OPETH biography
Yes, some people would consider OPETH to be a pure (melodic) Death Metal band but you have to differentiate a lot. The four guys from Stockholm/Sweden feature a lot of different elements on their albums. We have the aggressive death metal with Mikael’s growls (which are not generated with help of a computer, it’s actually his voice) with lots of breaks, mostly acoustic including Mikael’s clear voice. Mr. Akerfeld himself always underestimates his clear voice and often points out that he is a nov...Yes, some people would consider OPETH to be a pure (melodic) Death Metal band but you have to differentiate a lot. The four guys from Stockholm/Sweden feature a lot of different elements on their albums. We have the aggressive death metal with Mikael’s growls (which are not generated with help of a computer, it’s actually his voice) with lots of breaks, mostly acoustic including Mikael’s clear voice. Mr. Akerfeld himself always underestimates his clear voice and often points out that he is a novice regarding this kind of singing. But that’s not true, false modesty is the term here. His clear voice is warm and simply beautiful. The whole music is guitar orientated, on the one hand we have great riffing for aggressive parts, awesome melodic solos and on the other hand acoustic breaks with admirable melodies with some Scandinavian folk influences here and there and of course Mikael’s clear vocals. Sometimes you even get some PINK FLOYD or PORCUPINE TREE like parts or whole songs.
Sure, the band started out as a pure Death Metal combo regarding to their first release„ "Orchid" but from their second release on the prog elements got more and more. The second album "Morningrise" for example features a pure Prog song with PINK FLOYD like parts as well as epic song lengths. Mikael Akerfeld who also is the indispensable head of the band, often mentions that he is a proghead and mostly likes bands like CAMEL and PORCUPINE TREE. No doubt, you can hear those influences on albums like "Still Life" and "Blackwater Park" but their highlight regarding to pure Prog for sure is their 2003 release "Damnation" which features an entire album in the style of PORCUPINE TREE. Not really astonishing regarding the fact that Steven Wilson of PORCUPINE TREE is a good friend of Mikael and Peter and even worked together with the band for their double release "Damnation" and "Deliverance". Steven Wilson also produced their album "Blackwater Park" which is regarded as their best work so far, not only by death metal fans but also by many others normally disliking death metal growls (like me). "Damnation" for sure is the album most of you would be interested in because it is a pure Prog album. But Mikael said that the band will not do something similar again, he even announced the next album to be their most heavy, we will see. Sure ist that this release opened the door to new fans and certainly displeased some of their old fans coming from the death metal origin.
If you like Prog Metal and don’t mind‚ some’ death metal growls this is he band to check out. But you can check them out even if you don’t like growls. I don’t like Death Metal in general but love OPETH, even their death metal releases like their debut "Orchid". And that’s what happens again and again, OPETH attracts people normally disliking death metal, people calling themselves‚ progheads because of their diversity. And that’s the reason why you should try it as well.
