Robe

The first entry in the new Crucial Blaze series which picks up where the now-completed Crucial Bliss series ended. Now, the explorations into ambient drone, electronic noise and abstract heaviness descend into darker and more apocalyptic zones, and Robe's newest release Bleak combines these elements into an ideal flagship release for this new series.  
Robe released the stunning Remains of a Burning World cassette on Thor's Rubber Hammer a while back; this new set of tracks continues in that intensely dark and oppressive vein, with 75 minutes of rumbling, creeping ambience and oozing, blackened bottom-end. The blare of distant horns, smeared trumpets and screeching violins are stretched into endless drones while an immensely oppressive and threatening atmosphere drifts over formless glacial guitar/bass grind like plumes of pungent black smoke. It's like hearing corroded, distressed blasts of orchestral sound, broken and warped black metal guitars and clanking machinery rotting beneath massive waves of low-end heaviness. 
 
"... creeping dread so convincing, it may induce panic in the listener. Their toolkit seems limited to effervescent static and twisting creaks built on groaning foundations, but listen too long and, like staring into a snowy TV, you're bound to start imagining things in it. The third act is where the bad noise really starts to bare its claws, introducing fuzzy, discordant melodies like funereal foghorns wafting into a rickety, haunted harbor ... believably scores what might be taking shape in the shadows 'round bedtime..." 
--Rue Morgue Magazine