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Going through the Opeth catalogue again

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adg211288 View Drop Down
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    Posted: 10 Sep 2024 at 12:52am
Most MMA regulars probably know that I count Opeth as one of my favourite bands anyway, so it's rare for too much time to pass without me giving at least one of their albums a spin, but in anticipation for The Last Will and Testament I've been giving their entire discography an airing in release order. I partially did this last year as well, but only the extreme prog metal era (+ Damnation) but for some reason didn't play the modern prog rock albums, but I am including them this time around. I only have In Cauda Venenum still to spin in both it's English and Swedish language versions. 

While my views on the band's original sound, which appears to be making something of a comeback on their new one, haven't really changed - I still rank Still Life, Blackwater Park and Ghost Reveries as my top three - I surprised myself by how my views on the prog rock albums have changed.

When Heritage came out, it represented a vastly different side of Opeth. It wasn't even really comparable to Damnation. I dug it though. I played the first single The Devil's Orchard so much that to this day it's still ranked on my Last.fm as one of my most played Opeth songs. Yet this time around, with them having made three further albums, I found that I wasn't feeling it so much. Compared to what came next, Pale Communion, an album I once would have said was Opeth's weakest and actually led to them losing my interest until Sorceress came out and brought some metal elements back, it feels very disjointed and unfocussed. Perhaps it can fairly be called Opeth's most experimental album, but I found that while I don't dislike it, I have soured on it. 

The opposite is true of Pale Communion, which has only grown in my estimations of the years. Although their sound changed, I can hear more of the old Opeth in its song writing than with Heritage which now sounds like they were trying too hard to break away from what went before. 

I have always really liked Sorceress and it got me back interested in Opeth when it came out. My appreciation (and purchase of) Pale Communion only came after that album was released. 

As I said, I still have In Cauda Venenum to revisit, which may happen today, but when it came out I felt it was their best since Watershed. More metal parts without abandoning the prog rock approach that had become their new thing for almost a decade at that point. I've played the English version more, although I believe the Swedish language version is considered the album by the band. I'll be playing both as part of this run, and I expect to be playing their music a lot over the next month until the new one is released. 

I am really enjoying both new songs released so far which are very different to each other. 



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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Bosh66 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10 Sep 2024 at 1:07am
Interesting. I think that pretty much mirrors my thoughts on the back-catalogue. I'm a big prog rock fan as well as a fan of extreme metal and hard rock so Opeth over the years has pretty much ticked every box for me. I also think Heritage is the weakest release. A bit rough around the edges but I'm also a big fan of MAYH. It kind of acts as an opener for the albums that followed straight after.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Psydye Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10 Sep 2024 at 4:45am
I only went through their discography once and found myself enjoying the later albums more than the earlier, extreme metal ones...which is odd 'cause I DO enjoy extreme prog metal, just, for some reason, theirs wasn't doing much for me. I think I'm gonna go through it all again though to see how much my taste has changed since then, if at all.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote UMUR Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10 Sep 2024 at 9:53am
I´m not much of a fan of the first two albums, but from "My Arms, Your Hearse" and until "Ghost Reveries" I think they´ve made some really great albums. I´m not as awe strucken as I used to be regarding those albums, but when I give them a spin (which I do very rarely these days), I always enjoy them greatly.

I never really warmed up to their progressive rock phase (I simply think there are so many other great progressive rock artists out there who make much more interesting progressive rock music, that I´d much rather spend time listening to them), and I´m looking forward to the new album as it seems that some death metal elements will return.

Like you Adam I`ve started going through Opeth´s discography again starting with "Orchid", but I´m revewing them while listening, so it´ll probably take many years for me to complete my listening journey. for now I´ve only reviewed "Orchid", but I´ve prevoiusly reviewed all the other albums on PA and some on MMA, but all reviews will be re-written, because like you Adam my perspective on some of the releases have changed too.


Edited by UMUR - 10 Sep 2024 at 9:54am
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote adg211288 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 11 Sep 2024 at 12:01am
Has your view on Watershed changed then Jonas? I noticed you said MAYH to Ghost Reveries yet gave Watershed, which came out after Ghost Reveries, 5 stars back in the day.


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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote UMUR Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 11 Sep 2024 at 10:04am
Honestly I haven´t listened even once to Watershed since writing that review now many years ago, so I´ll probably not rate it with a 5 star rating again. I can´t escape the fact that I was a huge fanboy then and an inexperienced reviewer, so I gave out too many 5 star ratings. It was a genuine 5 star rating back then, because that´s pretty surely how I felt about the album, but I´ve just listened to so much more music since, and my perspective has developed and changed on what I think is good quality music. I´m not a particlularly harsh reviewer (maybe because I predominantly listen to music that I enjoy listening to), but I don´t give out 5 star ratings for fun these days.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote adg211288 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 11 Sep 2024 at 2:48pm
I think if anything Watershed is one of the ones that has raised in my estimations over time even though it was never an album that disappointed me. In hindsight it sounds like a transitional album for Opeth: only three out of seven tracks have Mikael's growl which of course were dropped completely on Heritage, but at the same time I feel like Heir Apparent was one of the most overtly death metal tracks they ever made. 
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Pekka Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 13 Sep 2024 at 2:15pm
I think Pale Communion is the only pretty thoroughly strong album of the post-growl era. Heritage was a disappointment and the two after PC have been quite uneven but I listened to PC a ton when it came out. 
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Nightfly Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Sep 2024 at 8:47am
Originally posted by adg211288 adg211288 wrote:

I think if anything Watershed is one of the ones that has raised in my estimations over time even though it was never an album that disappointed me. In hindsight it sounds like a transitional album for Opeth: only three out of seven tracks have Mikael's growl which of course were dropped completely on Heritage, but at the same time I feel like Heir Apparent was one of the most overtly death metal tracks they ever made. 

I'd put Watershed in my top 3 Opeth albums which few probably would. I agree it was a transitional album that wasn't really apparent at the time of release due it also containing some of the bands heaviest moments. Even the tracks that only contained clean vocals were still generally pretty heavy apart from Coil and Burden.

Apart from that one Ghost Reveries and Blackwater Park are my favourites. In Cauda Venenum is my favourite since they ditched the death metal growls but now they seem to be back, though used sparingly if the first review I read in Classic Rock is anything to go by.

Already ordered the special edition box set of The Last Will and Testament as I did last time. Not many bands I'd splash out on expensive box sets but Opeth are one of them.


Edited by Nightfly - 14 Sep 2024 at 8:48am
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