If you’re one of the many admirers who discovered Sunn O))) through last year’s galaxy-shaking Monoliths and Dimensions, then you understand the soothing effects of doom metal. As the band’s guitarist Greg Anderson told author and enthusiast John Wray in a 2006 New York Times Magazine profile, “I think low-frequency sound, when played above a certain volume, is very conducive to a meditative state or a trance.” This isn’t metal for headbanging; it’s metal to meditate to.

Although Anderson and his partner Stephen O’Malley have honed their brand of focused distortion to a therapeutic science, they’re far from the only metalheads employing extreme low-end rumblings for our metaphysical benefit. To aid you on your spiritual journey, we present this collection of notable releases from metal groups working to bring us closer to enlightenment through the heaviest of sounds. Namaste!