BAND OF THE DAY: DEAD TO A DYING WORLD

A band for long train journeys through a desolate rural wilderness with your face pressed sleepily against the drizzle-streaked window, Dallas, Texas  seven-piece Dead to a Dying World play epic blackened doom/crust with dual male/female vocals, cello, upright bass and all the usual band ephemera. Each song on their three-(long)-song debut (mixed by Kylesa guitarist/vocalist Phillip Cope) sounds like one of those time lapsed clips of stormclouds streaming omniously over the tops of trees, you can stream it on their bandcamp or pre-order the luscious double-LP package from the brilliantly named Tofu Carnage.

There's no shortage of epic crust with classical influences, or indeed ecologically aware bands prepared to adopt the musical conventions of black metal and inject some contemporary resonance to their lust for striking landscape, but rarely do they sound as monstrous and elemental as this, which is every bit as monstrous and elemental as their name.