UMUR
"Steelbath Suicide" is the debut full-length studio album by Swedish melodic death metal act Soilwork. The album was released through Listenable Records in May 1998. It was re-released in 2000 through Century Media Records with a different cover artwork and a live bonus track. Soilwork formed in 1995 under the Inferior Breed monicker, but changed their name to the current monicker in 1996. Soilwork recorded the 5 track "In Dreams We Fall into the Eternal Lake" demo in 1997 and upon a chance meeting with Michael Amott (Arc Enemy, Carcass, Spiritual Beggars), they gave him a copy of the demo, which led to the record deal with Listenable Records. Soilwork went through a couple of lineup shuffles in their early years and just before recording "Steelbath Suicide", keyboard player Carlos Holmberg and bassist Ola Flink were added to the lineup.
The addition of a keyboard player to the lineup, is something that would change the band´s sound a lot through the years, but on "Steelbath Suicide", the keyboards are more restrained and mostly work as atmosphere enhancers. The music on the album is melodic death metal influenced by fellow Swedish artists like At the Gates and especially In Flames. Mostly fast paced and energetic with high pitched raw and snarling vocals (no clean vocals on this album) and loads of melodic guitar themes and solos. The musicianship is brilliant. The delivery is tight and passionate. Considering the fact that this is a debut album, it´s actually pretty impressive how well playing Soilwork is.
The material is generally of high quality, and while not all tracks stick out equally much, the album as a whole works really well. The sound production is raw but profesionally produced. Some of the band´s later works have a tendency to sound a bit too polished, but that´s not the case here and the sound production suits the music well. Upon conclusion "Steelbath Suicide" is one hell of a debut album and certainly an album that Soilwork can be proud of. A 4 star (80%) rating is deserved.