Can anyone recommend some melodic death metal bands with great guitars? Emphasis on the melodic. I'm looking for the Gothenburg style, not brutal death metal. I have a bunch of bands I love, and I'm wondering what I'm missing.

Most important: I love fantastic guitarwork. That's what I really listen for. Blazing solos, catchy riffs, classically-inspired melodies, Iron Maiden-inspired twin guitar leads, yeah, give me more of that.

Other preferences: I like steady beats and rhythms. I hate blastbeats, technical math-metal, or complex stop-start time changes. I value excellent musicianship: I don't like bands where the band-members play as fast as they can (and often end up with a sloppy sound because it's right at the edge of what they can handle). Instead, I prefer strong competence at their instruments. Clean production is nice; I don't like the raw, dirty, sloppy, garage-band sound. I'm pretty flexible on vocals, as long as it's not black metal stuff. I tend to dislike metalcore, US death metal, groove, and progressive stuff; melodeath/doom can sometimes work, if the doom influences are modest.

I realize this is a vast genre with huge numbers of bands, so I'll list some bands I love, some I like, and some I don't like.

<i>Top favorites</i>: Dark Tranquility (anything Projector or later; Damage Done is my favorite), In Flames (anything Clayman or earlier; Whoracle is my favorite), Insomnium.

<i>I love</i>: Amoral, Blinded Colony, Closer, Detonation, Divine Souls, Lothlorien, Norther, Mors Principium Est, Omnium Gatherum, Nightrage, Scar Symmetry, Searing Meadow, Shadow, The Wake. Also Arch Enemy's Rise of the Tyrant (their other albums are just so-so).

<i>I like quite a bit</i>: Amon Amarth, The Arcane Order, Archeon, Avatar, Be'lakor, Before the Dawn, Blind Stare, Dark the Suns, Daylight Dies, Deadlock, Duskfall, Enter My Silence, Eucharist, Fear My Thoughts's Vulcanus, Final Dawn, Gates of Ishtar, Godgory, Lords of Decadence, Luna Mortis, Machinae Supremacy, Made of Hate, Mygrain, Opeth, Noumena, Raintime, Soilwork, Solar Dawn, Soulscar, Without Grief.

<i>Not bad, for variety</i>: The Absence, Blood Stain Child, Children of Bodom, Cipher System, Dark Age, Disarmonia Mundi, Edge of Sanity, Enforsaken, Eternal Oath, Garden of Shadows, Idols are Dead, Immortal Souls, Imperanon, In Arkadia, In Slumber, Kalmah, Light This City, One Man Army and Undead Quartet, Rapture, Sacrilege, Shades of Dusk, Slumber, Sonic Syndicate, Stigma, Survivor's Zero, Sylosis, Tantal, This Ending, Torchbearer, Wintersun, Withering Surface, Within Y, Trivium (barely).

<i>Have tried, but didn't inspire strong feelings either way</i>: 8 Foot Sativa (too brutal), Amorphis, Aeveron, Autumn Leaves, Burden of Grief, Callenish Circle, The Crown, Dark Age, Fall of Serenity, For Ruin, Gardenian, Hatesphere, The Haunted (too brutal), In Mourning, In Thy Dreams, Into Eternity, Lilitu, The March of Seasons, Naildown, Night in Gales, Sentenced, Suidakra, TME, Threat Signal, Urkraft (too brutal), Zonaria.

<i>I actively dislike</i>: All That Remains, Arsis, At The Gates, The Black Dahlia Murder, Brief Respite, Carcass, Daath, Darkane, Dethklok, Dimension Zero, Embraced, Fragments of Unbecoming, God Dethroned, Hypocrisy, Mercenary, Meshuggah, Morbid Angel, Novembre, Sins of Omission (Flesh on Your Bones), Skyfire, Souldrainer.

In case it helps, my favorite albums outside of melodeath are probably Metallica's Ride the Lightning, Iron Maiden's Powerslave, Running Wild's Black Hand Inn, Megadeth's Countdown to Extinction, Iced Earth's Night of the Stormrider.

Sorry for such a long post. Thanks in advance for any tips!

I think you just mentioned my whole Melodeath collection in your post.

you dislike some of the best and most influent metal bands, you know? death, carcass, morbid angel, meshuggah... lol.

anyway, can't really help you. recently I've been back to darkane and I like 'em a lot... maybe try anata but they may be too technical/brutal for you, idk. The best in the gothemburg sound IMO will always be dark tranquillity.

sorry, just re-read your post, you wrote daath (sucks) and not death. therefore, you are forgiven.

Is it a request or a Melodeath Guide?


Try Karlahan (Symphonic Melodic Death), Quo Vadis (Tech Melodic Death) and Eluveitie (Celtic/Gothenburg). I'll post links ASAP.

