TOTALLY ESOTERIC // Entombed - Left Hand Path // Composer Reaction & Analysis 

Always blows my mind that a couple of teenagers in 1989 wrote this magnum opus/Death Metal masterpiece, and released in 1990 when Death Metal was just coming to fruition. And it still stands the test of time.

"The Swedish scene" is... diverse. There's two main tiers: Stockholm (e.g. this, "old school" and "raw") and Gothemburg (melo death like At The Gates). There's also prog death, death doom etc of course.

Rest in Power LG Petrov.

this album was basically made by a bunch of kids.

One of the most iconic pioneering death metal albums. I was 16 when this dropped & damn it hit hard. Album #2 Clandestine is also great.

Its interesting you bring up blues rock because Entombed later went on in their sound to largely create/inluence a very bluesy inspired subgenre of death metal called "death'n'roll", their album Wolverine Blues being the prime example.

Aw man, all the music you like the least on your channel are my favourites! I love me some rough sloppy playing, I usually hate overly technical/proggy stuff, and I love repetitive droning music too. Always fun to see your reactions though.

Though not a favorite of mine I definitely respect Entombed's influence. They basically pioneered this raw, sludgy, thrash-meets-groove style of DM, and that guitar tone (courtesy of turning all the knobs on a Boss HM-2 to max) is pretty iconic and a good example of how having an identifiable tone is more important than having a 'good' tone.

Riffs for days. Scandinavian metal was truly something else in the 90's.

these are just kids, I remember reading a bit about them in the book, the thing with european kids is that they are really tied to their parents households, they live with their parents and are basically family kids; american metalheads in florida were much more anti-social or outlaw kids, running and doing drugs etc; and these kids had a chance to get drunk socially whenever their parents went away for a trip or something, and they had someone’s apartment to themselves. also, the swedish death metal is much more punkish in its sound and the scenes are intertwined as well, it’s not the same in the states for the most part

The band is highly influential. Not only were they one of the flagship Stockholm swedeath bands, with the immensely popular HM-2 buzzsaw guitar tone being a big deal at the time, but their more d-beat/punk-oriented sound really set them and their scene peers apart from, for example, the Florida or New York scenes that were contemporary. Their sound has bled over into a lot of influence in the punk scene as well - there's a whole style of hardcore known as entombedcore that takes heavy influence from this sound. Around ten or fifteen years ago, there was also a very popular resurgence of Entombed-style old school death metal, with a lot of newer death metal bands directly aping this sound. This whole sound would be completely neutered/sterilised if it were written by some square who went to music school. The music is much, much better for its imperfections.

A prime example of how to understand and appreciate the band and its impact while clearly not enjoying their music personally, respect. I think you would like the song Piece of time from Atheist's 1989 album of the same name, one of the bands that established the foundations of technical death metal which take heavy inspiration from jazz fusion especially in their later releases.

the hm-2 pedal is so wild sounding because each of the two eq knobs does +/-20db and they have every knob maxed out and used it as a boost in front of the amp

Death metal is a genre that doesn't necessarily click with me even though there are some bands I do really like, but I always enjoyed more doomier and old-school death metal like this or maybe Autopsy on the American side rather than the more modern "let's sound as heavy as possible with pitchshifted vocals as low as they can go". But I haven't dived enough into the genre to really know enough about it and like I said, there are some death metal bands that I do like a lot. I personally love the sloppiness this track has, it's also something I have loved about some punk and black metal as well over the years. That said, you can go too far for me, some demos I have heard from black metal bands are semi-unlistenable for me while I enjoy some others. As far as the band goes, I know I have listened to their first 2 albums in the past, but never really kept going back to it back then, but maybe I should. As far as the solos go, they remind me of Slayer solos, which were 5 tot 6 years earlier and I would say a lot of death metal solos I have heard are relatively close to this style (not counting the more melodic side of death metal).

