ON NEW ALBUM WATERSHED, OPETH KEEPS IT SIMPLE, ALBEIT BRUTAL, AND BANDLEADER MIKAEL ÅKERFELDT PRESENTS US WITH SOME OF THE CHEESIEST LYRICS SINCE JOURNEY

Yes, that’s right- Journey. I will give specific examples below…

I wish I could say that Opeth is still carving new territory in the symphonic progressive death metal arena, but truth be splooged, they — or more accurately, Åkerfeldt & Co., are starting to sound like a watered-down version of the band’s former self. Which, as any old-school Opeth fan might suspect, is still mostly awesome.

Yes, for a group/visionary of this musical magnitude, it will take a while before the new new Opeth is actually not worth checking out, although in this case I will admit up front that the compositions are noticeably simpler throughout, and the lyrics — well, I’ll get to the lyrics, and it ain’t gonna be pretty.

The absence of former guitar player Peter Lindgren and drummer Martin Lopez is indeed apparant on the band’s new studio offering Watershed (released TODAY in the U.S.), and yet, as to be expected, continuing bass player Martin Mendez sounds as buttery as ever. New guitar player Fredrik Åkesson (formerly of fellow Swedes Arch Enemy) fills/fits in just fine (although the overall simplifying of the compositions makes me wonder about Lindgren’s contributions to previous masterpieces), and thankfully keyboard player Per Wiberg definitely holds his own (especially in some unexpectedly groovy keyboard-driven parts), never getting too in the way.

Drummer Martin “Axe” Axenrot (who also appears on recent live recording The Roundhouse Tapes, and has been in the band since halfway through the Ghost Reveries tour) is the weak link here, performing *adequately* throughout, but this is frickin Opeth fer chrissakes! Where is the epic mastery over the trap kit? Gone are the fluid filles of Lopez’ reign and in their place are (too often) a bonehead’s dum-dum-dubba-dum…

Admittedly Axe holds his beats quite solidly, and his jazzy groove fits in, mostly. But his style overall is a little bit meathead, which is strange coming from a slight man who, with his dangerously straight blond locks looks like a teenaged female gymnast. I will take the silky-smooth percussive perfection of Martin Lopez any day of the week. What’s that guy up to these daze anyway??

However, my hateful musings are hardly to say that the new Opeth album is not without strong merits on most of the tracks. The best of the more straightforward tunes in this collection carry a great deal of weight largely due to their focus — here, Åkerfeldt sustains longer sections that stick to a more cohesive musical theme from beginning to end of a song, as opposed to exploring all the way through the melodic lexicon in a given piece, which admittedly worked wonders on Still Life and Blackwater Pork but fell somewhat short on quite a bit of Ghost Reveries. And so in a way, Watershed‘s “simplicity” (including the appropriately repeated sections) kinda works…but jeez louise, the freakin lyrics — at least the majority of the cleanly sung (i.e., intelligible) ones — are a bloody joke!

Let’s discuss in super-sexy detail…

The album opens with a pretty-enough folk intro entitled “Coil”; acoustic guitars/bass/synthy strings/round robin male/female vocals retain a sense of optimism despite the overly melodramatic tone of the lyrics:

“She told me why…
She told me life [lies?] always take care of this…
I told her how I’ve always stayed…
Always waited [waiting?]…for nothing.”

I would like to start my examination of the lyrics on Watershed by promptly calling bullshit on this first stanza; “waiting for nothing“? Seriously, give me a break — that is a greater load of circular heady horseplop than when I tried to sneak in a reference to some world superpower’s failure as a “lack of success” on a 10th grade history class paper and my teacher (anonymously) read it out loud as an example of what not to do.

Next stanza:
“When I get out of here…
When I leave you behind….
I found that the years passed us by…
And I can see you, running through the fields of sorrow…”

Pretty, terse and melodramatic, which is indeed a running theme throughout this album’s tracks (or at least the ideas behind the majority of the lyrics).

