Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Opeth
Label: Roadrunner Records
Release: 2008
Runtime: 54:59
Rating: 5/5
The new Opeth album is probably one of the most anticipated releases of 2008. Especially given the band’s evolution, which follows the big strides they fearlessly take as they change their musical expression from album to album. “Watershed” is yet another confirmation that, thanks to their constant transformation, the result of bold experimentation and a hunger to try the untried and unknown that keeps the Opeth wagon rolling, Opeth are one of the hottest names on the metal scene, if I may be very superficial.
“Watershed”, with its very fitting title, marks a kind of milestone in the band’s career. While it was being made, the group had to get through two lineup changes: Martin Axenrot is the new drummer, replacing the much-praised Martin Lopez, and on guitar Friederik Akkeson took over from Peter Lindgren. Both brought an absolute qualitative upgrade to the new Opeth sound, in technical terms as well as in experimental expression. “Watershed” is the first album in the band’s career where progressive rock elements take the lead over death metal – the very genre Opeth were originally born from.
Mikael Akerfeldt has never hidden his affinity for acoustic sound. His taste in music is very broad, and the man sets himself no particular limits when he sits down to write songs. The opening acoustic track Coil alone announces that something exceptional hides behind the “Watershed” label. A witty foundation built on acoustic guitar, with flute and keyboards in the background playing the role of an orchestra, cut through by an exceptionally fortunate interweaving of Akerfeldt’s clean, melancholic vocals with a female voice, with a real gothic touch of fragility and innocence, courtesy of Natalie Lorichs, who happens to be the girlfriend of the band’s drummer Martin Axenrot. The acoustic passages on the album carry an undeniable melancholic element, typical of Scandinavian bands.
The first unexpected twist, and this album is teeming with them, is the transition from the opening Coil, which pours into a heavy guitar riff of an almost dissonant, massive curtain of sound, in the song Heir Apperant. Opeth create a very wicked, gloomy atmosphere right from the intro, and when Akerfeldt’s death metal growls erupt a bit later, we’re facing the album’s most rowdy song, which in intensity and ambience brings back the feel of something like The Lepper Affinity – the opener of “Blackwater Park”. Akerfeldt’s vocals are terrifying, as if pulled straight out of hell, utterly evil. Heir Apperant is shot through with a contrast between calmer acoustic passages and extreme death metal roaring, a reminder that Opeth haven’t lost their brutal reach or accidentally chipped their metal teeth. It’s the hardest-hitting track on the album, and Akkeson’s excellent solo, which doesn’t let up on the evil, adds extra spice. The contrast of motifs flows without restraint, and in one of the calmer parts the guys even manage to squeeze in a weeping slide guitar solo.
So that this review doesn’t turn into an overlong sausage, I won’t go through the album track by track and will try to stick to the essential novelties the new album brings for Opeth. With all the multi-layered structure of this album, which only an insect’s compound eye could take in, that’s going to be a tough job.
“Watershed” is definitely an evolutionary step forward for Opeth. The band touched on some things and brought them into their sound that we hadn’t seen before, or that had never been this prominent in their musical expression. The acoustic arpeggio outro, fading out through slackened strings as if someone were letting the tuning pegs go into a completely dissonant, detuned sound, interrupted by an effect of studio-processed laughter (I never fully worked that trick out, but I suspect the sound originally came from outside Akerfeldt’s guitar) that kicks off the next track, is an extremely clever invention and a special curiosity of this album.
The album carries a generally pronounced psychedelic ambience. The reason lies in the introduction of acoustic instrumental tricks, which can often sound dissonant. These acoustic passages often create a downright eerie, almost cinematic atmosphere, born for some horror movie. Opeth also offer a very varied use of vocals on the new album (especially when it comes to blending different vocal colors) and a combining and merging of vocal harmonies. It’s also not hard to stumble on unusual additional effects (sampled sounds) woven into the overall picture of the songs. All of this sounds very fresh on Watershed, very new for Opeth, and so it opens a new chapter in their catalog of Opeth’s musical character.
By constantly alternating between acoustics and the extreme heritage of death metal, Opeth tip the scales this time in favor of progressive rock. There’s no need to guess anymore: the keyboards are emphasized in the sound more than ever and have become a hugely important part of the new Opeth sound. The use of orchestrations and even old-school parts played on a Moog has suddenly become a very important building block in Opeth’s music. More than ever before. The cherry on top of all this is the song Burden. This track is a real tribute to the prog rock heavyweights of the seventies. When you listen to this mellow song, which sails shamelessly on a Mellotron, it’s not hard to draw some parallels with the legendary Camel, while the “Oh-oh-oh” vocal lines in the last third of the song bring to life the classic Uriah Heep of the seventies. The surprises aren’t over when the listener bumps into the Moog solos, and Akerfeldt spices the whole thing up again with a semi-acoustic “bluesy” solo that pours into a closing harmonic Wishbone Ash-style trio of guitar melodies, which is then capped off by the already mentioned detuned arpeggio. Judging by the band’s catalog so far, definitely one of the most interesting songs on the album.
“Watershed” can be a very educational album, and with it Akerfeldt and company are becoming a sort of modern-day messiahs. The new Opeth album has real potential to grab the attention of all fans of old-school symphonic seventies prog rock, who will finally be able to slowly pull back, “in mild doses”, the curtain that has hidden the realm of melodic death metal from them so far, and vice versa. Death metal fans will inevitably come into contact with prog rock as it was played in the seventies through “Watershed”, and perhaps thanks to that they’ll start discovering this now-extinct but endlessly beautiful genre, which in musical and artistic terms is the most refined in expression.
With “Watershed”, Opeth have reached a new evolutionary milestone and broadly outgrown their previous musical milestones, or rather, further widened their creative musical range. This is an album with which the band confirms its enormous motivation, musical maturity, boldness and courage. It’s one of those albums you simply can’t get tired of listening to. When it spins from start to finish, you have no trouble putting it on again. And again. Only the best albums in rock or metal work like that, the ones we can call true works of musical art. And to put it bluntly, “Watershed” is also the ideal starting point for anyone who doesn’t know the band. With its constant surprises, uniqueness and musical unpredictability, it will feed every brain hungry for depth and wit in musical expression.
Lineup
Mikael Åkerfeldt – vocals, guitar
Fredrik Åkesson – guitar
Per Wiberg – keyboards
Martin Mendez – bass guitar
Martin Axenrot – drums, percussion
GUEST MUSICIAN:
Nathalie Lorichs – vocals on track no. 1
Production
Mikael Akerfeldt & Jens Bogren
Track list
1. Coil
2. Heir Apparent
3. Lotus Eater
4. Burden
5. Porcelain Heart
6. Hessian Peel
7. Hex Omega