I love how the solo switches between natural minor pentatonic harmonic minor to mixolydian It changes with each chord so pretty much regular jazz not free jazz

Classic track! The sloppiness, for me, just fits. The frequency response on the Boss HM-2 used has a huge spike at 80 Hz, a massive cut in the lower mids, and then another big spike at 1 kHz, so it just sits in a mix in a very different place than what we're used to now, especially combined with 90s mixing.

I must say, first listen in 1990 was quite shocking. Incredible amount of distortion, back then.

Swedish scene was indeed a sound of its own, especially when compared to the americans. There's quite a bit of punk bite to the swedish sound, something that warps back around nowadays with the crustier punk scene effectively stealing this thick guitar tone. For my money, their second album, Clandestine, is farily meatier, trading some youthful exuberance for some really clever songwriting before they just went and did their own death'n'roll thing. But like most early death metal, it works a lot better when you don't listen with your brain. You should check out the story behind the swedish "buzzsaw" sound, it actually came from a really crappy cheap Boss pedal that kinda sounds awful in any other configuration but a very precise one that is just perfect for this genre. ANd so it was that everyone at the time was using it in some form or another. Though cleaner in production, you will hear a very similar tone on Edge of Sanity's Crimson. And Grave, and Dismember, and Unleashed, and early Amorphis, (who went to Sweden to record their first couple albums).

It's okay Bryan, no need to waffle around with us metalheads, we're used to hearing that our music sounds terrible. 😆 Touching on the objectivity aspect, I do think sloppy playing is a flaw but it's not something that kills my enjoyment, up to a point of course. Unavoidable comparison with other media: in The Fellowship of the Ring, in one scene, there's a car moving in the background. It's a mistake, but one I can easily overlook or even chuckle at. It's the same with music.

One of the most important metal albums of all time.

That is the Sunlight Studio Sound right there.

This gave me a bit of nostalgia. Used to listen to this release on bus rides home from school all the time.

Lots of bands have been influenced by Entombed's sound and have recorded and played enjoyable metal, but to me it rarely works as well as in Left Hand path or Clandestine. Both album, and peculiarly this song, blend with some kind of perfection the riffs, growls, rythmic changes, solos... and mix chaotic and excessive feelings with a deeply sad and ungerdround atmosphere in a way that fits to me. This kind of atmosphere was quite common in the early 90's european death metal scene, and very effective, even if most of the time in a less iconic way than in Entombed's _Left Hand Path_ . (some outstanding records to me: Asphyx's _The Rack_ in 1991, Pestilence's _Testimony of the ancient_ , Sentenced's _Shadows of the past_ , Afflicted's _Prodigal Sun_ in 1992, Catacomb's _In the Maze of Kadath_ in 1993 ... not the most common bands and record, but definitely worth a listen) I could name hundreds of good bands and albums recorded since, but I still vainly search the band, the album, even only the song I crave that would copycat both Entombed's unique sound _and_ writting in Left Hand Path ... and come dive with me as deep in the darkest realms of despair and sadeness.

Thankyou for your essentially negative diatribe in analyzing this from a musical precision/schooling and subsequent worth filter. Metal fans want aggression and power. This hit like an A bomb. Sloppy timing and random chaotic soloing gave it a palpable sense of danger - unpredictable and menacing. Its sheer sonic power at the time made Enter Sandman seem as weak as Celine Dion. You've unintentionally validated that focus and sensible harmonic composition equates to weak and predictable, this is a probable accidental masterpiece of chaotic modal shifts and frantic shred, where the idea of power and extremity is superior to song construction from a trained perspective. It's an instinctive feeling when playing this death metal/grindcore, rather than saying 'we are in the harmonic minor key of ... so we can only use these notes/chords because that's the rules right'?

what are the odds i listened to this album for the first time in 2024 the same day he posts this video lol

I really think you should do I dive into the Swedish crust/hardcore/metal band Anti Cimex. Few such small and niche bands have had such a huge impact on the music scene. A favorite and an inspiration for a lot of metal and punkbands. Even billie ellish and lill waye have dressed in their merch xD Have a listen to the album "Scandinavian Jawbreaker" from 1993 or a few songs from it (relativly short songs). Their later sound is like if motörhead got a baby with sepultura and some punkband.

