Entombed – Review

Entombed

(Earache)
by Scott Hefflon

Entombed has been forging their own path through death metal and “death ‘n’ roll” on Earache since 1990. This self-titled release collects a few of the gems found only on EPs and the split 7″ with New Bomb Turks. Entombed have always been about skull-crushing production (courtesy of Tomas Skogsberg) and not bowing to the inherent restrictions of death metal. Whether they’re covering Kiss’ “God of Thunder,” Repulsion’s “Black Breath,” The Misfits’ “Night of the Vampire,” Stiff Little Fingers’ “State of Emergency,” or “Vandal X,” Entombed perform in a manner that is distinctly Entombed. When you listen to the songs, they just make sense as Entombed covers. In a perfect world, “Night of the Vampire” woulda been on Violent World , Caroline’s Tribute to the Misfits. While the song hovers somewhere between Entombed ‘susual throat-ripping brutality and the Misfits’ dark majesty, it represents each in a new and interesting light. As for EP-only tracks, Entombed opens with “Out of Hand” – typically (and I mean that it a good way) raw, tuned-low guitars growling like souped-up muscle cars that ain’t even breakin’ sweat, baby, mean-sounding half-step riffs, and vocals… Well, they’re Entombed’s vocals. To compare them to anything else would be going in the opposite direction, ya know? When the tracks from the Strange Aeons EP begin with track four, the production takes a turn for the more did-someone-leave-the-vacuum-on? school of death metal. Again, I mean that in a good way. The year was 1992, and thrash was not (quite) yet a four-letter word beginning with “S,” ending with “T,” and pausing briefly to say “HI” in the middle. Ditto for tracks seven through nine from the Crawl EP (1991) – the dive-bombing solos and broken-glass-cocktail vocals are usually the sure signs of “God, remember when we used to like this stuff?” but in Entombed’s case, the songs stand the test of time. They rose above the fill-in-the-blanks pulp then, and long after the chaff has fallen, they still stand strong. Skogsberg’s production has always been an integral part of Entombed’s dominance, and it’s never so obvious as on Entombed where years worth of work is tracked side by side.