Publishers Weekly made Daniel Ekeroth’s book Swedish Death Metal its Web-Exclusive Pick of the Week for August 25, 2008. From reading the review, the book actually sounds decent:

Death Metal musician and author Ekeroth (Violent Italy) shows a true fan’s dedication in this oral history/band index of the thunderous music scene that emerged from frozen, sparsely-populated Sweden in the ’80s and early ’90s. In his introduction, Ekeroth explains the youth phenomenon that was Swedish Death Metal (it sounds pretty much like you would think) as natural in a country “generally made up of extremely small and boring towns.” He writes: “In the small and worthless town of Avesta where I grew up, there were metal bands in every garage, school, and youth center,” he writes.

Without sensationalizing SDM’s dark, flamboyant lyrics, Ekeroth traces the movement that produced more than a thousand bands, from proto-genre “thrash metal” (more punk) to bastard offshoots like “black metal” (more makeup, less fun)

Maybe worth the price alone is the appendix, an “A to Z of Swedish Death Metal Bands,” which features brief profiles and discographies (with Ekeroth’s opinions) of every known SDM band, from world-famous At the Gates (“all their albums are classic masterpieces”) to Slakt (just one 2005 demo, “probably nerds”).

Now that’s a review that made me buy the book on sight, more for what Ekeroth says than anything. The review itself isn’t that great, but what the hell, it sold me on the literature.