Written by Rising Swedish death metal stars Orbit Culture have paid tribute to late At The Gates frontman Tomas Lindberg, four years after taking part in Lindberg’s final tour before his death.
Talking exclusively to Metal Hammer, singer/guitarist Niklas Karlsson, whose band supported At The Gates and fellow Gothenburg melodic death metal pioneers In Flames across Europe, remembers Lindberg as a “metal uncle” who was approachable and down-to-earth.
Although At The Gates played a handful of festival shows in 2023, it was their last full-length tour with their singer before he was diagnosed with adenoid cystic carcinoma, a rare cancer of the mouth and pallet, in December 2023. He died in September 2025 aged 52, following complications in his recovery.
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“[Lindberg] was so fucking kind to new, young bands,” Karlsson says. “The most down-to-earth guy you’ll ever meet. In one of the green rooms, he was watching skiing and drinking beer, and he was like, ‘You want to go out and play some darts?’ So we played darts with him and shit like that. He felt like a metal uncle, and it’s so sad that he got taken away at such a young age. We miss him.”
The singer/guitarist also remembers how In Flames, who headlined the tour, became one of Orbit Culture’s biggest champions. As well as opening for In Flames in Europe, Orbit Culture have performed at the band’s festival Göteborg Brinner and played with them across North America in summer 2022.
“I talked with Anders [Fridén, In Flames singer] a year or two ago and he said, ‘What separates you guys from other bands is you took the risk. You’re where you are today because you took stupid risks and they paid off,’” Karlsson explains.
“Our stupidest risk was our first US tour with In Flames in 2022. We were worth maybe $4,000 and we rented a bus for 60 grand. The funny thing is that we sold so much merch, we actually came home with profit! It was a stupid risk and I wouldn’t advise it, but, when you have a dream, you just try to pursue it, I guess.”
Lindberg co-founded At The Gates after the split of his previous band, Grotesque, in 1990. Though they initially specialised in a form of progressive death metal, they became one of the leading forces of the melodic death metal scene in the mid-90s, alongside In Flames and fellow Gothenburg band Dark Tranquillity. Their third album, 1995’s Slaughter Of The Soul, is seen as a masterpiece of the genre.
At The Gates split in 1996 but reformed in 2008 and made another four albums. The latest, The Ghost Of A Future Dead, was released after Lindberg’s death and featured vocal takes that he demoed shortly before his cancer surgery in early 2024. The music, artwork and tracklisting were approved by the singer.
News of Lindberg’s death was met with a wave of tributes from fans and peers. Opeth’s Mikael Åkerfeldt said that “as a frontman … he was awesome, plain and simple. Wild!” and “intellectually, he seemed to be a step above and beyond your generic metal musician”. Trivium’s Matt Heafy called him “one of the most important singers/screamers of any metal band”.
At The Gates have not confirmed whether or not they will continue without Lindberg. Their last show was at Aalborg Metal Festival in Denmark in November 2023.
