Metal bands seem to get better with age. There are, of course, exceptions, but as a whole it seems metal grows old disgracefully much better than any other genre of music. Facts are facts…
So it is with Swedish progressive titans Opeth who stand on the cusp of releasing their 14th studio album The Last Will And Testament on October 11.
Three decades in the masters of metal have - according to those in the know - recorded one of their darkest and heaviest albums ever as well as being the most fearlessly progressive. It is also the first out-and-out concept album of their career, recounting the reading of one recently deceased man’s will to an audience of his surviving family members. Sonically, The Last Will And Testament is an all-inclusive and in depth journey brimming with haunting melodrama, shocking revelations and riveting composition set in the 1920s when the world was engulfed in war and inner turmoil. It is a sonic masterpiece of epic story telling and claustrophobic musical landscapes that takes you deep into the twisted imaginings of songwriter/ frontman Mikael Åkerfeldt and peels back even more layers of what makes Opeth tick as a band.
HEAVY caught up with guitarist Fredrik Akesson to find out more.
"It's exciting times to see how the album's gonna be received," he smiled. "We do a lot of interviews right now and so far it seems like people really dig it. Of course, we have released two tracks, Paragraph 1 and Paragraph 3 and the reception is quite overwhelming, which makes us happy. The first criteria is we do an album that we feel 100% happy with, and in this case we do."
We ask him to dive deeper into The Last Will And Testament musically.
"It kind of resembles the old Opeth and the more proggier Opeth," he measured, "in a more restless, compressed direction and also a step forward. The songs are slightly shorter, but they have more ingredients than ever. A little bit like modern day society, even though the theme of the album takes place in the 1920s, which is apparently quite some time ago (laughs). If you listen to Blackwater Park, certain sections are dwelled upon quite long, and that's different with this album. There's quite a lot of action, it's an action packed album. In a historical way, there is a big pod of the Opeth sound. You have the yin and yang thing, you have the really heavy section, and then you have something more melancholy like a big, beautiful ish type of forresty sounds."
In the full interview, Fredrik described the album as a mix of old and newer styles, with shorter songs but more ingredients. He also mentioned that the album is darker and heavier than previous ones, but also beautiful at times. He explained that the album's direction was not pre-planned, but rather developed as they worked on it.
Fredrik explained that the concept idea was present from the beginning of the writing process, but the story was crystallized a few weeks before they went into the studio. He emphasized that this album had more depth and thought put into it compared to their previous concept albums. HEAVY praised the use of atmospherics and moods in the album, and asked about the difficulty of creating emotions through music.
Fredrik also explained that frontman Mikael Åkerfeldt brought back his death metal growls for the new album, a side of Opeth's music that makes a welcome return plus more.