Halter is a band from Yaroslavl, Russia. I'm not sure when they formed, but the first album seems to date from 2013, followed by an ep in 2014 and their second full-length right about now. If you're into funeral doom and a fans of bands like Evoken, Funeral and Shape Of Despair, you might want to check this one out. It has all the right ingredients to make it an excellent album: downtuned, grinding guitars, a suffocating bleak atmoshpere and deep guttural growls.
But Halter isn't just about playing loud, slow and crushing. There's a plenty of melody, mostly in the form of immersive guitar leads, which in a way also remind me of bands like Saturnus or My Dying Bride without the so-called goth-elements. 'First Snow' for instance, is a massive doom metal anthem, lasting for over ten minutes and not even stale or boring for a milisecond. I know, that is quite typical for doom metal but you need to be an excellent band to be able to pull that off.
And that is just what Halter is, an excellent band blessed with talent and experience. 'For The Abandoned' is full of these awesome anthems, from opener '...Of The Part Of Nature' to the deeply emotional epos 'Ode To The Abandoned'. I have no favorites, as I prefer to listen to the album entirely, with my eyes closed, sinking ever deeper in a thick cesspool of misery and finding a way out. Still, however, this cesspool currently is a way better world to dwell in than our current society.
So check out this monolithic funeral doom album. This is another one of those awesome pieces of extreme metal coming from Russia. As far as I'm concerned, Russia can keep them coming...
Serge