post-metal

Post-metal is a music genre rooted in heavy metal but exploring approaches beyond metal conventions. It emerged in the 1990s with bands such as Neurosis and Godflesh, who transformed metal texture through experimental composition. In a way similar to the predecessor genres post-rock and post-hardcore, post-metal offsets the darkness and intensity of extreme metal with an emphasis on atmosphere, emotion, and even "revelation", developing an expansive but introspective sound variously imbued with elements of ambient, noise, psychedelic, progressive, and classical music, and often shoegaze and art rock. Songs are typically long, with loose and layered structures that discard the verse–chorus form in favor of crescendos and repeating themes. The sound centres on guitars (subjected to various effects) and drums, while any vocals are often but not always screamed or growled and resemble an additional instrument.

Post-metal is related to other experimental styles of metal: avant-garde metal, drone metal, progressive metal, and industrial metal. It has also been called metalgaze and art metal, highlighting its connection to shoegaze (an indie music style related to post-rock) and art music, respectively. Contemporary post-metal, pioneered by diverse groups such as Isis, Agalloch, Boris, Pelican, Jesu, Wolves in the Throne Room, and Russian Circles, typically employs the deep heaviness of doom metal and sludge metal and/or the dark ferocity of black metal. The widespread acclaim of Deafheaven, who succeeded Alcest in combining black metal and shoegaze (a fusion nicknamed blackgaze), made this global post-metal underground more visible.