Melodeath probably makes up the largest percentage in my metal collection, so I should be able to find something. Try these three and let me know what you think.

Carcariass (melo-tech death, also, a lot of their songs are instrumentals -awesome instrumentals)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYBgVN89 ... 1&index=29

Scariot (mix of harsh and power metal vocals, maybe you'll like them since you love Scar Symmetry)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vl7ANdhlFI4

Soulfallen (melodic black/death- love this album)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5nLyMu6eCk

Allegaeon - melodic, technical and really catchy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6rserJOCT4
Really love their album, this song in particular

The Lucifer Principle
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6YaYr4- ... re=related

Wow... That's a lot of melodeath there. Way more than I've experienced...
Still, there were a couple bands that I couldn't find on your list.
I don't know if they'll satisfy what you're looking for at the moment, but hey.. You may still like 'em...

First off, one of, if not my definite favorite band at the moment:
Destroy Destroy Destroy:
Very mainstream, though. Pure party-metal.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-hbyYn2uBQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NhxvN4p ... re=related
Very mainstream, though. Pure party-metal.



Second, something a bit more heavy.
Swedish band Marionette. Takes a different take on the classic Gothenburg sound and I really reccomend checking it out. Very different.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gFv_mVy ... re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGv9Ze1F9lE

Wow... That's a lot of melodeath there. Way more than I've experienced...
Still, there were a couple bands that I couldn't find on your list.
I don't know if they'll satisfy what you're looking for at the moment, but hey.. You may still like 'em...

First off, one of, if not my definite favorite band at the moment:
Destroy Destroy Destroy:
Very mainstream, though. Pure party-metal.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-hbyYn2uBQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NhxvN4p ... re=related
Very mainstream, though. Pure party-metal.



Second, something a bit more heavy.
Swedish band Marionette. Takes a different take on the classic Gothenburg sound and I really reccomend checking it out. Very different.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gFv_mVy ... re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGv9Ze1F9lE

Check out Falchion's "Legacy of Heathens" album:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSJFWjarLDI

Some nice lead guitar work there.

How do you feel about more folky-sounding stuff. I'd recommend Orphaned Land if you haven't listened to them. Chances are that you have though.

Pure melodeath with great guitars and a beautifully voiced female singer: Amaran

Check out their first album: A World Depraved

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLIluvhtA4s

Also, I can't believe you have no love for At The Gates, the fathers of melodeath!? I just don't understand that...

I second Allegaeon.

That's not melodeath, it's just power metal.

Try Seducer's Embrace, melodeath from russia. Also btw how can you listen to melodeath and dislike At The Gates lol.

I might have just found a new favorite band. Thank you sir.

Well you say you don't like At the Gates, and seeing as With Fear I Kiss the Burning Darkness is basically the pinnacle of this genre, I don't know what else to recommend!

How about some Death'n'Roll?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_E9THI_RRg

Check out Archons's The Consequences of Silence, particularly the track "Plague of Corruption". Melodic and catchy riffs, no blastbeats abuse as you stated.

I can guarentee this is what you're looking for

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6pcJOS_vTE

Also, you said all of Arch Enemy's other albums except RoT are so-so. I encourage you to check out Burning Bridges again. One of my favorite melodeath albums ever. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdRmrL0I7dY&feature=related

Dark Lunacy's The Diarist also has some awesome guitars: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yM1ImfvvCHs

I have no idea how you can not like At the Gates, Hypocrisy and Carcass.... that being said I will throwdown here:

Insomnium, Soulscar, Neuraxis, Nonexist, Daylight Dies

Some awesome stuff that noone posted, that you should look into:

Solution .45 - Christian Alvestam's (ex Scar Symmetry vocalist) new band, their debut album came out this year. Reminds a lot of Scar Symmetry, but the overall sound is a lot more mature and, IMHO, better. Some excelent guitar work, mixture of clean and harsh vocals, and lyrics are written by none other than Mikael Stanne from Dark Tranquillity. Highly recommended.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZaXJw0Epgs



Ablaze My Sorrow - Gothenburg melodeath. I would classify them as mixture of In Flames and At The Gates. They have a bit more agressive songs, and a bit of more mellow, lead-guitar driven stuff. definitely worth checking out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMsKoDVt ... re=related



Degradead - Another, rather new, gothenburg melodeath. Jesper Stromblad (In Flames) helped them record their first album after he heard some of their demo stuff. Mixture of clean and harsh vocals, but really nicely done. One of my favorites when newer bands come to mind.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLzwW_4gs_0



Universum - Australian melodeath, kinda similar to the abovementioned Degradead. Worth checking out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJ0KcCMx ... re=related



