-At the Gates-

Founded in 1990 At the Gates begins their career with the release of the EP 'Gardens of Grief' which stuns the death metal scene, they are signed by Dolores/Black Sun Records. After that they release 'Red In The Sky Is Ours' which is till today (one of) the best metal-cd in existence! its style is a mixture between death/black and melodic metal. Tomas Lindbergs vocals are (to my knowledge) unique, he combines hysterical screams with powerfull grunts and this gives the music, which is already very complex and dark on itself a distinctive taste, After over a million times listening I still manage to find new elements in this CD I´ve never heard before. The next record 'With Fear...' is good but the sound is not too good, while 'Red...'´s sound is highly experimental and balanced on the edge, 'with fear..'´s production is much safer and the sound is too 'flat'. 'Terminal Spirit Disease' was released in 1994 and is also a monumental piece of work, the atmosphere created on it is one of deep sadness, combined with agression and anger, the only negative point about is that it is too short! but it also contains three live songs. Than comes 'Slaughter Of The Soul' in 1996, which shows their musical growth, and has elements of a new style of metal in it, a little taste of 'cybermetal' and the sharpness of the new way of producing but still stays true to the roots of death-metal. To me it seems that 'Red..', 'With Fear' and also 'Terminal Spirit..' stand for the past, a dark one with sadness, anger and loneliness, 'Slaughter...' on the other hand stands for the future and technological agression and harshness. Unfortunately it´s also their last CD, because they can´t dissolve their 'musical differences' they split in 1996, and end a promising career. Adrian, Anders and Jonas form The Haunted and make a new start. This band belongs to my all-time favorites, they seem to combine the best elements of death and black metal, and this is a very rare combination. Also they use a lot of different melodies in one song, while the lead guitar plays on the other guitar wanders off on a melody of its own but they always belong together, but you need to hear this to fully understand I think. Check the official site maintained by Anders Bjorler for lots of info on the band. Nowadays Tomas does the vocals for a band called Lock Up and Adrian has joined Cradle Of Filth.