The intro kinda gives me dream theater vibes. Overall, songs pretty good, though I'm not the biggest Opeth fan.

im feeling it boys

I don't find anything enjoyable in this, sadly. But that's the case for their last 2-3 albums so I'm not disappointed rly

Another nice one! Curious for the entire album, some super sweet vocal stuff here, nice Mendezzing as well.

I thought Opeth was metal, I guess I was wrong

Demon of the Fall, guess you fell asleep for like 10+ years?

seeming to shape up as a solid blend of oldpeth and newpeth

I'm digging this. There are some very Blackwater Park riffs littered throughout here and as a whole the track is very solid. A bit Ghost Reveries in the organs and atmosphere too. Sounds like a good blend of everything BWP and beyond.

"Demon of the Fall, guess you fell asleep for like 10+ years?"

kids these days don't know sputlore, sigh

Were they ever metal tho

Not feeling this unfortunately. Sounds like a regression just from S1. Standard new opeth track. Glad people are still digging this band, but they are very hit and miss for me these days.

@noxor https://www.sputnikmusic.com/review/42483/Opeth-Damnation/

I really like the interplay with the orchestral parts but damn, this would have benefited so much from the death metal vocals. The contrast between the vocals and the symphonic prog was what gave the first part its intrigue.

Havent listened yet. I feel everything will fall into place with this record when we have the full thing. As individual songs it may not work as well as a complete album

oh okay, this § symbol stands for "Paragraph"..

Yep, every song aside from the closer is a different paragraph of the Will

1:54 would have hit nicely with some Grrrrrrrrrrrrrs

For anyone who doesn't realize, Demon's comment is pasta from Dethrasher's last review lmao.

I dig this though. Loving the darker atmosphere tbh.

"I thought Opeth was metal, I guess I was wrong"

metal will always stand tall m/ m/

Yea, my final legacy to the piece-of-shit site.

Positives
+ The guitar solos, the only thing that provides a little bit or variation in this godforsaken album.

Negatives
- Utterly repetitive and dope-like music
- Completely unorignial music
- Even the Idol jury would deny Akerfeldt for his weak vocals
- People who suffers from sleep disorders, here is your cure. You will fall asleep as soon as you listen to the first track. ZZZZZZzzzzzzz

' People who suffers from sleep disorders, here is your cure. You will fall asleep as soon as you listen to the first track.'

already got ghost reveries and sorceress for that tbh

song is OKAY

So how do I pronounce the song title?

You pronounce it as "§3"

Shabby

Of the two songs, I really like both. I've great expectations about this new album. But, this happens always with an Opeth new work.

Love the album concept but both songs have fallen a bit flat for me although I’ve only listened to both a couple of times.

I originally thought it was "Section 1", "Section 3", but then I heard someone from the band call it "paragraph", so ig they know what they're talking about

Good song. Glad they're not overusing the growls

Enjoyed this but I haven't really been paying attention to Opeth since Ghost Reveries.

The section at the 3:45 mark and onwards has a real Drag Ropes vibe.

Definitely

liked the new one, got a feeling this new album is going to be similar to Pale Communion but with growls and better

I wouldn't expect them to completely toss away what they've been doing for the past 10+ years and forcefully growl on every song, so this isn't a surprise. Great track.

Pretty good track on first impression, but I probably won't listen to it again until the whole thing is out. Opeth always plays better as a full album

Their newer stuff took longer to grow on me than anything else I've ever listened to. I have spent the bulk of the last ten years totally uninterested in any of their post-Watershed material; I listened so many times but it never stuck with me for more than a song or two. This summer I got totally hooked on the latest four albums and listened to them all on repeat for a couple weeks. Pale Communion has such well-crafted songs, Sorceress has unique and crunchy psych-blues sound, In Cauda Venenum has some of their best melodic work. Heritage is the hard one for me; it is so amorphous and strange. I have listened to it so many times and can barely remember what a single song sounds like... normally this is a terrible quality for an album to have, but I also find the album to be really great sounding and enjoyable to listen to despite this quality, making it their most enigmatic album for me, which is certainly not a bad thing.

Can't wait to see what they're bringing this time around. The growls being back is wonderful, but I would have still been into another clean prog album, so I don't mind that they aren't on this track.

I will never understand the '(band/song/album) always sounds better as a full album' argument. Don't most people put music on shuffle? Songs should be able to stand on their own, or you're simply not listening to the music. The quality of a song shouldn't depend on the album's structure. A strong song should stand on its own, whether it's played in sequence or on shuffle. The album might enhance the context or flow, but every track should be able to hold its own merit independently

Jesus

§1 was ok but didn't really grab me overall, and I feel similarly with this one but I like a little better. At least they're pushing themselves and being weird. Hoping there're some nice quieter moments on the new one. §3 has some Ghost Reveries and Watershed elements around the 3 minute mark which is nice.