Agonize - Bosnian melodic death metal, quite unknown AFAIK. Imagine a bit more melodic At The Gates with Chuck Shuldiner on vocals. While the vocals arent exactly my cup of tea, the music is quite fucking awesome.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xv1oR-9xQ1k



Diablo - Finnish melodeath. They have some groove, but they are not overdoing it. Pretty original band, highly recommended.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nx2cO-5vG_8



Watch Me Fall - Another finnish band. They released only one album quite some time ago, and since then the whole project is onhold, if not disbanded. Niilo and Ville of the Insomnium fame on vocals and guitars, respectively. Nice guitar work with some keyboards here and there. Insomnium is my personal favorite band of all time, and since a lot of that vibe is present here too, I would highly recommend it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5TvPH4_wYA



Evading Downfall - Another Bosnian band. They have a demo which was released couple of years ago, and their debut album should be out pretty soon. Fuckload of Dark Tranquillity vibe to it. Here is a sample of the upcoming stuff:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hMk0Km6qAI



Thats enough for now, I think Out of the bands you mentioned, I would give another listen to Mercenary (The Hours That Remain is an incredible album, without a single filler) and In Mourning. I myself found them both unappealing at first (especially In Mourning, since they have some pretty brutal moments), but have grown to like them after a while, and now they are some of my fav bands. Both of the bands have pretty original atmosphere, with some really good melancholic melodies.

If you need more recommendations, ask away

OMG, I just have discovered this one:

http://www.myspace.com/fractalgates

I second giving Mercenary a second listen - especially Everblack and First Breath. Everblack in some ways reminds me of Whoracle but with deeper, harsher vocals and kick-ass clean singing. First Breath is a bit more death-metal oriented than Everblack but includes a lot of epic moments, including parts with sweet female vocals. And it's sci-fi oriented, for the most part. 11 Dreams, The Hours that Remain and Architect of Lies are the more power-metal albums and I like them quite a bit as well.

Unmoored is a really good progressive death metal band, quite melodic. I recommend all three of their albums although Cimmerian has more of a groove metal sound (there is still melodic death to be found on there, and I'd get it just for Final State part 1)

Also The Few Against the Many, they got one album that came out last year, another one of Christian Alvestam's bands. It's heavier, more Swedish death based and the album artwork is by Dan Seagrave.

Last One Dying. Metalcore but melodic death metal based.

Heaven Shall Burn is also a good band, also metalcore, but definitely one of the heaviest of all the metalcore bands. They name Edge of Sanity and Bolt Thrower as influences, these guys don't fuck around.

If Unanimated was mentioned, then it shall be mentioned again: Unanimated. This band put out some good stuff in the mid-90s, very In Flames like (think Lunar Strain/Subterranean) they have a new album as of 2009 as well.

You either rueld out or named a large portion of the melodeath I listen too, so I hope this helps in your search.

Garden of Shadows
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-niU87B6 ... re=related

Artas
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJbqnpM2 ... re=related


I'm not really sure about this band at all for you due to the vocals being higher pitched, but just in case as they have superb guitar work in my opinion.

Enfold Darkness
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XugATtBPBPU

Beyond the Embrace...

They were one of the first metal bands I got into, I saw them live with Therion back in 2005. It's a shame that I haven't heard anything about them in a long time - it seems they have been dropped by Metal-Blade, and their last log-on date on their Myspace is May 5th, 2010.

I recommend both albums, if you can find them. The band is straight up melodic death, even though they have a metalcore-ish name. Their more recent album has some groove elements.

A track from their second album:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEW5bLQ6ocg

First album has a similar production to Whoracle:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2msyurgIAI

I am highly surprised you did not have "The Gallery" by DT as one of your favorites, it's my personal favorite of all time (not saying that because I like it you should too, just saying the guitar seems to blend melodeath with hints of folk/power metal a bit)

And I saw you listed Blinded Colony, just warning you the new stuff may be a dissapointment. Go to their website and listen to some new demo tracks (site may have changed since they changed their name to The Blinded)

Check out Crystalic. Not TOO unique, but unique enough that I mentioned them. They seem to be influenced deeply by earlier melodeath acts such as In Flames, Dark Tranquillity, and At The Gates (which idk how you hate lol) here is a track:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i46PD6S-xIc

Cinders Fall I guess makes some pretty neat music. I mean, it is not very unique since there are other bands that sound like them already, but you may take a liking to them. They sould like a thrashier DT. Here are two tracks:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uzcun_E-THs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQy4fNLK-6A


And why don't you like Meshuggahhhhhhhh =[ haha even though they arent melodeath

Check out Trashcanned, they have a bit of that DT vibe when keyboards kick in. Dont let the intro riff fool you, they are not metalcore

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWCgG8OQ-yo

Mixing in more of the modern American thrash sound that often gets pigeonholed as metalcore, Darkest Hour are one of the best melodic death/whatever bands out there. Oddly enough, the album that they made in Sweden at Studio Fredman was a step away from the more melodic direction they went in starting with Undoing Ruin. Check out the Undoing Ruin album, it is generally regarded as their best and most accessible to those unfamiliar with them. The vocals are a love/hate thing, but everything really came together for that record.

