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Tenth album for Novembers Doom, who have had a career that redefines "uneven". They hit a high with the release of their fifth (and best) album, The Pale Haunt Departure, but then after were seemingly left chasing themselves, unable to really hit that mark again. The Novella Reservoir was just a try at doing the same album over again, while Into Night's Requiem Eternal and Aphotic were just kind of boring. So here we have this one.

Hamartia is just kind of another Novembers Doom album. It's better than their last few, with snappier songwriting and some good melodies. Paul Kuhr's voice remains the strongpoint of the band, with his visceral growls trading off with his excellent clean singing. The guitars are heavy, and there is a good tradeoff between the pummeling riffs and the more evocative sections. Songs like "Ghosts" are about as good a representation of what this band is about as you will get.

That said, there is just nothing here that this band has not been doing for years. The state of their songwriting has just been static for over a decade, and even the production is pretty much exactly the same as it was. One of the things that made The Pale Haunt Departure stand out so much was how different it was from what they had done before, but now they have just been imitating it for like 12 years, going nowhere at all. This is decent, but it has no surprises at all.