Abysmal Grief are like The Coffinshakers on Viagra (trademark!), alluring, sensual and depraved, with a blatant metallic edge, displaying their insurmountable ability to manipulate church organ sounding keyboards effortlessly into their basic but larger-than-life barrage of metallic sounds, seamlessly extracting the menacing sound these church organs are capable of, making their distinctive Italian sound ever more gothic and dark.

The drum sound is enormous, an all-encompassing hammering of war-like kettle drums, delivering a pulsating, constant funeral procession beat to which everything else abides, from the guitars to the vocals. Ha, the vocals! Like the Sisters of Mercy with a bigger set of balls, creeping, baritone-heavy, yet gritty.

Sublimely suffocating ambience, drums, guitars, keyboards and vocals (aided by a female singer's guest appearance and a violin of sorts) bring forth otherworldly, Stygian vistas, summoning dark powers of the netherworlds and culminating in an atmosphere so religiously blasphemous, it raises the hairs on the back of the neck.

_Feretri_ does not differ much from the band's 2007 self-titled, however it does provide more convincing, more powerful yet less insidious tunes of horror and atrocity. It's all in-your-face sort of an attitude that has been in the works on this album; still very Italian, very ferocious and very religious in the sentiments it conjures, Abysmal Grief's latest is nothing short of a breathtaking experience through man's most hidden, secretive, foul, dark desires; a manifesto against god and against the mainstream, _Feretri_ is the ultimate Italian Giallo film soundtrack.

Amazing on every level, from beginning to end, _Feretri_ contains so many qualities no simple review could ever list; beautifully twisted, arcane, mesmerizingly erotic and sweetly grim, this is a rare gem that everybody must listen to at least once throughout their flimsy, everyday, habitual, sun-drenched, bright life; and if this very reviewer has not hyperbolized enough, then this album comes as highly recommended, being one of the best musical outputs the underground has yielded in the year 2013.