Pelata If ever a title summed up the vibe of an album perfectly, it is 'Sincerest Misery', the title of the debut full length recording from Indiana’s Apostle Of Solitude. Both words truly surmise this album’s feel. It’s very sincere, both in attitude and execution and it projects pure, unadulterated misery.

Beginning their journey on the same well trod path taken by Reverend Bizarre, Saint Vitus before them and, of course, Black Sabbath, Apostle Of Solitude does not simply hold high the grand traditions of its forefathers, it makes these traditions sound fresh and alive. 'Sincerest Misery' is truly, deeply heavy in every sense of the word. The tones are pummeling, from the guitars to the drums. The vocals, both in melody and performance, give the impression of both sadness and anger. The harmonized, melodic guitar themes are both hair-raising and melancholic.

Choosing to stay mostly in the land of slow tempos, the band successfully conjures a 3-way marriage of melody, hatred and depression. 'A Slow Suicide' is a perfect example of this with a bombastic, ominous riff and angst-ridden, angrily melodic vocal. The title track is a 14-minute beast that will drag your helpless psyche along like clubbed, defeated prey in the hands of its conqueror... heavy and scarring. Somehow, this band even manages to take something as predictable as a Black Sabbath cover, in this case 'Electric Funeral', and breathe new despair into it by slowing the tempo to a crawl and cranking up the “epic” nature hinted at in the original.

I know it’s late in the game, 'Sincerest Misery' wasn’t unleashed upon us until October of this year, but if this album isn’t on every Traditional Doom fan’s Top 10 List, I weep for the genre. Apostle Of Solitude are future legends in this field.