Giant Drag was one of those bands I absolutely loved in middle and highschool, but no one else seemed to have heard of.  At the time, Giant Drag only had one full length album (which I listened to religiously): Hearts and Unicorns. Giant Drag is an indie grunge band formed in 2003 by singer/songwriter/front man (front woman?) Annie Hardy and drummer Micah Calabrese.  Giant Drag stands out from other bands in the genre due to Annie's vocals, and the band's unique dreamlike sound which takes inspiration from shoegaze bands such as My Bloody Valentine ( Check out my review of My Bloody Valentine - Loveless here! ). Giant Drag is also known for their humorous song names such as "Kevin is Gay", "My Dick Sux", "High Friends in Places", and "YFLMD" (You Fuck Like My Dad). The first song on the album is "Kevin is Gay". The title of this track has a funny story behind it; in Annie's own words, "Kevin is just a guy though, the

"A celebration for the death of man..." "...and the great cold death of the Earth" The names of the first and eighth tracks come together to create a perfect description for the mood of this album: It's harrowing, it's dreary, it's the soundtrack to the world slowly dying. The Mantle is the second studio album by the American blackened post metal band, Agalloch. If you want to know what blackened post metal sounds like, imagine black metal, way slowed down, and with some doomer guitars thrown in. Agalloch is especially good at throwing doomer guitars, and as a result has created some of the best music in the genre. The band created five great albums, but their  pièce de résistance  is The Mantle. The songs on The Mantle sound desolate and mournful in a way that feels almost terrifyingly relatable. Chilling song titles such as "A celebration for the death of man...", "In the Shadow of our Pale Companion", "You Were but a Ghost in