The Official Opeth Thread: New Album now streaming

[glaurung]

I would have loved to be there for that.

[?]

Yeah, I think we shall all do that. 

Imagine at every concert on Opeth's tour, somebody is shouting for that song.
Eventually Mikael will snap and be all like "U WANT METUUL?!"

I keep trying to get something similar organized for Devin Townsend shows that all DTFers attend. I want to get it to the point where Devy hears people requesting Punky Bruster (comedy punk album he did in the 90s) songs such as "Heinous Anus" during song breaks.

This brings to my mind: to everyone going to the US Opeth/Katatonia gigs, you should request them to "play" something by Heinz, Mikael and Jonas' (Katatonia singer) "project" in which they recorded their farts! You can read more about it in this Katatonia interview: https://web.archive.org/web/20070928124746/https://www.imhotepzine.com/imhotep10/10-katatonia.html

OK. So what about Heinz??

A: - Hmm..? What's that?

 

Well, it's a “band“ too...

A: - ....Aaaaah... (slaps his head)

J: - The “farting“ band....

A: - Shit. Mike, or what?

J: - It's buried, haha.

A: - Oh my God. He talks too much. He and Dan.

 

( Here my weird sense of humour came in and did it's thing...Gotta have a bit of it in an interview now and zen. Heinz was one of Jonas' & Mikael's many “projects“ some years ago, when they had nothing better to do.... And Heinz was, as said, the “plött“ (farting) band. They would sit down, eat loads of beans and record the outcome to tape... ënuff said.)

[Zantera]

Today there was a very interesting interview with Mike in a Swedish rock/metal-magazine called "Sweden Rock", the whole interview was about 5-6 pages or so, kinda long in other words, too long for me to translate.
It was pretty interesting, Mikael talked about being pretty depressed lately, and he also said that he spends a lot of time thinking about the band, what will happen if they break up, and what he would do with his life if that happened, and things like that.
It wasn't your typical "hows the new album? do you like it?"-interview, it was kinda dark and most of the questions were pretty personal.

Not sure if Zydar or any other Swede here has read it yet, but it was pretty interesting.

[Gadough]

....Based on that interview, should we be concerned?

[Zydar]

Today there was a very interesting interview with Mike in a Swedish rock/metal-magazine called "Sweden Rock", the whole interview was about 5-6 pages or so, kinda long in other words, too long for me to translate.
It was pretty interesting, Mikael talked about being pretty depressed lately, and he also said that he spends a lot of time thinking about the band, what will happen if they break up, and what he would do with his life if that happened, and things like that.
It wasn't your typical "hows the new album? do you like it?"-interview, it was kinda dark and most of the questions were pretty personal.

Not sure if Zydar or any other Swede here has read it yet, but it was pretty interesting.

I haven't read it, but I'll be on the look-out for the magazine if they have it here. Thanks.

[zxlkho]

....Based on that interview, should we be concerned?

must be answered

[Zantera]

I don't know, Mikael is kinda hard to grasp as a person.
On one hand he's like "hell yeah, new tour!" but on the other hand he misses his family, from what I know he has always been like that (every coin has two sides), I'm not too sure what to take from Opeth's future.
He also talked a lot about still really enjoying music, and that it is his job after all, so it wasn't just negative things or anything like that.

[Gadough]

Ok, good.

[Zantera]

It was just a part that made me react a bit, but I mean, it might be normal.
Obviously it depends on the person, but maybe it's Mikael's way of being "prepared", even though he might love the band and everything, something unexpected can still happen, and maybe it's just his way of thinking about different scenarios and such.
He also said that he gets really bored very fast when he doesn't have anything to do (at home), so that leads to him thinking about random things in life, he also said that most of it is unnecessary and unimportant, but he thinks about it anyway.
He also said that he really don't care what people say if they thrashtalk Opeth, but that he still has Blabbermouth bookmarked and can't avoid reading about them there, so yeah.. he really has a sorta "do and do not"-type of approach.

[Gadough]

Who the fuck "trashtalks" Opeth? Sure, they get a lot of constructive criticism thrown their way, but rarely do you see people outright bashing them. And for good reason.

[ACID_FOX]

Who the fuck "trashtalks" Opeth? Sure, they get a lot of constructive criticism thrown their way, but rarely do you see people outright bashing them. And for good reason.

Havn't you seen that guy on Youtube burning all his old Opeth albums?

[Gadough]

No, but I've heard about it.

[zxlkho]

There's a loooooot of people trashing Opeth for this album, which I think it undeserved.

[Zantera]

I don't think it's just this album, I've heard a lot of people make fun of the whole "RORORORORO".
No matter what band/artist you talk about, someone is thrashtalking them, it's just 'normal' on the net today.

[Marvellous G]

Me and my Latin teacher were discussing Heritage today, he appreciated what they were doing, but he missed their metal side. I guess we knew this was gonna happen, as I loved all the experimental stuff on Watershed but Still Life is his favourite. (yes, my Latin teacher loves prog metal)

[?]

Mikael said in the Finnish Soundi magazine he suspects that he may have a bipolar disorder, as he sometimes has some depressive periods.

[zxlkho]

Me and my Latin teacher were discussing Heritage today, he appreciated what they were doing, but he missed their metal side. I guess we knew this was gonna happen, as I loved all the experimental stuff on Watershed but Still Life is his favourite. (yes, my Latin teacher loves prog metal)

Your Latin teacher is awesome.

