Entombed - To Ride, Shoot Straight, And Speak the Truth!
Review: Merging rock and death metal Entombed have created an emotive and roughshod rock-n-roll alternative to alternative, grunge, and other neo-punk hybrids in the same way that Glen Danzig's later experimentation reinjected blues into the punk-based rock music artform. These songs rock through verse and chorus and little else, but in the style of Motorhead know how to recombine their pieces and overlay guitar solos for effect, while the romantic nature of melody in the vocals (delivered in a gruff mortician monotextural chant, like later pop punk or grunge) propels these anthemic songs through their spaces of obscurity and light. Where it is excellent is in fusing the atmospheric nature of alternative rock with the thunderous romantic urges and structures of epic sludge-rock, but what is often forgotten is the metal, which here is really only a vestigial organ of heavy distortion and a few strumming techniques. If you feel like an album in the postmodern collage of styles that is alternative, but with the minor-key monster chord goulash of grunge or metal, and featuring the powers of a lyrical vocal/compositional style, Entombed might feed your beast, but for those expecting metal - beware!
