Doom Metal

Doom metal is the slowest and heaviest of the foundational styles, built on thick, downtuned, Black Sabbath-derived riffs, crawling-to-mid tempos, and an atmosphere of gloom and dread. Black Sabbath created the blueprint in the early 1970s, and 1980s bands like Saint Vitus, Pentagram, and Trouble kept it raw while Sweden’s Candlemass added epic, operatic grandeur. Vocals are usually clean and mournful, though many offshoots use growls. It prizes weight, space, and foreboding over speed.