333: Three New Releases That Deserve Your Full Attention | Dawn of Solace; Melvins 1983; Cwfen
Join us as we dig through the murk to bring you three recent releases that are worth the weight. This time, it’s a trio that hits across the doom spectrum, from melodic sorrow to sludge chaos and haunted gloom. Yes, please.
1
Dawn of Solace – Affliction Vortex (Feb 14, 2025)
Tuomas Saukkonen continues to sharpen his vision of melancholic heaviness. Affliction Vortex doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but it spins with purpose. Clean vocals hover over thick, churning riffs, while the atmosphere remains cold and cathartic. There’s something relentless yet oddly comforting in the way songs like “Mother Earth” and “Fortress” unfold, like old grief resurfacing.
For fans of: Swallow the Sun, Katatonia, shape-shifting sorrow.
2
Melvins 1983 – Thunderball (Apr 18, 2025)
Buzz Osborne teams up once more with Mike Dillard for a particularly grimy ride. Thunderball is classic Melvins chaos: lurching, loud, and weird as hell. But underneath the distortion lies sharp intent. “Victory of the Pyramids” stomps like a doom locomotive, while shorter tracks play with garage rock and warped psych textures. It’s messy, unpredictable, and fully committed to being exactly what it wants to be.
For fans of: Sleep-deprived riffs, noise-sludge weirdness, low-end mischief.
3
Cwfen – Sorrows (May 30, 2025)
A quiet surprise from the UK underground, Sorrows casts a long, Glasgow-based, fog-drenched shadow. The album plays like a nocturnal mass, slow, minimal, and eerie in all the right places. There’s goth DNA here, but it’s buried under layers of low-slung doom-rock and coldwave restraint. The songwriting is subtle but detailed, and the end result is a focused (although quite airy in nature), thoughtfully constructed work that rewards close listening. * Bonus for all the ponderers, it’s pronounced “Coven”.
For fans of: Type O Negative, Lycia, fog-lit cemeteries.
