I don’t think there is any doubt that the first three albums from Entrails,  2010s Tales From the Morgue, 20011s The Tomb Awaits, and possibly the band’s 2013 Metal Blade debut, Raging Death are the pinnacle of the Swedish death metal revival. However, subsequent albums Obliteration, World Inferno and Rise of the Reaper didn’t quite hit the high mark set by their predecessors.

So here is the post covid album, album number 7, and a label change. It’s the second album for Penki Samuelsson’s switch to vocals and Markus Svenson on guitars, though there is yet another new drummer , Arvid Borg. But of course, this is still Jimmy Lundqvist’s show, and while everything is still in place including his stupidly heavy  mix which takes the HM2/Sunlight sound to teeth-rattling new levels, the result is largely the same as the last few albums- solid Swedish death metal.

The title track opens things up with a brief instrumental, (still one of my pet peeves), before “Die to Death” (really?) starts things for real with a pretty energetic if otherwise unspectacular track, but one that has a really nice mid-song groove that highlights the massive guitar tone. And it’s these moments where the guitars are allowed to breathe and shake your windows where the album stands out a little more.

All the tracks mix things up a bit with slower and faster moments, but it’s tracks like “Slayed to a Pile of Flesh”, “Dead By Evil”, “Inverted Graveyard” (two of the album’s better cuts), “Autopsy” and stout closer “Possessed”, where there is a little more focus  on heftier grooves and chugs are by far the albums highlights as the guitar tone is allowed to simply destroy everything in its path. Still, nothing ever comes close to the likes of “Voices”, “Euthanasia” or “End of All Existence”  from the bands early efforts.

Then, the likes of “The Dead”, “Fear the End” , “Open Casket Feast” and “Reborn in Worms’ all have more up tempo galloping harder charging riffs that deliver plenty of blast beats or d -beat, classic Swedish canters that are still satisfying if familiar.

While Entrails were once the undisputed kings of the genre, the fact is some other bands like Necrom (whose All Paths Are Left Here is the best album of the year in the genre) , Abscession,  Katakomba, Sentient Horror, Gods Forsaken, Disfuneral, Organic, Iron Flesh are nipping at their heels , and while they answered the bell with An Eternal Time of Decay, I’m not sure how many more times they can respond.

[Visit the band's website]

---

Comments