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This band comes with a pretty serious pedigree, as it is comprised of the members of Death/Thrash band Gravehill, including drummer Rhett Davis, who was part of the legendary Morgion and Keen of the Crow. The band members added a second guitar player and singer Melissa Pinion and made the lineup of a new Doom band in the classic Candlemass/Solstice mode.

This is exactly what I wanted this to be like. Stygian Crown conjure up long, heavy songs with crunching riffs and an atmosphere of dark myth. The production gives the guitar sound a lot of meat, though I do think the drums could sound a bit better. Melissa Pinion has a similarly dark, lower-pitched voice that adds its own kind of heaviness to the proceedings. I do wish she would exercise her range a bit more, as some more variance would definitely make the songs stand out more from one another.

This is a very dense, mystical, underground album, not making any attempt to write a catchy single or attract people who do not already love this kind of music, and I applaud that. If you like Epic, Traditional Doom Metal, then this is the album to beat this year.