Doom metal is today known as a largely established subgenre of heavy metal defined by typical slow tempo, downtuned heavy guitar riffs and the specific “doomy” vibe manifested in often ominous atmosphere and dreading lyrics that are characteristic for the genre. Taking it’s influences from Black Sabbath’s early albums, that featured songs like “Black Sabbath”, “Sweet Leaf”, “Children of the Grave”, “Orchid” etc.

Early doom metal bands will more distinctively define the genre in the mid-80s. Doom metal will further evolve and fuse with other metal subgenres and other genres as well, throughout the years, developing its own arsenal of characteristic subgenres.

Most of the subgenres were largely defined towards the mid 90’s and since then there has been little innovation in of deviating from the already established styles, even though decent amount of bands have pushed their respective style in their own directions, improving them and giving them their own touch. Atmospheric doom metal is a relatively new style that has been started in recent years, however not many bands have yet incorporated this style for it to be considered a legit subgenre of doom metal.

Doom metal is supposedly named after a Black Sabbath song “Hand of Doom”.

Early (Traditional) Doom Metal

Early doom metal (aka. traditional doom metal) is largely influenced by Black Sabbath with heavily distorted slow tempo guitar riffs and high vocals. Although Black Sabbath were the first to play this style of music, Pentagram are considered to be the first doom metal band to strictly perform this type of sound. Along with bands like Witchfinder General, Trouble, The Obsessed and Saint Vitus, Pentagram will set the main foundations and characteristics of the genre with traditional doom metal classic records like “Friends of Hell” (1983), "Saint Vitus" (1984), Psalm 9 (1984), “Repentless” (1985), “Born Too Late” (1986), “Day of Reckoning” (1987). The sound of traditional doom metal has slightly evolved throughout the years as well, with many bands like Count Raven, Pallbearer, Procession playing the style even today.

Representative bands:

Age of Taurus

Black Sabbath

Cave of Swimmers

Count Raven

Cross Vault

Crypt Sermon

Kings Destroy

Maligno

Monolith Cult

Orchid

Orodruin

Pallbearer

Pentagram

Procession

Reverend Bizarre

Saint Vitus

Stonegriff

The Obsessed

The Wounded Kings

Trouble

Witchfinder General

Witchcraft

Witching Altar

Epic Doom Metal

Epic doom is one of the earliest subgenres of doom metal to form. What generally defines the “epic” aspect of this style is the very strong influence of classical music evident in melodies produced by vocals, guitars and keyboards, in similar fashion with early power metal bands. Vocals are characteristically high and very theatric and are sometimes accompanied by background keyboard sounds adding up to the said “epic” element. First band to define this style was Candlemass with their trademark debut album “Epicus Doomicus Metallicus” (1986) that laid the early foundations for the style and after which the genre got its name from. Although Candlemass was fairly popular the style remained largely unnoticed and played only by handful of bands with only few bands like Solitude Aeturnus , Solstice and Isole achieving success. Classic records of this genre such as “Nightfall” (1987), “Ancient Dreams” (1988), “Into Depths of Sorrow” (1991), “Through the Darkest Hour” (1994), “New Dark Age” (1998), “Candlemass” (2005), “Alone” (2006) are highly regarded by many.

Representative bands:

Candlemass

Cromlech

December Dawn

Doomshine

Doomsword

Evangelist

Forsaken

Forsaken Peddlers

Gatekeeper

Isole

Scald

Solitude Aeturnus

Solstice

Sorcerer

While Heaven Wept

Sludge Metal

Coming in with hardcore music, doom metal forms this very harsh and noisy fusion called sludge metal. Preserving that initial doom metal style of riffing and adding the hardcore raw production value and intense shouted vocal style. Melvins are the first band to perform this style, their debut album “Gluey Porch Treatments” (1987) laid the early foundations for the style. Perhaps the next most influential band in the genre is Eyehategod with their early records being absolutely fundamental for the genre. Other bands like Crowbar, Corrosion of Conformity, Soilent Green and Acid Bath are the pioneering bands of the genre with albums such as “Ozma” (1989), “Blind” (1991), “In the Name of Suffering” (1992), “Crowbar” (1993), “When the Kite String Pops” (1994), Dopesick (1996) being some of the genre’s early classics. In the late 90s some sludge metal bands like Neurosis, Cult of Luna and Isis would incorporate post-rock elements in their sound creating a mixture called atmospheric sludge metal or post-metal.

