ENTOMBED — Left Hand Path (review)

ENTOMBED — Left Hand Path album cover Album · 1990 · Death Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
3.5/5 ·
UMUR
Left Hand Path is the debut full-length studio album by Swedish death metal act Entombed. The album was released in May 1990 through Earache Records. Left Hand Path was recorded in the now legendary Sunlight Studio in Stockholm, Sweden with producer Tomas Skogsberg. There are various vinyl versions available. The original album contained 10 tracks while the CD version, and some vinyl versions, of the album contain two bonus tracks.

The music on the album is brutal yet catchy death metal. Typical Swedish death metal from that period but of the better quality. One of the things that sets most Swedish death metal bands apart from their more technical and more clinical sounding American brothers, is the way the music swing. Drummer Nicke Andersson is what I call a rock´n´roller, and even in music this intense and brutal he is able to put a lot of human emotion into his playing. I didn´t get that back then, but I see now how important his playing is to the sound on Left Hand Path. Guitarists Uffe Cederlund and Alex Hellid deliver brutal and crunchy sounding riffs but also add a solo to the songs now and again. Most notably the melodic solos that closes the title track. The vocals by Lars-Göran Petrov are brutal but not undecipherable. Bass duties are shared by Nicke Andersson and Uffe Cederlund. Many of the songs on the album were already written when Entombed went under the name Nihilist in the late eighties, and while old demo tracks re-recorded in a "real" studio sometimes come to life, I think the fact that some of the songs on Left Hand Path were already a couple of years old is audible. The songwriting is consistent as such, but some songs are very simple and lack a bit of an adventurous approach. The title track always stood out as the most interesting track on the album with it´s eerie breakdown and closing melodic soloing and I wish there were more songs like that one on the album.

The production is a typical Sunlight Studio recorded and Tomas Skogsberg produced affair. Very raw and crunchy. Probably one of his best productions from the early nineties.

Left Hand Path is pretty much the epitome of old school Swedish death metal and if you´re looking for a place to start listening to that sub genre I can recommend starting here. It´s not a perfect album IMO and the songs tend to sound a bit too much the same the longer you get into the album, but no one can take away the fierce and youthful energy of the performance or the fact that this album is widely considered a "classic" old school Swedish death metal album. I would love to give a 4 star rating to Left Hand Path but as there are some obvious flaws it´s a 3.5.
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