{"id":105219,"date":"2025-07-18T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-17T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=105219"},"modified":"2025-08-08T13:30:49","modified_gmt":"2025-08-08T12:30:49","slug":"album-review-entrails-grip-of-ancient-evil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-entrails-grip-of-ancient-evil\/","title":{"rendered":"ENTRAILS – Grip Of Ancient Evil (2025) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

ENTRAILS
\nGrip Of Ancient Evil<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nHammerheart (2025)<\/span>
\nRating: 7\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\n\n\n
<\/td>\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

Sweden\u2019s Entrails is one of those reliable death metal bands that never let you down. Thrills are rare, but if you like steady meat n\u2019 potatoes grunting then Grip Of Ancient Evil<\/em>, just like the band\u2019s previous seven albums, is worthy of your time. Even so, Entrails are not essential listening, but this new opus is the first to feature Nazghor frontman Julian Bellenox, who takes over vocal duties from Pontus Samuelsson.<\/p>\n

As expected, Grip Of Ancient Evil<\/em> still likes to throw its weight around, even if it\u2019s familiar flab. Drifting in the same crushing realm as Grave and Dismember, the posse remains comfortable in certain tracks, although my favourite song here just happens to be the one which doesn\u2019t feature Bellenox on lead vocals. Nifelheim, Friends Of Hell and Necrocurse dude Per \u201cHellbutcher\u201d Gustavsson rips his throat out on the blackened styling\u2019s of \u2018Inner Demon\u2019, where buzzsaw riffs are in abundance as Entrails still somehow manage to breathe some life into the old dog Swedish sound.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a shame that the guys saved another corker until last with the volatile \u2018Consumed By Insects\u2019, which is arguably the most savage cut on offer. Elsewhere, it\u2019s the Entrails we\u2019ve all become accustomed to. \u2018Fed To The Dead\u2019 and \u2018Wings Of Death\u2019 are heavyweight bruisers, the latter opting for a thrashier combination. \u2018Skin \u2018Em All\u2019 does a lot of foaming at the mouth, bringing to mind the rabid onslaughts of Bloodbath, so there\u2019s always a consistent framework applied to the Entrails cacophony.<\/p>\n

The band\u2019s protective scaffolding houses delicious if at times generic HM-2 notions, but occasional forays into hefty doom (\u2018Hunt In The Shadows\u2019) are always welcomed as skinsman Arvid Borg rattles skulls like no tomorrow. Bellenox\u2019s vocals add an extra throaty nastiness, but most importantly an extra level of energy which results in a refreshingly engaging opus in spite of being riddled with the once again archetypal Swedish butchery. Long live rot n\u2019 roll.<\/p>\n

Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ENTRAILS Grip Of Ancient Evil Hammerheart (2025) Rating: 7\/10 Sweden\u2019s Entrails is one of those reliable death metal bands that never let you down. Thrills are rare, but if you like steady meat n\u2019 potatoes grunting then Grip Of Ancient Evil, just like the band\u2019s previous seven albums, is worthy of your time. Even so, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,483],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-105219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-entrails"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105219","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105219"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105219\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":105221,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105219\/revisions\/105221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}