Representative bands:

Abominable Iron Sloth

Acid Bath

Baroness

Black Sheep Wall

Black Tusk

Bongzilla

Bongripper

Buzzo*ven

Cancer Bats

Chrch

Corrosion of Conformity

Cough

Crowbar

Damad

Deadbird

Down

Eyehategod

Grief

Graves at Sea

Inter Arma

Iron Monkey

Kylesa

Mastodon

Melvins

Meth Drinker

Mistress

Rwake

Slugdge

Soilent Green

Weedeater

Stoner Metal

Stoner metal takes its influence from 60s psychedelic rock bands like Blue Cheer and Sir Lord Baltimore. The word “stoner” is used to describe the particular fuzzy guitar sound and a kinda retro vibe production style. So essentially stoner metal is doom metal with stoner attributes making it even more repetitive, slower and heavier. Very influential grunge band, Soundgarden, featured these stoner elements on their debut album released in 1988 which influenced later coming stoner bands. First bands to define the stoner metal genre were Cathedral, Sleep and Kyuss with their early releases “Forest of Equilibrium” (1991), “Wretch” (1991) and “Sleep’s Holy Mountain” (1992). These bands along with Electric Wizard, Acid King, Sons of Otis and Orange Goblin released landmark albums such as “Blues for the Red Sun” (1992), “Zoroaster” (1995), “Spacejumbofudge” (1996), “Time Traveling Blues” (1998), “Dopethrone” (2000), “Dopesmoker” (2003).

There has been a lot of fusion between stoner and sludge metal as well due to the similar characteristics between the genres, bands like Electric Wizard, Weedeater and Bongzilla make it hard to pinpoint under which category they fall under. In the early 2000s stoner genre made a breakthrough thanks to commercial success of stoner rock band Queens of the Stone Age with their album “Rated R”.

Representative bands:

Acid King

Beehover

Black Pyramid

Cathedral

Church of Misery

Egypt

Elder

Electric Wizard

Goatsnake

High on Fire

Kyuss

Monolord

Om

Orange Goblin

Planet of Zeus

Red Fang

Sigiriya

Sleep

Sons of Otis

Stoned Jesus

Ufomammut

Windhand

With the Dead

YOB

Death/Doom Metal

Influenced by Hellhammer and Celtic Frost’s early records and mixing the aspects of death with doom metal, first bands to play this style were Autopsy, Paradise Lost, Anathema, Winter, Asphyx and diSEMBOWELMENT their early records like “Severed Survival” (1989), “Into Darkness” (1990), “Lost Paradise” (1990), “Last One on Earth” (1992), “Transcendence into the Peripheral” (1993) and “Serenades” (1993). What generally defines this style are it’s insanely heavy riffs followed by death metal growls, death/doom essentially combines death metal’s rawness with doom metal’s gloomy atmosphere.

Somewhere towards the end 90’s death/doom started losing its popularity and some bands like Paradise Lost, My Dying Bride, Tiamat and Draconian started shifting their sound towards more mellow sounding gothic metal style. Despite this the style is very much alive and played by many bands like Inverloch and Coffins even today.

Representative bands:

Acid Witch

Akem Manah

Anathema

Anatomia

Angellore

Asphyx

Below the Sun

Beyond Dawn

Celestial Seasons

Coffins

Derkéta

diSEMBOWELMENT

Dusk

Graveyard Dirt

Grudge

Inborn Suffering

Iverloch

Mourning Beloveth

My Dying Bride

Mystic Charm

Officium Triste

Ophis

Paradise Lost

Solothus

Thorr’s Hammer

Tiamat

Vainaja

Unholy

Winter

Melodic Death/Doom

Death/Doom produced a subgenre within itself from bands such as Saturnus, Novembers Doom and October Tide that have been influenced by melodic death metal and fused it with doom/death, making it less heavy but with a bigger emphasis on the feeling of melancholy and atmosphere.

