Huge fan of Opeth. The thing about harsh vocals is that they're kind of like vocal effects. They're designed to be a part of the texture of the music, and they often represent very strong emotions (particularly pain, anger, frustration, depression, etc.) Its definitely something that can take time to be comfortable with, but honestly I'd personally say the same about autotune and other vocal effects like that.
You're wrong, a vocal effect is something that enrich the voice, something like a reverb or a chorus. Growling vocals is another technique, and it need a lor of practice to use it without hurt your throath
@@nicchioss You need to re-read what I said. I said it is like, or similar to, an effect, in the sense that they provide a different aural texture than clean vocals do. Before you accuse someone of being wrong, make sure you actually understood what they said.
@@Celatra In hindsight maybe thats true, but back then people definitely called Opeth prog death as opposed to prog metal bands like dream theater or symphony X. I guess Opeth were one of the first to incorporate the death metal vocals in their prog mix, and thats why people called them death metal back then. Nowadays bands like Leprous, Haken, Wilderun, Dissilusion etc are all called prog metal even while having the death vocals.
@@metalmanny666 i actually saw between the buried and me and opeth at the same show. btbam was like motorhead for me. it just gave me a headache and i couldn't wait for their set to be done.
Check out Tech N9ne when you get a chance.. He's got a track with NF but if you really dig through his cateologe (6's & 7's or K.O.D. to start) you'll see what crazy lyricism really is. He does these multi syllablic rhyme schemes over an entire verse with some songs with crazy duality in the meanings. He even uses alliteration like V for Vendetta style. Oh, he's got features with Serg from S.O.A.D. and Slipknot too. (and Eminem and Tupac) Tech N9ne's label features artist that are a really fun rabit hole too. ¡Mayday! is so good that it'll make you mad they're not more popular. If you like really cool videos, the best rapper under 25 who makes really creative videos is Token.
Rarely anyone not a hardcore metal listener gets into the growls at first. But the music keeps having them coming back and eventually they not only grow accustomed to it, they start to really enjoy it. Happened to me, I wasn’t a fan of growls (and am still particular to only a few bands) but I’ve grown to appreciate it. It takes time though. I think this is a great song to show their sound and tendencies.
For anyone wondering or paid attention to the comments in the stream chat. Opeth were originally a Progressive Death Metal Band that eventually morphed into a Progressive Rock Band. They've always thrown in some rock ballads some Progressive some not, their first album foray was Damnation. Heritage is when they started no longer playing Heavy Metal and instead Progressive Rock.
Opeth, especially the Blackwater Park record, is an experience. Looking at each song in the context of the perception of a normal song isn't the best way to do that(not saying you did that). The Drapery Falls for example, when I close my eyes and just listen, makes me feel like so many different things and creates so many different images in my mind. And I could see from the first 3 or so mins, you were on that path into it also, which is why you get my like. Many people see the length of the song and quit. Others hear the genre and quit. But whether its something you latch onto immediately or whether it grows on you over time like with me, its an experience worth having. And the rest of the album is the same. One of the greatest pieces of music in Progressive Death Metal/Metal ever. Also, the vocals are very harsh which is very likely to alienate a lot of people as they even did for me. But once you start seeing them as another instrument in the song, they almost start to fade into the rest of the music and I stop noticing them as vocals. Its such a strange feeling. Great reaction!
Anthony, once you opened Opeth door is a point of no return. The entire library of Opeth is a long pleasant Journey. Give it a try to more Opeth songs. You'll see. Next Suggenstion: The Grand Conjugation.
Steven Wilson of Porcupine Tree produced this album. Highly recommend checking them out if you havent already. Anesthetize is an absolute journey of a song.
My favorite band and one of their best albums. Another great selection of music to react to. Some of their later works are a bit more subdued. Porcelain Heart is a good song for Opeth newbies. Let the Opeth rabbit hole begin!
When they released Ghost Reveries in 2006, music critics said they were the most talented band of any genre. Music critics hate this style of music, so it says something.
Nice reaction, but also entertaining is watching the chat say wacky things like, "Opeth is the Black metal of Tool". Then another person say "Opeth start out as black metal I think, and then evolved into more prog metal. Don't quote me"
Yeah the only change in their style (up to and including watershed) is how much Death Metal was in their prog... with it being incorporated less and less until it was gone altogether.
Yep. However, they have made 2 songs that I would consider to be black metal, "Into the frost of winter" and "Eternal soul torture". This is definitely not enough to classify them as black metal though.
They were black metal until Still Life. There’s not a single death metal riff on Orchid/Morningrise, not to mention the song structures, vocals and melodies are nothing like prog death. MAYH is still mostly prog black metal too. Black metal influences still lingered in Opeth’s music even after MAYH. Dirge For November is just a black metal song. Songs like The Drapery falls, Wreath or The Moor have very black metal parts too. That’s all not even mentioning their demos before Orchid. You can probably count Opeth songs that are actually progressive death metal with your fingers. Most just have vaguely death metal parts at most.
