Swedish death metal pioneers Entombed stood out from many of their contemporaries due to their “buzzsaw” guitar tone. It was a tone that would inspire countless bands in its wake. Converge guitarist and producer extraordinaire Kurt Ballou has often cited hearing Entombed as the moment that he realized hardcore and metal could be combined with such spectacular results.

Entombed would evolve beyond straight death metal over the course of their nine studio albums, leaning more and more towards a sound they called “death and roll.” With the departure of founding guitarist Alex Hellid in 2013, it seemed as though Entombed had come to an end. However, the remaining members regrouped under the moniker of Entombed A.D. and released their debut record Back to the Front in 2014.

Today’s Massive Metal Monday track takes us back to 1993 and Entombed’s killer third album Wolverine Blues. Here with the official video for the title track is Entombed performing “Wolverine Blues.”

This week we lost a giant of the metal community. Bassist Frank Watkins was, for 20 years, a member of Tampa, Florida death metal pioneers Obituary. He had split from the band on bad terms in 2010, and more recently was a member of another groundbreaking band, Norwegian black metal titans Gorgoroth.

The 47-year-old Watkins had been battling cancer in recent years, but remained active musically right up to his passing. For a more lengthy look at his career, check out this article by our friends over at Blabbermouth.

Our massive Metal Monday Track for this week is the title track of Obituary’s second album, Cause of Death, which was released in 1990 and was Watkins’ first recording with the band. So, help us in celebrating the life of one of death metal’s founding fathers by blasting “Cause of Death.”

There is a movement afoot that is known as the new wave of old school death metal. It’s the stripping away of all of the super technical elements that have dominated the death metal genre in recent years in favor of the more straight forward elements that defined the early days of the genre. At the very forefront of this movement is an East coast power trio known as Horrendous.

Don’t let the name fool you though; these guys are anything but horrendous! In fact, I recently got my mitts on a copy of the band’s upcoming third full-length album, Anareta (due October 30th on Dark Descent Records), and I’m so blown away that I couldn’t wait to share a bit of it with you guys!

So without further ado, here is the sixth track from Anareta. It’s called “Sum of All Failures” and it is my Massive Metal Monday track for the week. Go get this record when it comes out… you WON’T be sorry.

Morbid Angel was one of the first bands to lay the groundwork for the genre that would come to be known as death metal. The band quickly rose to the top of the heap in the flourishing extreme metal scene of the late ’80s in Tampa, Florida. Their debut album, Altars of Madness, was released in 1989 and is considered to be one of the cornerstone recordings of death metal to this day.

Morbid Angel has undergone numerous lineup and stylistic changes over the years, but remain active to this day. They are currently working on new material with yet another new lineup. We here at GoD will keep you up to date with any news regarding a new album when it becomes available. Until then, enjoy this live video of this week’s Massive Metal Monday track “Chapel of Ghouls” from Altars of Madness.

South Carolina death metal titan Nile has just released its eighth studio album What Should Not Be Unearthed. The album eschews the complex technicality of the band’s past few albums, marking a return to straight forward death metal on which the band first rose to fame.

Egyptology has always been the core theme of Nile’s lyrical approach and little has changed in that department. Listening to a Nile album is like taking a very brutal trip through history. If you like traditional death metal, I highly recommend picking up a copy of What Should Not Be Unearthed. It is one of the best death metal offerings that you will hear this or any year.