OPETH SURVIVOR 2016: Results -> The sun sets forever over Blackwater Park!

Final thoughts on Deliverance:

Wreath – One of the most immediate Opeth openings ever. It’s brutal as hell, with lyrics depicting a reoccurring nightmare possibly about a past traumatic event (involving dead children, ghosts, and burning cattle of course). The drumming on this track is absolutely phenomenal. However, the riffs and melodies do almost nothing for me. It feels like an onslaught of average riffs and never-ending, indistinct growling. The same kind of chunky chord and octave riffs repeat for 5 minutes of mediocrity. I honestly have zero interest in this song until the solo (which is admittedly very awesome and responsible for at least two of the points I’m giving this song). The whole section after the solo with the wailing ghoul guitar is neat and then we get a cool Still Life-style riff with some crazy layered screams, and suddenly the song is good. The ethnic percussion section is neat and should have been longer, but the solo after it is also amazing. Once the vocals come back in, I lose interest again. It just feels like something Opeth is not and that is: stock. This song mostly sounds like a band trying to be Opeth that doesn’t have the same genius as Opeth. From 5:00-9:00 this song is very good, but the first entire half and the last two minutes are simply uninteresting. I like that they recall the intro riff to end the song (reinforces the theme), though. Wreath is the weakest song in the catalog up to this point. 5/10

Deliverance – Oh, you amazing son of a bitch, you. Insanity begins this track and the genius never stops. This song is everything that Wreath is not. The riffs are catchy, the dynamics are constantly shifting, it’s just pure brilliance. Lopez’s drums are once again completely stellar. The first heavy verse is pummeling and when the song slows down it only gets better. The guitar leads and vocal melodies here (“walk with me”) juxtaposed with the heavy riff are beautiful. A transcendent musical moment. It culminates in the hits at 3:00 before breaking out into that intro part again with Lopez slaughtering the double bass. I adore the Dream Theater section leading into the first line of “Facedown into the waterline, gazing into the deep!” followed by that awesome mini-solo. Shifting between clean vocals and devilish growlies for the next few sections works so well. It’s the melody in this song that makes me think it’s every bit as good as Blackwater Park (possibly better depending on the day). “Devil guides the way” is just classic newer Opeth. The melodies, harmonies, the rhythm, the groove, the amazing drumming, and that unspeakably good solo…starting with this section through the very end of the song is in my top 3 Opeth moments of all time. The title repetition is so eerily catchy. And what about that ending? Oh, it’s just the catchiest instrumental bit to ever exist in the entire discography. 10,000/10

A Fair Judgment - Cards on the table: I love this song. I want it to be perfect, but holy crap, that piano intro is way too long. It should be half as long at the most. It’s so repetitive and just does not work after 3 and ½ minutes of the best repetitive riff ever. The song picks up with some melancholy vocals and instrumentation and that’s when things get interesting. It’s dreary, murky, yet still heavy. That first heavy riff is golden. I believe this song shows where Mikael’s head was actually at during the recording of this album, and that place is: Damnation. The heaviest songs on here sound a little bit simple, a little bit disjointed, and a little bit forced compared to what came before (and after). A Fair Judgment, however, sounds like a beautiful track that could have been on the follow-up/complimentary album, but Mikael just couldn’t resist adding those heavy riffs in there. I think this is a great synthesis of the Opeth sounds and wish that newer material sounded more like this production-wise. The harmonies in the final vocal section are gorgeous, as is that jazzy blues solo. Once it gets heavy again there’s another awesome solo. I feel like the lead guitars on this album are really stepped up a notch – quality solos all around. The melodic riff lead at 7:00 is killer and sounds like it could be a restrained Adrian Smith moment. AFJ is a subtle riff-fest, but credit must be given again to Lopez and Mendez who turn in a really brilliant performance on this (especially the former, showing that he’s more than double bass). The outro riff…is the biggest downfall of the song. I don’t think it fits very well and it simply drones on and on. I think the lack of imagination in intros and outros (other than the title track) on this album speaks to Mikael’s tiredness and metal burnout. This song is almost perfect, but the intro and the ending (and the fade) kill it. 9/10

For Absent Friends – Harmless, also kind of pointless. I feel like this would have made a better ending to A Fair Judgment than the heavy riff. Oh well. It’s played nicely and the shifts between major and minor are interesting. 7/10

