Entombed
Wolverine Blues
Earache/Columbia Records
Released October 4 1993
The third studio release from Sweden’s famed death metal outfit Entombed took an extreme turn stylistically with this effort from 1993. The band decided to move away from their death metal roots and adopt a mid-tempo groove style they termed “death ‘n’ roll”. For fans of their first two landmark albums (Left Hand Path and Clandestine), this was a shocking turn of events. Although still exhibiting a dark vibe to their core sound, the new style divided fans over the direction the band was taking and some even went on to say they sounded more like Pantera. Obviously, the new direction gave the band more commercial viability and it gave Earache a chance to strike up a deal with Marvel Comics to use the character Wolverine on further pressings for the album cover.
That decision did not help the band’s cause though, when Marvel wanted the CD heavily edited to drop the track “Out of Hand” from the album and the audio samples were subsequently removed for fear of possible legal action over unlicensed use. The band lifted the samples from films like Flatliners and Hellraiser III and it helped to give the songs that extra edge. With those changes in tow, the album still went on to find success by getting ranked at # 494 in Hard Rock Magazine’s book of the 500 greatest Rock & Metal Albums of All Time and it was also declared the best Death Metal Album in 1994 by Guitar World.
My Favorite tracks on this release are: “Eyemaster”, “Wolverine Blues”, “Demon”, “Full of Hell”, “Hollowman” and “Out of Hand”. This album gets a respectable 8 out of 10 and despite some of the stylistic flaws, this release still ranks up there as a classic Entombed album.
Horror Metal Sounds 