Who are they? You won’t be surprised to discover that a band named Bohren & der Club of Gore was founded by German musicians with a background in doom metal. But early on, the group ditched metal in favor of jazz-influenced instrumentals that retained a doom sensibility.

What should I listen to? “Black Earth” (2002) the band’s fourth record. The introduction of tenor sax refined Bohren & der Club of Gore’s guitar-free sound, resulting in their first masterpiece. “Piano Nights” (2014) is also excellent.

What Steven says: I saw them described as “a doom metal band playing acoustic jazz,” and immediately liked that concept. Bohren & der Club of Gore utilizes the musical vocabulary of jazz to create slowcore ambient music with a kind of doom metal aesthetic.

The stately and glacial paced music very rarely rises above a whisper. It’s based on organic sounds and acoustic instrumentation, mostly Mellotron, Fender Rhodes piano, saxophone, double bass and brush drums. Like a lot of ambient music, it fills the room like a perfume.

You might like this if you like: Sunn O))), Portishead, Popul Vuh, Talk Talk “Spirit of Eden”.