Lycus are an American band, originally located in Oakland, then moved to Sacramento, with a rather successful promotional demo done in 2011 (Demo MMXI, released via Graceless Recordings on tape and Flenser Records on vinyl). It caught the attention of Olympia-based 20 Buck Spin, whom the band signed to recently.
At the end of 2012, Lycus entered the Earhammer Studio with Greg Wilkinson (Pallbearer, High On Fire, Asunder, Samothrace, Vastum etc.) to record the three songs of Tempest. The whole lasts for forty three minutes, meaning that all of them last pretty long: from nine to twenty minutes.
What Lycus bring with Tempest is a wonderful trip through spheres of Utter Darkness and Abysmal Apocalypse. The basics are Funeral Doom-based, somewhere in the vein of Mournful Congregation, Ahab, Black Wreath, Evoken, Monolithe or Comatose Vigil. It means: slow, oh so slow epic riffs, a harsh, battering and hammering rhythm section, and grumpy death grunts as initial and essential fundament. However, like some of these bands / projects, and several others within this specific genre, the whole gets darkly coloured by blackish bleakness (à la Throne Of Katharsis, Situs Magus, Thrall, Blut Aus Nord or Manii) (a couple of times, by the way, the Black-parts do blast like an undivine eruption in Hell itself!), as well as some elements from the most eerie and obscure-melancholic Doom-Death scene (with Thergothon, Asunder or Colosseum coming to mind). Add some subtle details from Drone, Industrial, Noise and Ambient (Kaula, Empire Auriga etc.), and join / share my happy misery!