Normally I consider Metal to be a genre that is full of energy and power; I listen to it and I wake up, I feel alive. In the genre of Doom Metal, things are a bit hazier as despite the death vocals and occasionally fast guitars, it can often be so slow and heavy that it makes my eyelids feel heavy. This is also the case with "Hollow", the newest album from MY SHAMEFUL, however, that is not to say it's bad, on the contrary: it scratches an itch I didn't know I had.

The vast majority of the songs begin in a very slow tempo, before speeding up considerably right before the end for the outro. One thing that surprised me about this particular band is that their vocals are often actually intelligible, the first instance of which is in the very first song "Nothing Left At All" when the title can be heard clearly. The next track titular track "Hollow" follows a similar structure to its predecessor with a very slow intro, before eventually breaking down with much faster guitars and drumming. The vocals are a lot scarcer, though, which allows the music room to breathe.

The album as a whole is very tightly mixed, so that the sound seems to be compressed. This is actually not a bad thing, as the guitars and drums become more symbiotic as a result and the bass is nicely tucked underneath both without disappearing altogether. This is especially apparent as the songs are very long as a general rule; the shortest song is over 6 minutes with the majority clocking in at around 8-9 on average. The length means that the band should have more to say, and while that is sometimes true, there are a couple of songs which seem to have no particular purpose: the aforementioned titular track for one, along with "Hour Of Atonement" which doesn't offer much in the way of variety from the rest of the album.

One thing I did enjoy from a few of the tracks is the throwbacks to BLACK SABBATH songs such as "Iron Man" and "Black Sabbath", with a lot of dissonance between notes of the guitar in "And I Will Be Worse" and "The Six". It creates a tension that is instantly released, and just sounds pretty damn Metal overall. The standout track is probably "Murdered Them All" since it is also the most imaginative: the sound of rainfall is played throughout and becomes very relaxing, especially in the 2 minute intro when some very slow picking on the guitar makes me want to curl up in a ball and sleep. However it then breaks down in a big way, with some brutal vocals and drums jerking everyone awake and shaking them for the next couple of minutes before eventually setting them back down again for the outro, which reintroduces the rain track. I'm not usually a fan of ambient noise on albums, but something about rain in particular I found worked quite well.

For someone who's not generally a keen listener of Doom Metal, I was pleasantly surprised by this album which made me remember that music with death vocals doesn't have to make me want to break things to be decent. For people who are already fans of Doom Metal, this could be a real gem, despite its occasional moments of repetition.