gatekeeper Opening with a dirging track that’s tendencies are fairly minimalist, the appropriately titled “…”, Abandon plow through eleven doom-filled caricatures of subharmonic discordance on “In Reality We Suffer”.

This record is for those who like riffs that drip like molasses from a mountaintop, sludgy and painstakingly slow. Johan Karlsson issues anguished vocals that are abrasive enough to peel paint from walls on the sandpaper anthem “Trauma Is The Trigger”. Unlike many groups of this nature, Abandon mix up the lengths of their songs and this proves to be an effective approach, allowing the group to deliver mind numbing sonic manifestations without becoming redundant.

Clean guitar tones usher in “In Hopelessness Enlightened”, a somber behemoth of a track that encapsulates the meaning of heavy in its plodding depth. On the granular “Piles Of Pigs” the group stabs away with a corpulent concoction that is hastily withdrawn in favor of further deliberate discordance in the despair filled title track.

Abandon are extreme, there can be no objection to that fact, but this band simply takes their sonic languidity in the opposite direction of most, opting to slowly bludgeon the listener with resonating forcefulness.

Put this weighty platter of mournful dissonance in your PC and check out what this music does to the visualization program in its media player for an optimum experience.

Quite the disquieting ration of hopelessness, “In Reality We Suffer” is bitter, glum weight upon your doom seeking soul.