The middle sections where Anthony said "polyrhythms" was actually an accident. When they were doing the playback in the studio the tapes played back off time, they thought it was cool and figured out how to play it live.
It's been a while. A lot of people are recommending Opeth songs with harsh vocals, which is a lot of their catalogue. But I recommend some songs like Faith in Others, Burden and Windowpane. Which are a lot softer but still show their brilliant and unique song writing, chord choices and Akerfeldt's incredible vocal performances.
If we're comparing the song to a proverbial juicy burger that has been seasoned nicely, it has swiss/Havarti cheese with caramelized onions and bacon in addition to an aeoli sauce on a sourdough bun. The additional clean vocals are from the producer of the blackwater park album, Steven Wilson from Porcupine tree
Watershed (released 2008) was their last album that features the death metal growls, any albums afterwards only has clean vocals. So if you liked the clean progressive stuff, the newer material might be more up your alley, although every album has clean vocal gems. You could try To bid you farewell, In my time of need, Burden or Hope leaves of songs without the gutturals.
Completely by coincidence I am wearing my Opeth Blackwater Park TShirt. Needless to say I’m a huge fan and this is probably my favourite Opeth album 👍👍👍
They have a wide range and there are still certain albums you can enjoy without the growling. But I think for a good entry, to get a little better picture of their repertoire, I recommend "Ghost of Perdition" (Live at Redrock Amphiteater) and "Reverie/Harlequinn Forest" (live at Royal Albert Hall).
Red Rocks is one of the worst vocal performances I've ever heard from Opeth. His voice is done by this stage, he can't growl anymore. It sounds awful in comparison to say the Round House tapes for example.
I think Mikhail Ackerfeld "the lonely Swede" has one of the most beautiful voices ever. Just listen to the entire Damnation album. Dark, mellow and pristinely beautiful.
My first reaction seeing this on my RU-vid front page: "WTF, YES!!" Some songs to follow up from this (more progressive metal): - Opeth - Soldier of Fortune (a Deep Purple cover) - Katatonia - Lacquer - Katatonia - Atrium - Grim Salvo - Heart of Darkness (it's featuring a rapper named Sect Unit, he just isn't credited on the video title) Oh, and just btw: the singer of Opeth, Mikael Åkerfield, is friends with the guys from Katatonia, he's featured in some of their tracks back in the late 90s (when Katatonia's own singer, Jonas Renkse, had problems with his voice). Katatonia is my favorite band, ever. Katatonia used to have scream vocals for the first two albums, and they were pretty influential in the formation of the death/doom subgenre, but Jonas had a slightly wrong technique with his screaming and he almost lost his voice completely, then Mikael covered for a bit while they transitioned to completely clean vocals (=no scream) which they've been doing for the past ~20 years. Ps. Pretty much any metal song that's polyrhythmic and/or doesn't follow the regular rock song structure (A-chorus-B-chorus-C-chorus), is considered progressive metal.
Opeth have songs in many different genres both with and without harsh vocals. All great though! Generally speaking older stuff harsh vocals, newer stuff clean vocals only. Really hope you check out a few songs from different albums. Harsh vocals takes some time to get into.
Opeth has never been a black metal band. As they are progressive, they have incorporated different musical styles, including folky melodies and even black metal-ish themes and soundscapes. But they don't have a single released Black Metal song. This is the 1st song of their 1st album: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-msYuFVnhKMg.html --Not BM This is Black Metal: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-SBwu83RR6ZU.html
You wouldn't guess by the album title, but Damnation is probably one of their softest and more melodic albums. Great rainy day music. No screaming and no heavy music, just the chill music they start and end this song with.
I'd consider Opeth Melodic Death Metal rather than Black. Their sound varies through their collection from more base Death to Progressive Metal with a lot of influence infusion in all their work. Hope you dig into more of these guys. They do not disappoint.
Should check out some underoath! I grew up listening to that band along with enter shikari flyleaf I could go on and on. But anywho! This band is fire! I haven’t heard any of there music in a little bit!
The comments are killing me 😁 They were never black metal. More straightforward death metal early on and slowly incorporating more and more progressive elements (which they always had to some degree). But that’s OK, there’s no reason everyone should know all the metal subgenres. Cool to hear people checking out Opeth, especially one of their earlier albums. All great stuff. Cheers!
Careful. Black Water Park was my first Opeth album, I didn't like the growling to start with, but I loved the atmosphere and musicality. Then I really started to love the growls. Jinjer are another band that offset the heavy with the beauty very well. The musicianship of both bands is absolute s-tier.