Master’s Apprentices – Goddamn, ‘dat riff. MA follows the same idea as Wreath (hit ‘em hard, hit ‘em always), but is far more successful. The riffs are better, the melodies are better, and holy hell how is Lopez not dead? The odd-meter sections from 2:00-4:00 are incredible, the vocals pure menace. “Sever the faith from my body” is so wicked. The fact that clean vocals exist in this song is shocking considering how evil it is. The fact that those cleans are major at one point and sound like heaven is just plain awesome. The acoustic section with the wah-ish lead is very, very cool and the “every wretched dream” part is catchy, and creepy, as hell. Nice bass by Mendez behind it, too. Ethereal harmonies of “ahh’s” appear out of nowhere and I know I need to be thanking Steven Wilson. It’s so weird, but really works. Unlike every other Opeth fan, I don’t love the growling that jumps out from under the bed to eat our souls, but it does lead us to the riffing at 7:55 which is the single best musical moment on the album that doesn’t exist in the title track. The outro riff (and fucking fade!) gets a little stale, again, and mars my overall enjoyment of the track. 9/10

By The Pain I See In Others – A companion piece to Wreath in that it’s relatively weak and uninspired compared to the rest of the album. The intro is average, but the riff at 0:55 is really great. Lopez, as always on this album, is on fire. The arpeggios in the verses are creepy, but I really, truly hate the vocal choice and effect. I don’t like the idea, I don’t like the execution. “Rise to submission” is incredibly powerful, though, and makes this song stronger than it initially seems. Random transition to a double bass part…and another neat riff that serves more to showcase the drums than the actual riffing. There is a tasty panned lead in there, though. I love the circus bit, even if the vocal melodies don’t really go anywhere. Another bad transition leads us back into the verse riff, now heavier, before more rising to submission. Just like Wreath, we get a too brief section of ethnic percussion before we rise to submission again. At this point, this chorus has overstayed its welcome. The acoustics start up and I get excited: then they immediately go away for some mediocre gutturals before a pointless feedback outro. Eh, it’s better than Wreath, but not by much. 6/10

Overall, this album is marred by opening and closing tracks that are weaker than the meat of it. I do think the transitions between the first three tracks might be the best in Opeth’s career – they flow back-to-back very nicely. I think I feel the same way about this album that most Opeth fans do, there are moments of brilliance (one a career best), but the album as a whole is a bit uninspired and underwhelming. With an overall rating of 7.6/10, it is so far my least favorite in the discography.
 
I've noticed that Peter has more of a shred style with more arpeggios and stuff while Mikael has a much more traditional bluesy style.
 
Forostar said:
Does anyone know who plays which solos? Is there an overview? Or a way to recognize?
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All regular album songs from all Opeth albums (excluding last 2) have been played live, apart from 2 instrumentals from Orchid, 3 instrumentals from MAYH and For Absent Friends. So you can pretty much go to YouTube and look it up there :P Not sure about the availability of songs from first 2 albums, but everything after that is easy to find.
 
I love the outro of AFJ. It's an iceberg riff, with creepy open-string ringing notes to boot. I love when they add creepy open-string notes to their riffs; it's one of the hallmarks of their style. Another example is 2:23 in Master's Apprentices. Also, my favorite part of that entire song is the brief moment when the band locks up on that same riff at 3:25.

Also, BTPISIO >>> Wreath.

Mosh said:
I've noticed that Peter has more of a shred style with more arpeggios and stuff while Mikael has a much more traditional bluesy style.
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This is accurate, but I wouldn't say Peter is shreddy. Fredrik is shreddy. Peter uses many arpeggios and odd tonalities, which is how I differentiate him from Mikael's bluesy, often legato (tapping on Ghost of Perdition, Grand Conjuration) style. Deliverance (song) is a good example of this; Peter first (~4 mins), Mikael second (~8 mins). Since Fredrik has been in the band, Mikael seems to solo far less on the heavier tracks and more on the quiet ones.

On Damnation, I think there's only 3 or 4 traditional guitar solos, and Mikael plays them all (Hope Leaves, Disease, two in Windowpane). I believe the "noise" solos (e.g. Death Whispered) are Peter's.

Oddly, Opeth is a band where I don't really notice the guitar solos. They come and go, and I may think "did I just miss a guitar solo?" But because Opeth songs whisk me away to a magical happy place with rotting trees, bleak overcast rainy skies, and ghouls, I don't notice.

Here's a video regarding solos on the Deliverance album:

 
I also gave it a 7.6 when rating the songs a couple years back.

