Part Cenobite dismemberment soundtrack, part incidental music for the terminal ward, but ALL darkness, Letum is not for the optimist (unless you pine for a balrog smecking at your throat).

Most of what brings this material through is the lack of a beat — lone artist Mattias Henrikssons’s modus operandi comprises rather of television snow, encompassing choral lament, rusty clanging, organ dirge, whispered missives, and winds that could shear the skin off of a Hell’s Angel.

It all culminates into a gnarled soundscape of immense dark ambient, the likes of which I’ve only witnessed in Gustaf Hildenbrand and the nether reaches of Krzysztof Penderecki. If Hell exists in audio waves, Letum leads by example. (9.5/10)