Incantation - Upon the Throne of Apocalypse

Well, this was bound to turn up here eventually. As a young Lovecraftian and budding hessian I had the priveledge of seeing Nile and Incantation in a Mexican restaurant nearly fifteen years ago, and it was a life-shaping experience. For one thing, it made me perpetually skeptical of Nile after their two-hour set up time and misbehaving smoke machine lent their set an air of cheesy desperation. For another, Incantation easily outdid them in every conceivable aspect. They were like a force of nature to my young ears, and they were my gateway from slick cartoonish commercial death metal into darker, murkier occult waters. For those unfamiliar, Incantation plays doomish death metal steeped in forbidden knowledge, covered in layers of muck and grave dirt, and downtuned almost to oblivion. There's a vast subsegment of metal bands playing in this style now, from Swamp favorites Hooded Menace and Vasaeleth to Teitanblood and Impetuous Ritual. Still, nobody does it better than these bastards, and they never did it better than they did it here.
Hang high, Torment in the wind