Review by Sam on August 25, 2026.

The latest recording from death-doomsters Night Hag has what I would call a lot of character. I was initially put off by the low-fi mass of sound that oozed into my ears, because the album opens with a sloppy blast beat sequence and it just sounded like a giant wad of shit. But if you stick with it, as I chose to do, you will be rewarded with some hefty and utterly dismal doom metal in which you can clearly hear what the drums are doing, and the bass is given voice as well.

The atmosphere of this album is pure, unadulterated filth. This is the kind of thing that is made by sleazebags, for sleazebags. All of the required influences are present, with heaping amounts of Incantation and Autopsy, and I will venture to say that these guys are well read in terms of southern sludge metal. Second track "Effluvia Tendrils" features some rather hellish screaming towards its end that lends itself nicely to the overall horrorshow thing they've got going on. The guitars, much like the vocals, are low and abyssal and absolutely evil. With the song "It Came Back The Next Night", a penchant for underground death/doom heroes Winter can be detected. This one also features a putrid bass guitar break and an ensuing doom sequence that moves at a squalid crawl. Night Hag is most definitely in their element whilst playing slow and creepily.

One band that these dudes don't really resemble is Grief, but their music coveys similar vibes of suffocating hopelessness. Grief is the most hopeless band on the planet, but Night Hag seems to draw their water from a similar stream of nihilism. I just wish that Night Hag wouldn't play fast because they are just not good at it, and when they do it seems to be counterintuitive to what they are going for. Their doom sections, however, are the embodiment of the genre's ethos. "Strange Whispers From Beneath The Cyprus" is wholly chilling with its moribund lurch, and again the vocals are redolent with the macabre.

Album closer "Excoriate" starts with another of those nondescript blast sequences, but this one evolves into some of the most desolate doom metal to be found in 2026. The drummer pounds away with massive double kicks beneath the dreary and depressive guitar as the ghoulish vocals gurgle in a sea of purulence. With "Great Dismal Darkness", Night Hag offers a thick and healthy slab of low-fi death/doom diabolism for fans of the old school.

Rating 8.5 out of 10 strange whispers