Metal Centre

With the posting of this GRAVE interview, I have completed the unholy trinity of Swedish death metal. The only band missing from this circle is ENTOMBED, but it has been many years since ENTOMBED played a similar style to that of GRAVE, UNLEASHED and DISMEMBER. The other three groups had their own lull points in their career, but they never moved too far away from the pure death metal posture established in the early nineties.

GRAVE’s first three releases—“Into the Grave” (1991), “You’ll Never See..” (1992), and “Soulless” (1994)—were classic, churning chucks of death metal sickness. Each album had its own traits, yet each shared a common thread of sound. After “Soulless,” original vocalist Jörgen Sandström (he also took over bass duties after “Into the Grave) left the group to play bass in ENTOMBED, leaving guitarist Ola Lindgren to man the mic, and marking an obvious shift in momentum.

Ola and GRAVE faltered at first with the release of the sub-par “Hating Life,” but caught their second wind with “Back From the Grave.” All subsequent albums showed Ola’s vocals mature as the band fell further back to their original style. GRAVE’s most recent album, “Dominion VIII” is possibly the closest the band has come to emulating their early sound. It is definitely the fastest of the group’s career, and Lindgren’s vocal performance is the strongest yet. After releasing seven studio albums on Century Media, GRAVE released their first recording via Regain Records. Drummer Ronnie Bergerstĺhl spoke with Metal Centre about this newest release.