Opeth are Progressive Death Metal.... Mikael was asked how would define Opeth and he said it himself "Progressive Death Metal." Well they used to be. Now they're Jethro Tull 2.0 Opeth's few first albums had hints of Black Metal, but no where near what Black Metal was considered at that time. But From Orchid to Watershed they were the greatest band on Earth. Thanks or this song
Opeth is one of my favourite bands of all time. They come from Death Metal, then shifted style included more and more elements from other genres. Sometimes you even notice Jazz element - not kidding here. The cool thing about it was the techical very clean growling parts with very complex sounds switching with clean vocals. This band was inspirating other amazing bands that evolved like for example Jinjer which could be worth looking into aswell. Try out Jinjer - Pisces for a fair and not too long first track to experience, try Teacher, Teacher if you wanna see screams, growls, very beautiful clean singing and even hip-hop styles combined in one song. Opeth these days skip the growing part which is one of the bad results for ppl that liked the switches when a progressive metal band like opeth evolves and switches their style when time passes but on the other hand i still prefer bands that can change their style rather than reproducing the same shit over decades
Later Opeth albums walked away from growl vocals. For other swedish prog metal bands with a somber sound, and generally more clean vocals, try Katatonia.
Ironic that you called the song a juicy hamburger because you start off with the bun intro, then go down to the lettuce, and pickles, onions, cheese, etc: the clean stuff. Then you get to the THIIIICK Screaming patty. Get one more layer of cheese, then the bottom bun is the intro riff as the closing outro.
it's surely melodic and surely death (and more!), but usually when you refer to "melodic death" you refer to the Göteborg sound (at the gates, in flames, dark tranquillity were the first exponents) that took a very defined identity and is widely popular and appreciated to this days, but it's become pretty much different than the rest of death metal. The rest of death metal can be very melodic, though, it's just that historic classification might be a bit misleading. I agree who wrote in the comments that opeth had slight blackened elements at the beginning and moved to prog rock later, but has mostly been rooted in progressive and death metal for most of their career. They've been so influential that to this day people refer to opeth sound and opeth vibes to describe others' work.
It’s very funny seeing all of the comments on the stream saying black metal or rock. Opeth started as Melodic death metal with some progressive tendencies and then fully embraced progressive death metal on the album Still Life. Opeth was never a black metal band but they have a lot of black metal influences, especially since they are from Sweden. Nowadays, they are releasing prog rock albums, which are amazing but not as good as their earlier albums imo.
Awesome reaction, this whole album is a masterpiece, it's more progressive death metal than black metal, but their first three albums were a lot more of a black metal style.
Opeth is NOT Black metal. They did have some hints of black metal on their very first album "Orchid" but more in the keyboard melodies. Opeth is mainly a progressive melodic Death Metal, and with their most recent albums just progressive rock.
opeth is my favorite band! the drapery falls is one of my least favorite opeth songs, and easily my least favorite song on blackwater park, but it would still be the best song in a lot of bands catalogs.
Always funny to see how people react to harsh vocals, especially Mikael's growls. No one ever seems to LIKE it on their first listen, but all it takes is exposure. Just a different way of singing to me. Chat didn't seem too knowledgeable about them. They started as death metal with elements of black metal, and gradually turned into a progressive death metal band during their "prime" years. They dropped the metal in 2011 and their last 4 albums have been pure progressive rock with no harsh vocals.
DO NOT listen to people with that "Black Metal" bullshit! Opeth are a Progressive Metal band. I do not think that if you do the "growl" that makes you so-called Black Metal. Stay away from the stupidity. And do not use the names Tenacious D or Slipknot in the same paragraph with Opeth. Opeth is on another level. I like what you do and I'm going to recommend a couple of things for you to check out : LOVEBITES..."Inspire"...Live from Abyss(Live in studio concert)..2021 BAND-MAID..."Hate"...Official Live video..2024
Oh my god you guys really compared opeth and tenacious D....and I love Jack Black...but I want to die now....please, God (mikael), forgive them, cause they don't know what they're talking about...
Opeth is one of the originators of Black Metal. They are from Sweden. I would say they are more like straight up Progressive Metal these days, but it’s been a long transition from the mostly harsh vocals to what they are today. Interesting fact: they released their most recent album in both English and Swedish. I honestly prefer the Swedish lyrics as to me it flows with the sounds in a way the English doesn’t.
They aren't anywhere near originators of Black Metal: Bands like Bathory and for 2nd wave Darkthrone and Mayhem are originators. Opeth had a melodic black metal influence on their first and 2nd albums Orchid and Morningrise, but they cannot be considered black metal pioneers or originators especially since their first album was 3 years after Darkthrones A Blaze in the Northern Sky and a decade after Bathory first did Black metal.
lol where do you make up something like this? They've only been Progressive Death Metal until 2011. Even their first albums musically is death metal, death metal vocals. Song structure or content not really black metal related.