"I will never understand the '(band/song/album) always sounds better as a full album' argument. Don't most people put music on shuffle?"
I almost never suffle or use playlists tbh

At least they're pushing themselves and being weird.

word, feeling the weird in both tracks, pretty excited for the album

Sorceress was fine, ICV I skipped (although I enjoy Width of a Circle), but these past two singles have been unexciting.

Yeah, I'm not digging this one as much as the first track.

First track was pretty good, this is just more of the same polyrhythmic noodling which I really hate in this band, it makes the tracks sound the same.

^ I've never once associated Opeth with polyrhythmic noodling, lol

Especially compared to a lot of other prog metal bands

"I will never understand the '(band/song/album) always sounds better as a full album' argument. Don't most people put music on shuffle?"

For the first 25 or so years of my life I lived this way but honestly after awhile it felt like I was always skipping to the next song looking for the next high lol.

I started playing albums front to back and I feel like it's allowed me to enjoy music so much more for whatever reason.

First time listening to an album: Front to back
If im out and about and roaming ill have a playlist of stuff from like 2024 on shuffle. So if a song comes up i havent heard yet and really dig i go listen to the album when i have time to focus

but every track should be able to hold its own merit independently

yeah but album structure is also important to the flow and affects how it's consumed. for ex Ghost Reveries' concept album structure was abandoned because the narrative made the tracks flow weirdly; it's much more nicely organized now.

midpeth

moarpeth

"I will never understand the '(band/song/album) always sounds better as a full album' argument. Don't most people put music on shuffle?"

unless I'm listening to a playlist, which i very rarely do, no.

Sounds pretty nice, hyped for the full album for sure

I have playlists for when I'm in the car with friends. otherwise I pick an album and roll with it. maybe that's my happy place because I grew up with CDs, or maybe it's because I love albums with a story (or at least a unifying concept/theme).

Man, if you only or mostly listen to shuffle playlists and not entire albums, you're gonna miss out on all time transitions like Flaming Telepaths into Astronomy, that sounds like a sad life for a music fan

i listen to albums in their entirety 95% of the time

There's a lot of ways the "albums should be listened to in full!" thing can come across as snobby and pretentious (and yeah I recognize the irony of saying this with my Steven Wilson username, lol) but that has always been my preferred way of listening to most stuff. A lot of Prog albums seem built that way, full of transitions, medleys, story-based songs, etc., but even in other genres, listening in the right sequence can be a really great conduit for the hidden layers and dynamics of a band or a song to really flow out. It's not even all that uncommon for me to dislike a new single by a band, but then to warm up to it when I hear its surrounding contexts in the full album. Like maybe it does sound really good to hear a breezy pop song between, say, a big epic track and a really heavy banger or something.

There are definitely many songs that sound just fine on their own, and there are plenty of great albums that have more of a "collection of songs" feeling than a whole work. And that's totally fine. Opeth is all about contrasts and dynamics, mood and atmosphere. These qualities stand out more when you hear the whole thing in sequence. So listening to the single, it just feels like I'm not really seeing all that much. Not to mention, almost all of the songs on this album are called stuff like "Paragraph 2" "Paragraph 5" etc. Kind of obvious they are written in such a way that they gain relevance when put together.

True. This is also a concept album which is meant to be taken in as a whole, at least I'd wager that is the intention of the artist. However, the average listener (and i'm not talking about all of us music nerds on Sputnik) seems to prefer to listen to individual tracks. There is a reason why releasing Singles has grown in popularity over recent years. The average listener consumes music differently in modern times.

Yep, no question about that. I know like two or three people in real life who have a similar way of listening to music as me. I know dozens, though, that listen to just singles and playlists and such, and I still end up having pretty strong overlap in taste with most of those people.

Shorter albums have become more common due to this effect too, and I actually really like it in many respects. I think 25-30 mins of really refined, solid material hits a lot better this day and age than a big bloated concept album. However, there was a time when I probably would have felt cheated paying for a CD that's only 25 mins long and would have insisted it's an EP and not a LP, regardless of the quality of what was on the disc.

Imma skip this one and wait for the full album

just skip the album tbh

Finally checked this out today, and it's pretty good. Not as strong as the first single imo, and it definitely brings out a more technical prog sound akin to Charlatan off the last album. Enjoying Mikael's vocal work a lot though, and I've noticed that he's been pushing his range quite a bit on both of these new singles

Everyone here has really interesting takes worth considering. I wonder how people are going to rank this in the Opeth discography.

Woah didnt mean to cause such a big discussion.

You're all (music) nerds, and I respect it.

But no matter how you slice it, you're still listening to individual tracks, even if it’s in the context of an album. That’s what it boils down to—end of story

Got em

I play numerous songs simultaneously, on different sources, to obtain that advanced listening experience

me too, overhead headphones over in-ear buds is the way to go

Dude, I'm so prog that I listen to concept albums on SHUFFLE

Starting The Wall with The Trial makes it more narratively engaging.

i thought they brought back the growls. where the growls being at, my dudes

they did on the first song !!!!!!!

please refer to §first song

While not as heavy as the first single there's definitely a move back towards prog metal than the 70s prog rock worship of the last decade or so. New drummer has a lot to do with that, he also joined Paradise Lost just as they returned to their death-doom sound.

