Sadness Will Prevail

The album took three years to write and six months to record, mix, and master all at Steve Austin's self run studio Austin Enterprise.[7] Reoccurring themes of the album include isolation, depression, death, suicide, and violence. The album, for the most part, was inspired by a period of time when Austin was stuck in his home due to a severe snow storm with his family.[8] Another big inspiration for the album was the rise of technology and the internet, which according to Austin, influenced his decision to stop using his phone to instead use E-Mail to communicate with other people.

According to Austin, the biggest inspiration for him to do a two-hour double disc album was in attempt to progress from the "really fast and stripped down" In the Eyes of God. Each track on the album was intentionally mixed so that there was a continuous flow between one track to the next, this was done in attempt to give the album a tone similar to that of a movie soundtrack.[7] The artwork for the album, a grainy black-and-white photograph of a drug addicted woman sitting in the corner of an empty room, was specifically chosen for the album's cover because it goes along with the album's themes of despair and impending doom.[9]

The audio sample from "Christianized Magick" was taken from the 2000 film Paradise Lost 2: Revelations, a documentary about the West Memphis Three.[8]

Upon its initial release in 2002, Sadness Will Prevail received mixed critical reception. William York, of allmusic, gave the record two and a half stars out of five, questioning the album's low-end lacking mixing and critiquing what he refers to as "the abundance of filler on [the] two discs".[1] Xander Hoose of Chronicles of Chaos gave the album six and a half stars out of a possible ten, stating that Austin's performance on the album is "far below his capabilities" and criticizing his vocals and production work on the album.[5] R. Temin of Blistering.com gave the album a thumbs down for its vocals, long runtime, and packaging, referring to it as "pretentious crap".[3]

Maelstrom Zine's Roberto Martinelli, on the other hand, praised the album and called it the group's "most diverse and complete effort".[6] Extreme metal fanzine Apeshit also gave the album a positive review, stating that Sadness Will Prevail contained "the darkest, most miserable, schizophrenic suicidal sounds you're most likely find" and ending their review stating that it is "the most original, albeit miserable album in recent memory".[2] Similarly, BraveWords editor Chris Bruni called the album "one of the harshest, most insane releases [he's] heard all year".[4]

All tracks are written by Steve Austin.

Adapted from the Sadness Will Prevail liner notes.[13]

Today Is the Day

• Steve Austin – vocals, guitar, bass guitar, sampler, piano, keyboards, production, mixing, recording, mastering, cover art, design
• Chris Debari – bass guitar, guitar
• Marshall Kilpatric – drums, percussion

Production and additional personnel

• Shawn Briggs – design
• Kris Force – electric violin, acoustic violin
• Jackie Gratz – cello
• Orion Landau – cover art, design
• Mark Morton – additional guitar
• Seth Putnam – additional vocals
• Wrest – sampler

• Sadness Will Prevail at Discogs (list of releases)
• Sadness Will Prevail at Bandcamp