I love all styles of DM but I'm very picky about the bands I like.
God Macbre was an awesoe SDM band.

I love Nihilist. Sweden definitely contributed a lot to the death metal scene.
HAIL SVERIGE!

The scene has a few bands worth mentioning, but bands like Dismember and Entombed never did anything for me. Boring boring boring.

Apart from the obligatory Nihilst/Dismember/Entombed/Carnage/Unleashed mentions, all of which's debuts containing some of the best death metal I have ever heard, I would like to add Grotesque/At the Gates.
Grotesque's recent collection showcases some rather technical black/death metal for the time. As well as this, At the Gates, depite becoming quite the borefest later in their career, really mixed things up on their debut including a violin to accompany their brand of excellently written and complex melodic death metal.
If I were you I would start with the aforementioned mandatory early scene releases, then branch out into the varients of the style like early At the Gates, Therion, Hypocrisy and Necrophobic to decide which styles take your fancy!

http://www.amazon.com/Swedish-Death-Met ... 444&sr=8-1

Best source for the whole scene. I'm still reading my copy, and so far it's a wealth of knowledge. I thought i knew a decent amount of bands and members of the swedish scene (which i prefer to american death metal actually) but still learned a TON from what i've read so far in this book.

I got Dismember's 'The God That Never Was' a few weeks ago, and I can say I haven't got enough of it yet. It is really, really great and I'm looking forward to get their debut.

I like Macabre End better...

Grotesque are the best band I found so far, and I already knew and loved ATG

The main difference, back in the days, was that if you lived in Sweden (like me) you recorded in Sunlight Studios, with Tomas Skogsberg. And if you lived in USA you recorded at Morrisound Recording with Scott Burns.

That is the very, very fast version.
And there is actually a lot of truth in it as well.

You can check out a list of bands that recorded in Sunlight (with timeline) here:

http://www.carnagedeathmetal.de/carnage ... tudio.html


As far as best records/bands I'm sure they are mentioned here already.
I'll just raise a small voice for a personal recommendation:

Cemetary - Godless Beauty (1993)

A record that I think as aged with dignity over the years.
Obviously not as influental as releases from Entombed, Dismember, Grave, At The Gates and the rest, but still a very fine record. In my opinion.

very cool link and i will be checking out Cemetary

I really like the Therion stuff that I have heard, but from their last fm, it looks like they become some sort of gothic/symphonic metal band. What releases are in their death metal style, like the track megalomania

their first 3 albums are death

Edge of Sanity. No one has mentioned them.

Oh, just wait until you do. You will be eaten alive.