Hate to burst your bubble, but I'm pretty sure Mikael does as Mikael wants pretty much for the entirety of Opeth's existence, and I highly doubt that changed drastically with their 14th LP. Also, PL are pretty tight with the songwriting process, basically Greg and Nick do everything, and he joined at a point when they'd already released TPW. Don't get me wrong, I love the guy, but I highly doubt he had anything to do with any of the bands' relative change in sound

maybe he's really convincing !

I don't think he meant he had input in songwriting per se, as much as his style of drumming is more "metal" than Axenrot's. but yea guys I don't hear much metal here, this is still the same prog wankery that's been going on for some time

I mean Axenrot plays in fucking Bloodbath, pretty sure he was metal enough lol

haha I know, but I feel like with Opeth he was more into jazzy/proggy style of playing, unlike the new guy

Yep, he definitely fit this period of the band like a glove, really think he was fantastic overall even though I'm not a particular fan of newpeth at all

Walt sounds a bit like he's emulating Lopez which is pretty cool ig

doublepost :

"I will never understand the '(band/song/album) always sounds better as a full album' argument. Don't most people put music on shuffle"

is this bait? lol

if it's not then I think you may be lost. I mean this place has that crusty weathered 'retro' aura permeating from every crevice and the prog threads are crustier than most

tl;dr / serious response - a lot of us (not all!) are old(ish) and remember physical being the dominant format / are still staunchly in favour of playing albums in full, even if the way we digest them has changed somewhat over the years

>I will never understand the '(band/song/album) always sounds better as a full album' argument. Don't most people put music on shuffle? Songs should be able to stand on their own, or you're simply not listening to the music.

rage bait more obvious than those stupid facebook "cooking" videos

I love Opeth 1999 - 2007 - I believe the intrigue is the death metal - Could this be a bait and switch from the band? This music is boring without it IMO. And I've tried so hard to enjoy the newer albums. I just can't seem to find them very interesting at all even though I know that the music they create is super complex and good.

FWIW Mikael has said in an interview that the new drummer influenced the return of metal elements to the new album.

People are dumb. Opeth can, and should make whatever type of music they want. Branch out, everyone. Don’t be so boring and predictable. It’s sad and pathetic.

I agree. Those who dislike their music must check Other bands.

And there it is, I knew this sad sack of band would come back down to earth.

Even trying to bring back the growls in the last song released is so damn forced.

As I said 10 years ago, just retire the name of Opeth and call this "Dudes trying to play 70s prog rock"

wiz their last album was good tho

funny you found it forced, I found it fit the track perfectly. the band definitely isn't in their 70s prog cover band phase anymore though, this is something different

apparently once a band starts playing a style of music you don't like, they should start over under a different name

regardless, it's not like Mikael woke up one morning and decided to pay homage to 70s prog, that part of their sound has always been there, sometimes very blatantly

Parts of Orchid was written for lute.

I agree with you Demon. The 70's prog sound has always been there in different ways. If we check their first records and we can see that perfectly well.

while the elements were always there, they never leaned into em as much as they did on their last 3 records though. almost to the point of blocking out their other influences which I found rather regressive for a band that's trying to be progressive - damn ban me right now for that

The band always was progressive. There are many ways to be a prog band. One of the most evident is the band is progressing, evolving their style all over the years.

" lot of us (not all!) are old(ish) and remember physical being the dominant format"

Or, like me, your access to digital media was severly limited so buying and smuggling cds was one of the few ways I could consume music as a teenager

apparently once a band starts playing a style of music you don't like, they should start over under a different name

Never I didn't like the styles of music they play.

regardless, it's not like Mikael woke up one morning and decided to pay homage to 70s prog, that part of their sound has always been there, sometimes very blatantly

True but why ruin a perfectly good union and turn your back on one sound, favouring the other?

bc he got booored of it and wanted to be a proper dad nerd rocker

Mikael apparently wrote an entire album n the prog death style after Watershed, but the others in the band could tell the songwriting was becoming forced cos he'd grown tired of it and encouraged him to write what he wanted to write instead. It'd just be selling out your musical integrity to stick to a style you no longer want to play just because that's what people demand you play. Plus the musical quality would have suffered. If the others in the band could tell it was becoming forced then other people would have too as it would have eventually devolved into Opeth-by-numbers.

they absolutely needed to switch up after Watershed, Heritage was lovely record, everything following it is pretty much buttprog wankery

calling post watershed opeth buttprog while hardstanning ghost reveries is hypocrisy at its peak

perhaps our definitions of buttprog don't align

I think people just like to say buttprog.

guilty as charged

whats buttprog

not much, whats prog with you 😂🤣

lol