I wouldn't call my least favorite though. I would probably give the first three albums 6/10.
 
Up to this point, I'd only consider Nectar and Karma to be worse tracks than Wreath. -Aside from the interludes-
 
I think it's better than everything from the first 3 albums except Advent, April Ethereal and Demon Of The Fall.
 
Detective Beauregard said:
This is accurate, but I wouldn't say Peter is shreddy.
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Poor word choice but i wrote it in a rush on my phone. What I meant was that Peter takes a lot of techniques that the more modern (ie. 80s/90s) guitarists used. Mikael plays guitar as if he has never listened to anyone play since 1978. And now he writes music that way too.
 
I think Deliverance is better than any post-Watershed album, and probably better than MAYH. But I liked the style on their first few albums.

Mosh said:
Poor word choice but i wrote it in a rush on my phone. What I meant was that Peter takes a lot of techniques that the more modern (ie. 80s/90s) guitarists used. Mikael plays guitar as if he has never listened to anyone play since 1978. And now he writes music that way too.
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Ha, now that I can agree with.
 
The Moor
Moonlapse Vertigo
Face Of Melinda
White Cluster
Death Whispered A Lullaby
Ending Credits
Weakness
Still Day Beneath The Sun
 
I don't know what my favorite album of all time is. My favorite Opeth album changes depending on my mood. But if I were asked the question, "What's the album of your life?" -Whatever that means-, I'd go with Damnation. Departing the usual brutal sound does no harm to the level of excellence Opeth captured with their music. I feel like Damnation captures the sense of bleakness better than any other Opeth album. Aside from the mellotron heavy wide sound that accompanies simple structures, I love the simple lyricism as well, thought provoking. If Opeth's album up to this point was "dark", Damnation is as "grey" as it gets.

1. Windowpane: What a lovely tune. Love how the rhythm section drives the song beneath those sweet guitar lines. The part after the Martin Lopez solo thingy is incredibly eerie. Then a beautifully melancholic guitar melody carrying over to a gut wrenching solo. Love the mellotrons wailing over the opening riff to get back to the last verse. This song holds a special place in my heart, due to a story that I've shared on the forum before. Mikael dedicated Damnation to his grandmother who had just passed away. Whenever I listen to this track I get occupied with feelings of losing my grandmother who raised me and I deeply care for. Now I don't know this song is specifically about his grandmother, probably not, it may be about his ex-girlfriend who committed suicide, but it is about a loved one passing. "His hand is waving a goodbye, there's no response or action returned" line stabs me right across the chest.
2. In My Time of Need: Radiohead is strong in this one, huh? The vocal play in the verses sounds like something they'd do. The chorus though. Wow. Very simple chords but the vocal melodies and the wailing mellotrons are stunning. Love the small solo in the middle. Think this one could've been a bit shorter, fade out is the right idea, but repetition goes on for a bit too long, even though it repeats a stunning part.
3. Death Whispered a Lullaby: This may be one of the lesser tracks here but it's very enjoyable nonetheless. Love Mikael's vocals. The part after the second chorus is amazing. The crying reverb guitars accompanied by a pretty heavy sounding chord progression. That part (and its comeback later on) really takes the song to another level.
4. Closure: This is the first ever song I learned to play and sing at the same time. There's a reason for that, I love it so much that I could be arsed to sit down and learn everything. The verses are cool and all, but the highlights are the two Eastern sounding parts. First one is the eerie, straight up oriental sounding guitar riff that goes on for quite a while. And the second is the absolute highlight of the album. It's full on Turkish sounding. Impossible not to dance to it. Martin Lopez even uses a Turkish percussive instrument here (Darbuka). It could go on forever for all I care.
5. Hope Leaves: After an abrupt end enters a chilling guitar lick. Beautiful vocals on this one. The arpeggio that connects the first verse to the first solo and the second chorus to the bridge is fantastic. Low frequency solos are a nice touch. Fade out is once again the right idea.
6. To Rid the Disease: The intro and verses are cool and all, but that chorus...Possibly the best Opeth chorus. "There's innocence torn from its maker, and stillborn the trust in you. This failure has made the creator, so would you tell him what to do?" After the second repeat of the chorus song feels kinda finished, can't lie. The solo begins, maybe could've been a better idea to extend the entrance of the solo and play it over the same backing track, but they change it up. And while the piano thing is cool, it just seems out of place. Only thing dragging the song down. If they went down the route I suggest, this is a perfect song without question.
7. Ending Credits: Fade in damn cool. A simple but nice chord progression which is enhanced by the bassline quite a bit, with passionate lead playing on top. Mikael, as he says it himself, goes full Andrew Latimer on this one. This truly feels like an appropriate tune for ending credits for a movie and is the more appropriate ending for the album in my opinion.
8. Weakness: A weird track. It's pretty cool but not sure it belongs here. Sounds like a bonus track that just made the cut. We know this sort of thing can happen with Opeth, because it happens on Ghost Reveries with Isolation Years.
 
