In fair Sweden is where we set our scene. Two cities, both alike in dignity… you know the story. You’re either Stockholm or you’re Gothenburg, and this isn’t an article about football. Sweden may have taken the crown (no Johan Lindstrand related puns please!) when it came to Europe’s burgeoning death metal scene but the line was drawn depending on if you preferred the melodic thrash of Dark Tranquillity and At The Gates (in the red corner… Gothenburg) or the buzzsaw, Sunlight sound creeping out of the darkness in Stockholm thanks to bands like Entombed, Dismember and Treblinka.

But 45 miles north from the Swedish capital lies a previously untapped pool of death metal nihilism. In a university town of 140,000, Uppsala is the religious capital of Sweden so it’s unsurprising that it gave us early progenitors of Swedeath in Sarcasm and black metal bastards Unpure and later Watain. But the spotlight has turned away from the old guards of the major cities and is glaring on this unassuming hub of metal mania. Invidious, Graveless and Degial have put Uppsala on the death metal map and it’s showing the big boys of Stockholm and Gothenburg that the sounds of the suburbs … Read More