BLABBERMOUTH.NET
Legendary Swedish death metallers
ENTOMBED will play "one exclusive show" at next year's edition of the
Gefle Metal Festival, set to take place July 14-16, 2022 in Gävle, Sweden. The band says: "It will be quite special. See you there!"
ENTOMBED's lineup for the performance will include original members
Alex Hellid (guitar),
Uffe Cederlund (guitar) and
Nicke Andersson (drums) plus former
ENTOMBED bassist
Jörgen Sandström, who previously played with the band between 1995 and 2004. There will also be guest appearances by other former
ENTOMBED members and various well-known musicians.
Gefle Metal Festival festival general manager
Chris Rotenius said in a statement: "Next year, it will be six years since the last time
ENTOMBED was on a stage. Now we have managed to gather the core with
Uffe,
Alex,
Nicke and
Jörgen to create the perfect opportunity to perform a concert beyond the ordinary. At
Gefle Metal Festival next summer you can expect a unique
ENTOMBED gig. This is going to be a death metal evening you don't want to miss."
ENTOMBED's performance at
Gefle Metal Festival will mark the band's first appearance since singer
Lars-Göran "LG" Petrov died on March 7 after a battle with bile duct cancer. He was 49 years old.
"
LG was a central figure in Swedish metal who left a huge void behind,"
Gefle Metal Festival CEO
Edward Janson said. "When we started
Gefle Metal Festival 2016,
FIRESPAWN with
LG was the very first band to play and at the last festival in 2019, he was on stage with his
ENTOMBED A.D. In between, he was in attendance as an enthusiastic fan. It feels good to be able to pay tribute to
LG and his contributions to metal with this concert."
Hellid,
Cederlund and
Andersson played the band's groundbreaking 1991 album,
"Clandestine", in its entirety at Malmö Live in Malmö, Sweden in November 2016. Joining them at the show were
Robert Andersson (vocals) and
Nicke's half brother
Edvin Aftonfalk (bass), both formerly of the Swedish death metal band
MORBUS CHRON. Two weeks earlier, the most recent
Hellid-led lineup of
ENTOMBED made its live debut on the
Close-Up Båten cruise.
Hellid and
Petrov had been embroiled in a legal battle over the
ENTOMBED name for several years. In 2014,
Petrov was reportedly awarded the right to use the band name in connection with future recording and touring activities, a decision which
Hellid appealed without success. The guitarist then went on to register a trademark for spirits production under the "
Entombed" name. This move did not sit well with
Hellid's former bandmate, who filed a letter of protest against
Alex's registration of the name, claiming that it could be confused with band activities. He also said that
Hellid acted in "bad faith" when he registered name and that there was a desire to "deceive the public."
Petrov's protest, however, found no favor with the
Swedish Patent And Registration Office, which rejected his claims on the issue in a March 2016 ruling.
In an interview with
Revolution-Music.dk,
Petrov defended his group's decision to release albums and tour under the name
ENTOMBED A.D. in order to avoid a legal battle with
Hellid who didn't want his former bandmates to use the
ENTOMBED moniker: "It had to be done, because without an album you can't tour," he explained. "I mean, you
can tour, but if there's seven years between albums, it's ridiculously long. So we did the right thing, and we did what bands should do, and still do — release an album and go on tour and headbang and have a good time with friends, and that's what it's all about."