 2013 produced Dove and Oblation (2014), restoring Floor's influence on the Miami doom and sludge scene and introducing the band to a new generation of listeners.
Wilmington, North Carolina's He Is Legend defy easy categorization, lurching between southern-fried hard rock, sludgy stoner grooves, and progressive post-hardcore with Schuylar Croom's wild, theatrical vocals tying it all together. Albums like 'I Am Hollywood' and 'White Bat' showcase a band that thrives on unpredictability, equal parts Queens of the Stone Age and Every Time I Die.
Heriot formed in Swindon in 2014 and developed into one of the most exciting British heavy bands of the 2020s by making metalcore feel claustrophobic, industrial, and physically dangerous again. The group's early lineup built the foundation, but Debbie Gough's arrival in 2019 sharpened the band's identity through her guitar work, screams, and visual presence. Profound Morality announced Heriot as more than another revivalist act: the songs fused metallic hardcore, sludge weight, death-metal violence, and noise-scarred atmosphere into compact bursts of pressure. Devoured by the Mouth of Hell expanded that world with tracks like "Foul Void," "At the Fortress Gate," "Siege Lord," and "Opaline," allowing melody and ambience to appear without reducing the threat. Heriot fit metal scope directly through riff density, harsh vocals, extreme dynamics, and their place in contemporary heavy touring. What makes them stand out is control. The band understand space as well as impact, letting silence, feedback, and texture make the heavy sections feel even heavier. Their music sounds less like release than containment finally failing.
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World Metal Index is an index of World heavy metal bands — death metal, black metal, thrash metal, doom metal, metalcore, hardcore punk, and all heavy music. Browse bands by genre, find metal concerts near you, and discover the World metal scene.