Master of the riff - Leif Edling!

Fifth category - Masters of the riff! And to start this category, I have chosen one of my favourites: Leif Edling of Swedish doom band Candlemass!

Who
Leif Edling started playing bass in 1979 in relatively unknown metal bands Trilogy and Witchcraft. His first release came in 1982, when he was playing in Nemesis. Their album 'Day of retribution' was released in 1984, but Edling dissolved the band shortly after the release to form his own band, Candlemass. And here's where it gets really interesting.

In Candlemass
Right from the beginning, the Black Sabbath inspired band made an impression. Their first album Epicus Doomicus Metallicus, today considered a milestone in doom metal, featured vocalist Johan Längqvist and was released in 1986. The sound was heavy and dark, but melodic. And at the centre of the compositions were Edling's crushing riffs. Equally adept at lumbering behemoths and scalpel-sharp stabs, Edling's playing elaborated on Black Sabbath's famed style of playing and composing. The album opened with the slow and lurching 'Solitude', and right from the beginning the lyrics centered on dark fantasy, and interpretations of christian themes from other perspectives. The masterpiece of the album came midway through, in the form of the monolithic 'Black Stone Wielder', where Edling crammed 3 great riffs into the same 7-and-a-half minute mini-epic and topped it off with great lyrics.
For the second album Nightfall, Candlemass' most famous singer Messiah Marcolin came onboard, and the 'classic' Candlemass sound was born. Marcolin's operatic wail was the perfect vocal for the type of music, and with him on board, the group made what is considered the classic Candlemass records:

Nightfall (1987)
Ancient Dreams (1988)
Tales of creation (1989)

All these albums contain great songs, with fantastic riffs of every kind.
Following a live album (Live from 1990), Messiah Marcolin left the band. For the next 13 years, Candlemass had kind of a wilderness period with various singers fronting the band. The records were not a patch on the first four albums, but there are still diamonds to be found on each of them. And not surprisingly, founder member Edling's riffs are what makes many of the songs awesome. Messiah returned in 2002 for another live album (Doomed for live from 2003), and a (so far) final studio release with him on the mic, Candlemass from 2005. He then left the band again, and was replaced by Robert Lowe from doom band Solitude Aeturnus, who sang on the 2007 release King of the grey islands.

Other bands
With Candlemass temporarily on hiatus in 1995, Edling formed the band Abstrakt Algebra and released an album of the same name with Mats Leven on vocals. The band was short lived and met with limited commercial success. Musically, it was basically a slightly watered down Candlemass with more heavy and less Doom.
In 2003, following a temporary falling out between Edling and Marcolin, Edling founded a heavier doom band called Krux, again with Leven. They have released two studio albums and a live album so far.

What to get
The best place to start is definetly the 'classic' Candlemass albums. I would recommend Nightfall from 1987 as the best starting point, seeing as how it contains awesome 'Mass classics like 'Dark are the veils of death', 'Samarithan' and 'Bewitched'. The album is through and through probably the best Candlemass album, and besides Edling's awesome compositions it also contains the only good metal-version ever of Chopin's 'Marche Funebre' (The Funeral March).
The other two Marcolin-fronted albums from the first tenure are also well worth a purchase if you like doomy heavy metal. If you like it a bit heavier, try the first of the Krux albums which also features some great riffs.
Even today Edling is still churning out classic riffs. The latest album, King of the grey islands, features great songs like 'Of stars and smoke' and 'Emperor of the void', and is also well worth investing in. Lowe's voice fits into the bands sound perfectly.