Rigor Sardonicous

Formed in 1988 by Long Island natives Joseph J. Fogarazzo on vocals and guitar with bassist Glenn Hampton, Rigor Sardonicous have pursued the most obscure and funereal depths of doom imaginable. Their self-described "raw apocalyptic doom," which draws from the ragged crust of Winter, the grinding rust of Disembowelment, and the terminal rumble of Khanate, produced only two albums—1999's Apocalypsis Damnare and 2004's Principia Sardonica—along with a single 2002 split EP across the next eighteen years, confirming the unyielding nature of their vision. Such an impossibly slothful pace generally demands a drum machine, since no drummer has endured it for any sustained length of time.