I heard Jethro Tull influence on one of the Damnation tracks. I think it was To Rid the Disease. And King Crimson's Epitaph is all over this record. I played the whole thing yesterday and I don't think I've enjoyed it as much before. The last two songs are the least strong for me. The sounds in Weakness reminded my wife of Kate Bush. :) Then probably comes Lullaby. Also a vote for Beneath the Sun. Some guitar patterns in Patterns in the Ivy II appeal to me so I'm not voting for it now.
 
Windowpane - It's easy to take the proggy side of Opeth for granted since that's all they do now, but this album still does it better than anything they've done since IMO. It doesn't feel pretentious or forced, but a completely genuine musical statement. I love how there's no question of where this album is headed with the first song. Windowpane is one of those songs that manages to sum up the entire album. I love the swing feel of the 6/4 beat between the bass and drums. Gives it a melancholy vibe.

This is probably also the first song that made me pay attention to the guitar playing in Opeth. The soloing is so melodic and pleasing to the ear. As I mentioned earlier, Mikael has a very traditional style of playing. It fits the music perfectly here. Other guitarists would overdo it. The call and response sections are also very enjoyable. Very Camel-esque (there's a lot of Camel on this album). That whole bridge in general is really enjoyable.

The drum beat that follows is awesome. The following interlude is as dark and moody as anything Death Metal Opeth would do. Lots of melody and mood changes, yet it all flows together so beautifully. They've really mastered their arranging skills by this album.

And then it seamlessly goes back to the intro with some added mellotron. By the end of this song it already feels like Opeth has taken us on a journey. Awesome song and a promising start to one of Opeth's more ambitious albums.

In My Time Of Need - This song is good at maintaining the mood of the album but also does some different stuff. The staccato vocals are very unusual for Opeth but they work perfectly. It spares no time creating tension and relieving it with the chorus. They acheive all this in a couple minutes where it typically takes place over the duration of an 8+ minute song.

I've also always loved the reverb-laden guitar sound on this tune. It's a very calming sound. Also unusual for Opeth is how the guitars only really exist in this song as texture. They don't do really take the lead and are only really outlining chords. Here the bass and keyboards are really the main event. This changes during the instrumental interlude where we get some really moody harmonies. But it's still a very simple melody, the guitars are continuing to create an atmosphere.

Mikael also gives a masterful performance here. Love the buildup in the vocals and the drums during the bridge.

One of the most atmospheric Opeth tracks, great song. I agree that they overdid the fade, but it's so enjoyable to listen to that it doesn't bother me that much.

Death Whispered a Lullabye - Lyrics by Steven Wilson. The guitars are back to the forefront in this track. It feels that SW had a stronger influence on this song than just the lyrics. The timid vocals and repeating acoustic guitar figure is very reminiscent of something PT would do. The song in general kind of reminds me of The Sound of Muzak, which is from around the same time IIRC. The jazzy guitar melodies in between verses is definitely Mikael though. The jazzy rhythm section from Windowpane is also back on this tune. Love the syncopation during the verses.

The music is also starting to get a bit more aggressive here. It's at a higher tempo and we're starting to hear more distorted guitars. The guitar solo has a Radiohead quality to it. Probably the first heavy section of the album, but even then they stop themselves before it gets too heavy.

Another great track. Not quite as memorable as the previous two but still worthy of sharing album space.

Closure - This is an oddball track for the band. The opening guitar harmonies, the 12 string guitars, Mikael using an extended vocal range. Then it has an extended instrumental section before going back to the vocals. The heavy outro with the sudden ending is also very unusual. It still fits in really nicely with the rest of the album though.

Very eerie tune with the tribal drum beat and creepy sound effects. This one also has more heavy sections. Really intense buildup to the next verse song.

The next verse is more "typical" Opeth. Great eerie vocal harmonies. Then it goes back to the tribal rhythms. Awesome section. Love the experimentation with foreign instruments and rhythmic patterns.