Aw man, this was the first death metal album I heard as a kid. Borrowed it from a friend and was instantly hooked.

Sir listen please to the whole album and you will be dancing in circles in your bedroom just go with the flow !

This gave me a flashback to 8th grade math class... Glad you listened to this epic classic of Swedish Death Metal history! Do keep in mind these guys wrote this material in their mid-teens lol

i'm not sure if they used the same pedal, but there's also a band called slaughter who released an album called strappado in 1987 with a very similar guitar tone to this record, should give that album a spin some time, good cheesy aggressive 80's fun

The keyboard part is sampled from the film Phantasm. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-C9vpG_b8beQ.htmlfeature=shared

I believe the fill at 3:54 is intentional o went back to the album and it sounds the same

The epitome of Swedish Death Metal. Atmospheric and putrid.

Early / old-school Death Metal was often inspired by horror movies, so the theme frem Phantasm here makes sense, but the horror stuff is usually more of a USA thing. ;) And this is of course another classic Swedish DM song / album, one of the genre defining ones. Never been my favorite album though, though favorite song on the album, but it is what it is. I see people talk about At the Gates, which is another classic Swedish death metal band. They revolutionized the sound of DM a lot with their Terminal Spirit Disease and Slaughter of the Soul albums, and then went dormant for a while before they came back 10 years later. Their To Drink from the Night Itself is a really good album. However, my favorite of them is their very first album, The Red in the Sky is Ours. People are split on this album I think. It's NOT the sound of later albums that they are so known for, but it's highly experimental neo classical prog death metal. I don't know what else to call it, but I got a feeling that you may actually enjoy it, even mixes in violin quite a lot, I think you even get some almost solos. See songs like Through Gardens of Grief, Within, and Neverwhere. Love this album btw!

This album and Dismembers "Like an everflowing stream" made me the fine specimen of humanity you see before you today.

Awesome and fair reaction, love this song and the Swedish death metal scene overall. Please please react to gorgoroth-gorgoroth

Wait, was this video on mono? Because it sounds very centered and mushed together. Something is wrong here because the CD and streaming version sounds huge with clear left and right stereo separation between the instruments. The sound should be messy but not this messy.

They were 17 and out there walking a different path than what came before so gotta give them props for that. Pun intended

When "swedish" sound came out, I thought possibilities in death metal became endless.Together with classic heavy metal, thrash metal and grindcore, (fast) death metal is my favorite genre of metal. Over years I learned to hate the word production.

If you want old-school metal with a good bass tone, you should really check out Overkill (the thrash band, not the Motörhead song), if you haven't already done that. Pretty much every modern metal band uses the ridiculously punchy bass tone that Overkill used first

its illegal to criticize this album. you will be hearing from my lawyers.

great band, great album, great song

excellent analysis. You're catching everything on this one. No notes from me :)

Keres - Homo Homini Lupus - I vote for this as Death Metal Album of the year. - And I am in a Death Metal band.

Fun fact: Before Roxette and Ace of Base made their international debuts, this was the swedish band/artist that had sold the most records internationally - second to ABBA of course.

23:48 DUDE you don't know about phantasm???? that movie is crazy! i don't wan't to spoil too much, but it's a horror with a premise of "what the heck were they smoking?!" variety (actually from what i remember premise is based on creators nightmare, and it shows) so like, again, i don't want spoil much, (and i don't wan't to hype it up too much either, because it is still and old low budget film), but i am confident that if you would watch you'll get why it's so iconic and considered cult classic for a reason

One of the classic metal bands I never understood.

Can I ask for you to review a song track III ULVER on the Bergtatt album. Edit . First comment.

Sounds like darkthrones soulside journey

Simply put, I don't understand death metal. And when you don't understand something, you don't comment.

The HM2/chainsaw can easily tip into total mud (looking at you, Nails). These early Swedish DM records featured a lot of the HM2/chainsaw. The production is definitely distinct from the Scott Burns' Morrisound records of the same era.

Had to stop this reaction at your opinion. I knew nothing of value was following. RIP Petrov \m/\m/