Representative bands:

Black Sun Aeon

Daylight Dies

Dawn of Solice

Exgenesis

Forest of Shadows

Ghost Brigade

Hanging Garden

Kaunis Kudemton

Novembre

October Tide

Rapture

Saturnus

Slumber

Swallow the Sun

Within the Fall

Funeral Doom

One of the most extreme doom metal subgenres is without doubt funeral doom. Influenced by death/doom, funeral artists take the slow tempo characteristic for doom metal to extreme, this is followed by prolonged guitar riffs and immensely low reverbed death growls. Later coming bands incorporated dirge music that only amplifies the depressive and melancholic atmosphere for which the genre is known for. Important year for this genre is 1991 when 3 bands, from different locations and possibly unaware of each other, Thergothon, Mordor and Boй released their demos which are considered to be the first funeral doom records. Thergothon remained the most influential and along with Funeral, Skepticism, Evoken and Mournful Congregation shaped the genre with classic records “Scream from the Heavens” (1994), “Weeping” (1994), “Shades of Night Descending” (1994), “Tragedies” (1995) and “Stormcrowfleet” (1995).

Today, along with classic bands, bands like Ahab, Esoteric and Shape of Despair are considered funeral doom’s pioneering bands.

Representative bands:

Ahab

Ataraxie

The Austrasian Goat

Bell Witch

Catacombs

Colosseum

Doom:VS

Dream After Death

Ea

Eirð

Esoteric

Evoken

Drem

Fallen

Funeral

Funeral Tears

Funeris

Monads

Monolithe

Mordor

Mournful Congregation

Nortt

Pantheist

Profetus

Septic Mind

Shape of Despair

Skepticism

Thergothon

Вой

Urna

Woebegone Obscured

Worship

Ysgim

Black/Doom

Influenced largely by black metal, black/doom manifests combination of doom metal melancholy and black metal misanthropy with slow tempo black-ish guitar riffs and black metal vocals. First bands to arise with this type of sound were Goatlord, Barathrum, Bethlehem and Katatonia with their early genre defining records “From Black Flames of Witchcraft” (1991), “Reflections of the Solstice” (1991), “Jhva Elohim Meth” (1992) and “Dark Metal” (1994).

Representative bands:

Abstracter

Abysmal

Acacia

Argentum

Barathrum

Bethlehem

Carpathian Full Moon

Culted

Deinonychus

Dolorian

Elysian Blaze

Faustcoven

Forgotten Tomb

Goatlord

Hellige

Katatonia

Misery’s Omen

O x í s t

Raventale

Skitliv

The Foetal Mind

Triptykon

Woods of Ypres

Drone Metal

A style that fuses drone music, a genre that puts the use of repetitive and prolonged sounds in slow tempos on emphasis, with doom metal creating a very noisy yet hypnotising music.

First band to start this style were the innovators Melvins with their album Bullhead (1991). Bands Earth and Boris, influenced by Melvins, further developed the style with their records "Earth 2 - Special Low Frequency Version"' (1993) and "Absolutego" (1996).

The genre has gained a lot of attention recently thanks to Sunn O)))'s commercial succes.

Representative bands:

Ascend

Avgrunden

Black Boned Angel

Bong

Boris

Earth

Hyatari

Jesu

Melvins

Nadja

Sunn O)))

Teeth of the Lions Rule the Divine

Tummler and Solomon

•••

Other Doom (Unique Shit/Avant-Garde/Not Specific)

Aarni

Æterna

Anatomy of Habit

Antareth

Clouds

Hjarnidaudi

Mindrot

Smallman

Sobre Nocturne

The Body

Umbra Nihil

Uncertainty Principle

Vulturium Memoriae

Wreck and Reference

Yearning