We also reach peak heaviness on this song. It doesn't turn to Metal but it's probably the loudest part of the album. The sudden ending still catches me off guard. Good way to end the song.

Hope Leaves - I think this is Mikael's favorite Opeth song. I can see why he likes this one so much. It's a nice vocal showcase and there's a lot of really pleasant guitar work.
The reverb-laden guitars are back but this time the focus is entirely on the guitars. The vibraphone sounds is straight out of the book of Floyd.
Love how it switches gears in the middle. The cut back to the intro and guitar solo is very disjointed but in a good way.
The fadeout is good and this time doesn't overstay its welcome.

To Rid the Disease - I feel this is the underappreciated track of the album. I love the eerie guitar intro and Mikael's tepid vocal performance. Really creates an uneasiness. Great chorus. I like how the guitar pattern is doubled on piano for the second verse. Can't help but think that was a SW addition. The guitar solo is fantastic. Short and sweet.

The piano bridge totally comes out of nowhere but I think it works great. It continues the eerie vibe of the song with something new for Opeth. Love the call and response with the rhytm section. The guitar harmony to close this song is gorgeous. One of their best outros. I like how it builds up and then comes back down at the end.


Ending Credits - The Camel influence is strong here. This is such a cool tune. The nailed the end credits vibe here. IMO the next phase of Opeth is the band at their most cinematic and that really starts with this song.

I like that they keep it simple here. Very simple AABA form, simple melodies, no solo sections. Anything more complicated and it probably would've ruined the purpose of the song. One of my favorite instrumental pieces of all time. Gives the album a nice sense of finality.

Weakness - This one does feel tacked on, but I like it. It's totally uncharted territory for Opeth. Completely keyboard driven, hardly any guitar. Easily the weakest song on the album, but on an album this good it's almost an arbitrary distinction. I appreciate its uniqueness at least.
I actually think it works better as a closer than Ending Credits would. It's not uncommon for the end credits in movies to start with an instrumental piece (probably the main theme of the movie) and then follow it with a pop song that wasn't included in the movie. I think that's what they were going for here. It also leaves the listener with the same melancholy vibe that started with the album.

This album really sold me on Opeth. By the time I got to Damnation I had already heard the first few albums and BWP. I enjoyed them but I hadn't yet become a fan of the band. This album really showed me what they were capable of. As I said previously, you can tell that this was the album Mikael truly wanted to make and not Deliverance.

In contrast to the new Deliverance, the new mix is hardly noticeable here. I think SW said himself that he thought the album already sounded fine so he didn't do much with it. I agree that messing with this album would've been a bad idea. The original mix is part of what makes it work IMO. The Deliverance/Damnation project as a whole is pretty cool.

Windowpane
In My Time Of Need
Hope Leaves
To Rid the Disease
Ending Credits
Death Whispered a Lullaby
Closure
Weakness
 
I won't do song-by-song review for this album. Since I updated the game I played the studio album 3 times and the live album 3 times and the whole thing just blends together in a wonderful way. It's one of those albums that I always play in full. It's very easy to listen to since it's short and light. Whenever I'm on a long bus ride and I need to fall asleep, I play this album and I'm down before Windowpane ends. (Obviously this is me praising the album, I can't fall asleep to music I don't like :p)

Windowpane and Closure are probably most standalone songs on the album. Live version of Closure from Lamentations is a Top 10 Opeth song. It's not just that it's heavier, it's that they extend and prolong the tribal section at the end and build it up much better than on the album. I also think the live version of the album is just as good. Instruments are much clearer and Lopez's drums are much more in the spotlight.

I enjoy all the songs from this album and also the last 2 songs from the EP. However, gotta vote for something, so gonna go with the last 4 songs in the poll (Credits, Weakness, Still Day and Patterns II) which are slightly weaker (but there's not a huge gap in quality between the songs). Also, it hurts, but gonna have to vote for some Still Life songs too. Y'all are vote hungry and I can't see all these surviving till the end of the album rounds. Voting for Godhead, Moonlapse and White Cluster :( Not necessarily my least favorites, but Moonlapse and White Cluster are probably gonna be eliminated anyway :(
 
I like this album more with each listen, but it still blends together quite a bit for me.

Voting for:

In My Time of Need
Closure
Weakness (my least favorite Opeth track ever, possibly)
Still Day
Patterns II
+ White Cluster (for the same reasons as NP)
 
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