[lateralus88]

Who the fuck "trashtalks" Opeth? Sure, they get a lot of constructive criticism thrown their way, but rarely do you see people outright bashing them. And for good reason.

Havn't you seen that guy on Youtube burning all his old Opeth albums?

I must see this video. Also if you ever read the comments on their Facebook updates, you get some pretty ridiculous posts that makes almost no sense. But once you get passed the terrible lack of grammar you realize a lot of people are saying shit like "Opeth are sellouts now fags". Extremely sad to see people say such things about a band who have practically changed my outlook on progressive metal, black metal and music with much darker tones.

[ACID_FOX]

Who the fuck "trashtalks" Opeth? Sure, they get a lot of constructive criticism thrown their way, but rarely do you see people outright bashing them. And for good reason.

Havn't you seen that guy on Youtube burning all his old Opeth albums?

I must see this video. Also if you ever read the comments on their Facebook updates, you get some pretty ridiculous posts that makes almost no sense. But once you get passed the terrible lack of grammar you realize a lot of people are saying shit like "Opeth are sellouts now fags". Extremely sad to see people say such things about a band who have practically changed my outlook on progressive metal, black metal and music with much darker tones.

The irony is that this album is the complete opposite of selling out. And I'll link that vidoe here as soon as I find it, I can't remember what it was called.

[lateralus88]

Who the fuck "trashtalks" Opeth? Sure, they get a lot of constructive criticism thrown their way, but rarely do you see people outright bashing them. And for good reason.

Havn't you seen that guy on Youtube burning all his old Opeth albums?

I must see this video. Also if you ever read the comments on their Facebook updates, you get some pretty ridiculous posts that makes almost no sense. But once you get passed the terrible lack of grammar you realize a lot of people are saying shit like "Opeth are sellouts now fags". Extremely sad to see people say such things about a band who have practically changed my outlook on progressive metal, black metal and music with much darker tones.

The irony is that this album is the complete opposite of selling out. And I'll link that vidoe here as soon as I find it, I can't remember what it was called.

no u r gai they sld out bcuz dey no longr screem dey just do pusyass sing

[BlobVanDam]

They are sellouts. Switching to 70s prog is an obvious attempt at popularity, because that's always popular on the charts, and it's clearly the only reason Akerfeldt did it.

[zxlkho]

I tried to find the video on youtube but had no luck. Anyone have it?

[Zantera]

The whole 70's thing is a trend, however... I wouldn't say that Heritage fits under the 'typical' 70's music, it's not as easy to grasp as most other attempts at 70's music.

[ACID_FOX]

I tried to find the video on youtube but had no luck. Anyone have it?

I can't remember how I found it, didn't somebody here link it?

[ariich]

The whole 70's thing is a trend, however... I wouldn't say that Heritage fits under the 'typical' 70's music, it's not as easy to grasp as most other attempts at 70's music.

Want to show me all these popular bands and artists taking up this 70s trend? I can only think of Pain of Salvation and Opeth, neither of whom are particularly big, and I guess TDH's Orange EP had a 70s vibe as well.

[lateralus88]

Mastodon, but that's hardly even an example.

[Zantera]

Opeth, Pain of Salvation, Steven Wilson (to some extent), but apart from those, there has been a crazy wave of 70's sounding bands in the last years, take bands like Wolfmother, Clutch, The Answer, Airbourne and Graveyard to name a few.
Let's not forget the new hipster-trend of many indie bands having long, thick beards, and making the music sound more 70's then 10's.
There are probably more examples, but these are the ones that comes to mind.

[skydivingninja]

I do think there is a bit of a "let's go back to the 70s" mentality with a lot of bands.  Stripped down production, vintage instruments and gear, love of old artists, and bluesy rock seems to be coming back.  Bands that are doing this (that this forum worships) include PoS, Opeth, Mastodon, Steven Wilson, and The Dear Hunter (Orange).  Not to mention all the modern prog Spock's Beard clones who want to be the next Gabriel-Genesis.

The trick, however, is to showcase your love for that kind of music, but without deliberately imitating the 70s style of production or sound, which is what Mastodon did perfectly with CtS and what Opeth did very well with Heritage. 

[Zantera]

I agree with Matt.
Things like this can be done in a very good and subtle way, but if it sounds exactly like an album that came out 40 years ago, it's not really a good thing. :/

[emtee]

Add Astra to the list of retro prog...and many other lesser known bands.

Thing is, having been there and experienced it, it was the most amazing period of music in my life. The late 60's to
the mid 70's. So much was fresh and new and experimental. So many new branches sprouting out from the blues
rock metal scene. SO much new to discover. Don't get me wrong, there is a ton of great music to discover in every
era but there was really something special about that time frame and I think MA feels the importance and weight
of the music from then and needs to pay homage, just like Steven Wilson just did with Time Flies.

[Zantera]

Yeah, I guess it's the artist's way of "branching out to their roots" or whatever, but after a certain amount of 70's sounding albums, it gets a bit tiresome.

[Pyroph]

....Based on that interview, should we be concerned?

must be answered

At worst SW and MA would form a super band.

[zxlkho]

Wouldn't that just be the best option?

[HarlequinForest]

Man, I hope they play Slither when I see them in October.  This song is addicting.

[Zantera]

Time for song-rankings on Heritage:

Famine
Nepenthe
Folklore
I Feel the Dark
Devils Orchard
Slither
The Lines In My Hand
Häxprocess
Marrow of the Earth
Heritage