Here's an awesome song, if you don't like the vocals there is still plenty of guitaring at the end.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcMlBVSXv7M

I think an In Flames fan might enjoy Ebony Tears. Swedish melodeath featuring occasional female vocals and some nice violin. Check out "Nectars of Eden" from their debut album, Tortura Insomniae. That might be a good place to start with them. They released three albums, and I've heard they moved away somewhat from the style found on the debut.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fGmt1Gm ... re=related

2nd Suicide, somewhat reminds me of In Flames circa Clayman at times. Great band, that should be bigger.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChnhLrAf ... sponse_rev

Intro's a bit irritating, but bare with it.

Empyrean Sky, they structure their songs sort of like Opeth do, but have a very different melodic style. Kind of folky. Kind of. I don't think they'll ever be one of your favourites, but they're worth giving a try.

You could try Hilastherion. Unfortunately, their lyrics are Christian, but damn they are great guitarists.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61j8J84a ... re=related

First of all I'm going to second Dark Lunacy's "The Diarist". While not exactly pure melodeath I feel like you would enjoy them.
I've always though Mutiny Within is kind of a poor man's Scar Symmetry. I don't care for them but if you really like Scar Symmetry you may enjoy them. You can also probably catch them touring since it seems like thats all they ever do.
Most of all I would recommend "Serene Catharsis" by a band called Canopy. They tend to have dual layered guitarwork that is quite interesting.

In Dread Response. They don't fuck around. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsHCCIf2GUk

Seconding Fractal Gates. Spacey melodeath with (whoda thought?) space themes.
Also worth a look is Barren Earth.

Solar Dawn, Miseration, Catamenia, Dark Flood, Detonation, Embrace Damnation, Vacillation, Epicurean, Quo Vadis, Vehemence

Also vital remains has some melodic parts, although not melodeath.

As far as regular melodeath, I highly recommend Dawn of Tears, who offer a full-length album and an EP for free download on their website.

There's also Deathevokation, who are more of a standard death metal band but have a strong sense of melody, not a lot of blasting, and some strong musicianship. Most of the songs on The Chalice of Ages are mid-to-slow paced, but it does have some faster moments. Again, it's not melodeath, but I think you'll like it.

Disillusion have a few EPs that are pretty much standard melodeath. Their first full-length, Back to Times of Splendor, is proggier. Essentially, it's what would happen if Soilwork tried to write Opeth-style songs; most of the progginess is in the song structures. Don't bother with Gloria; it's a weird Rammstein-ish shift in style that has a few bright spots but isn't what you're looking for.

Cormorant have one EP (The Last Tree), which is more or less regular melodeath with a more traditional heavy metal take on it (except for the last song, which is proggier), and a full-length (Metazoa), which has some longer song structures and has tinges of folk, doom, post-rock, and other genres scattered across the album. The production values may not be up to your standards, but they're a newer band with not much money, so I'd advise cutting them some slack.

I second Barren Earth. While I was thinking how I'm uninterested in the existence of this whole subgenre, this band came by, and which happens to be the only melodeath band I like currently. Check out the album Curse of the Red River or something. It's a doomy melodic death metal, with low death growls.

Thanks so much for all the great recommendations, everyone! Thanks to your help, I have tons of wonderful new music. I really appreciate it.

Some notes on several bands that folks mentioned:

Trashcanned's newest album: nice! 2nd Suicide: excellent!

And Cinders Fall, Watch Me Fall, and Degradead's newest album sound great. I also liked Allegaeon, Carcariass, Hilastherion, Mercenary (even if to me it sounds more like power metal than melodeath), Seducer's Embrace, Solution .45, and Universum. Thank you for all of those!

Also, you reminded me of Anterior's This Age of Silence and Garden of Shadows' Oracle Moon, both of which I'd put on the back shelf and forgotten that I kinda enjoy. Sorta. In small doses.

Beyond the Embrace: Oh yeah, they're definitely good stuff! Dunno how they fell off my list.

I would have really enjoyed Enfold Darkness with a different singer. Maybe they'll release an instrumental album.... One can dream...

The Blinded: Oh, man, what a disappointment. And Blinded Colony was <I>so</I> good....

Dark Lunacy: I agree that the song Heart of Leningrad is great, but alas, most of the album didn't do anything for me.

Thanks again to all of you. This web site rules.

Gotta recommend Hateform, very thrash influenced, but man, do they ever rock.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFCgiCuL2Gg