Second-largest city after its country’s capital Stockholm, west coast seaport Gothenburg exported melodic death metal three-and-a-half decades ago. Adapting razor melodies off NWOBHM acts, the Swedish triumvirate of At the Gates, In Flames, and Dark Tranquility changed the course of metallurgic brutality. Operatic blast furnace Anders Fridén and axe headsman Björn Gelotte still stoke In Flames, which once torched old-school ATX metal vanguard the Back Room, on whose footprint Emo’s now stands. The former venue’s load-bearing pole in front of the stage remains in the latter hall near the smoking exit. Gatecreeper’s Arizonan death metal will require exactly such reinforcement for current cataclysm Dark Superstition. Denton’s Creeping Death opens. – Raoul Hernandez