Gardens of Grief

Gardens of Grief
EP by At the Gates
Released	February 1991
Recorded	1990
Genre	Death metal
Length	19:54
Label	Dolores
Producer	At the Gates and Tomas Skogsberg
At the Gates chronology
Gardens of Grief (1991) The Red in the Sky Is Ours (1992)

Gardens of Grief is an EP by Swedish melodic death metal band At the Gates. This EP was later re-released as a split CD with Grotesque's In the Embrace of Evil album.

On the inlay of the rerelease you can find this line: "Tomas wants to dedicate the lyrics in 'At the Gates' to the memory of Per Ohlin ..R.I.P..." He was the vocalist of Mayhem and Morbid who committed suicide in April 1991.

Background information

When the tracks were recorded at Sunlight Studio, At the Gates had been playing together for "roughly" four months. Björler accredits this period as the time when At the Gates developed their musicianship, songwriting, and ability to work together. In comparison to tracks which featured on later recordings, Björler believes the songs are less structured. Due to a modest studio budget combined with inexperience, the EP's production "suffered a lot". However, Björler has described Gardens of Grief as "an ok debut EP".^[1]

The opening lyrics to "All Life Ends" is nearly word for word identical to the opening lines of the monologue at the beginning of Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior.

Track listing

Cassette - Side A
No.	Title	Length
1.	"Souls of the Evil Departed"	3:34
2.	"At the Gates"	5:22
3.	"All Life Ends"	6:10
4.	"City of Screaming Statues"	4:46
Total length:		19:54

Split CD from In the Embrace of Evil by Grotesque
No.	Title	Length
5.	"Thirteen Bells of Doom"	2:25
6.	"Blood Runs from the Altar"	4:26
7.	"Submit to Death"	3:28
8.	"Fall into Decay"	4:47
9.	"Seven Gates"	2:04
10.	"Angels Blood"	7:36
11.	"Nocturnal Blasphemies"	4:37
12.	"Spawn of Azathoth"	2:38
13.	"Incantation"	7:21
14.	"Church of the Pentagram"	5:25
15.	"Ripped from the Cross"	4:14

1994 Reissue

Side A
No.	Title	Length
1.	"Souls of the Evil Departed"	3:34
2.	"At the Gates"	5:22

Side B
No.	Title	Length
3.	"All Life Ends"	6:10
4.	"City of Screaming Statues"	4:46

Vinyl Reissue

Side A
No.	Title	Length
1.	"Souls of the Evil Departed"	3:34

Side B
No.	Title	Length
2.	"All Life Ends"	6:10

Credits

At the Gates

• Anders Björler – guitar
• Jonas Björler – bass
• Adrian Erlandsson – drums
• Alf Svensson (also was in Grotesque and known as The Haunting) – guitar, cover artwork, logo; keyboards (on In the Embrace of Evil) & bass (tracks 11-13)
• Tomas Lindberg (also was in Grotesque and known as Goatspell) - vocals

Grotesque

• Necrolord - guitars, keyboards
• David Nuctemeron - bass (tracks 5-10, 14)
• Offensor - drums (tracks 6, 7, 11-13)
• Shamaatae - drums (tracks 5, 8-10, 14)

Additional personnel

• Kasper Hard - producer (tracks 6 & 7)
• Tomas Skogsberg - engineering (tracks 1-4), producer (tracks 1-4, 11-13)

References

1. Morgan, Anthony (November 2007). "'The Flames of the End'? - Guitarist Anders Björler wishes to pen the final chapter in the glorious history of Swedish legends At the Gates". Lucem Fero. Retrieved 2008-03-08.