Swedish retro death is as common these days as reality shows about fat, uneducated hoarders. Steel Druhm appreciates both trends, so he’s happy as a pig in shite over the Dismember-worship demonstrated by Daemonicus on their second album, Deadwork.
Grave
Hooded Menace – Effigies of Evil Review
Ah, what could be better than nasty, heavy-as-hell Finnish doom-death to ease the transition from summer to fall. In case you haven’t heard, winter is coming…
Evocation – Illusions of Grandeur Review
Evocation once walked amongst the likes of Dismember and Entombed. Now, they travel the road to common melo-death and some (Steel Druhm) are not pleased by this switcheroo. Send him beer and beef jerky so he can get through these difficult times.
Bombs of Hades – The Serpent’s Redemption Review
Bombs of Hades delivers an album of punky Swedish retro death loaded with crust and scabs. Our intrepid Steel Druhm is here to pick ’em all and find out what lies beneath. It ain’t pretty.
Rex Shachath – Sepulchral Torment Review
A band with no past is not necessarily a band without a future. But a band which doesn’t look at the future is surely one which lives in the past. With regards to the present, if you title your album Sepulchral Torment and you play old-school death metal, well, there is apparently not much to be said. Rex Shachath is a band with a good hand playing an old game not many people appreciate anymore, but it does it with style and you can’t help but recognise it.
Grave – Endless Procession of Souls Review
Retro-thrash, retro-death, will the present ever stop being the past?? Well, at least it’s Grave doing what Grave does, so I shant complain. Nasty, slimy death from Sweden can always crash on my couch (after I put down some plastic).
Blood Mortized – The Key to a Black Heart Review
Just in time to wash away the bitter taste of Six Feet Under, comes this ridiculously sick death metal masterstroke by Blood Mortized. Taking the vicious old school Swedish death sound from their Bestial EP and improving on it in every way, The Key to a Black Heart is exactly what you want from the style and death metal in general.
Malfeitor – Dum Morior Orior Review
It’s been said by some (others) that we don’t review enough death metal here at AMG. This is because you’re all a bunch of wackadoodle metal divas and Steel Druhm is tired of your whining, bitching and crying!
Vallenfyre – A Fragile King Review
2011 might as well be dubbed the year of Swedish Retro Death. Band after loathsome band has burst from the underground to pay rancid homage to genre legends like Entombed, Dismember and Grave. Despite the sheer volume of the stuff, Steel Druhm has remained supportive and for the most part, the trend hasn’t worn out its welcome. Now we get Vallenfyre’s debut full length from a veritable death metal super group featuring members of Paradise Lost, My Dying Bride and Cradle of Filth. With such a pedigree, it shouldn’t be too surprising when A Fragile King has everything you would reasonably expect from a Swedish death album. It’s chunky, thick, nasty and vile. It’s an ode to all things Entombed with a sizeable injection of Celtic Frosty goodness as well. At times, its so much like the immortal Left Hand Path it’s uncanny, yet it also brings in plenty of dire dirges to shake things up. This MOFO was conceived in unholy sin, birthed in ungodly filth and raised on bloody carnage. There’s a guitar sound heavy enough to fracture your vertebrae and vocals so grisly they’ll disturb the deranged. But, you rightly ask, is it actually good? Oh yes, it’s really good! This is unapologetically retro and doesn’t strive for innovation but it nails home the tried-and-true Swedish sound with the subtlety of a Panzer division. How this will sit with you depends entirely on your tolerance for more Swedish death. If 2011 has fed you all the old-time death you can stomach, move along and I won’t think less of you. If not, belly up to the death buffet and chow down on this meatloaf of the damned.
Cryptborn – Into the Grasp of the Starving Dead
My oh my, more rancid, raw and caustic Swedish retro death, this time by way of Finland. Into the Grasp of the Starving Dead is the debut EP by Cryptborn and as with any proper Swedish retro death, it sounds as if it should have come out in 1990 along with the big releases from their obvious influences Entombed and Grave. It has that classic unrelentingly raw, buzzing guitar tone and vocals so low and phlegmy they almost rattle your speakers off the stands. Both Angry Metal Guy and myself have been eating up this particular trend while wondering when we would start to grow weary of it. While I can’t speak for AMG on this, I’m still enjoying it fully and most of the bands currently involved in this retro Swedish death wave are quite good. Now you can count Cryptborn among those doing it right and doing it crusty, rancid justice. Although its an EP, you still get seven tracks worth of face peeling, zombie attacking, brutal goodness and it packs everything you could want from this style (except originality since its retro).