Never mind that Akerfelt’s tense changes halfway through this stanza (I get, I leave, I found) — or is it simply the fault of his Scandanavian pronunciation which seemingly employs both a long ‘i’ sound and a past-tense ‘ow’, one after the other? In any case, the picture these words paint (especially when they are echoed by a wistful woman using proper tenseage, mind you) sound more like an introductary flashback to Les Mis Part Deux (rumored to be staged in ’09 by fledgling dramaturgeologist Fred Durst), but despite all musical accolades due, Akerfelt is no Jean freakin Valjean, and furthermore…where’s the fuckin brutality??

Oh there it is, on track numero dos! After a too-lengthy single-chord heavy start, “Heir Apparant” eventually busts into some seriously deep growling syncopated riffage, and the tune keeps its brutal groove going through a handful of different tempos/moods — even during a brief yet lyrical flute (i.e., synth) into acoustic guitar interlude, there is a strong sense that a firestorm is a brewin…and aside from the overly simplistic ‘chorus’ this track never stops delivering. And the surely prizewinning lyrics on this one are disguised by the unintelligible growl, so it’s got that goin for it too!

The same encouragement can certainly also be employed towards the next track, “The Lotus Eater”, which is pretty much the most ‘progressive’ of the bunch, but that never gets in the way of this badass, thunderous song. The uptempo clean singing/heavy growling back-and-forth verse is fucking fierce, and the organ-heavy funk bridge is groovy as all hell…maybe the new Opeth has a future on the jamband circuit (aka the white man’s funk world)?

Thankfully the music on “The Lotus Eater” amply overshadows the lyrics, but here’s a gem buried within:

“You are stuck in a beautiful future
Changing and waiting and seeking the truth of it all.
Fleeting in sorrow
Pushing your spirit away,
Seeking the weakness of dislike,
Whispered from the heart.
To be, we’re all in the mourning,
To despair…”

Blah blah friggity BLAH.

Unfortunately the lagging, meandering (and aptly titled) “Burden” is a major piece of maudlin dead weight (thankfully the only true clunker on Watershed), and its centerpiece placement makes the middle of the album feel like it’s quickly sinking. However it does have a wicked Hammond-esque keyboard solo about halfway through (and some solid, if not rambling, guitar work), so listen up for that diamond in this rough one.

Despite its deliberate midtempo crawl, the anthemic “Porcelain Heart” brings the album back on track, even though it really only contains two main parts. However, the bridge rocks one of the strongest and hardest riffs on Watershed. But again the lyrics kinda make a player wanna hurl:

“I, lost all I had (one April day),
I, turned to my friends (nothing to see),
I, wrote down a name (and read it twice),
I, wallow in shame.
I, said that I love (eternal skies),
I, cling to my past (like childish dreams)
I, promised to stay (and dwell my grief)
I, went far away…”

Or is it simply the whiny melodrama of the vocal delivery of said lyrics that irks me so?

The album drags a touch once more with “Hessian Peel”, which has a rather slow verse that ultimately proves to be among the most melodic on the album. But again (and perhaps the most on the whole album) the lyrics make me wanna take out a contract on Akerfelt’s need to create something ‘profound’:

“Will the children cry
When their mother dies
And in the Autumn of their lives
Will they feel the same?”

Come on — really? This sounds like an excerpt from a poem written by a poor 14 year-old girl hiding from the Cossacks in a dilapidated basement. Drama!

“Hex Omega” is a rather strong finish to Watershed, with probably the most solid and gratifying riffage on the album, as well as a few well-apportioned varying moods throughout the track. And in this case the lyrics actually had me pretty intrigued as to their meaning:

“Two years
In your heart
One moment of doubt
Two lives
Torn apart
One second from now”

Wait a second — is this a break-up song (album)? Hmmm…

And it is important to mention as well that this is actually the very first Opeth album to be produced entirely by Åkerfeldt himself, which, as could be expected, yields mixed results. No doubt Åkerfeldt has had a major hand in the decisions on each of the band’s albums thus far, but it is clear here that he is experimenting with a neophyte producer’s zeal and open mind, which is awesome when it hits and disappointing when it’s too extreme or seemingly unpurposeful (the extra-hard panning/fading of certain instruments, as well as a guitar de-tuning mid-progression definitely left this listener wondering).

The best thing about Watershed is that similar to every Opeth album thus far (save the single-toned “chill” album Damnation), this is a work that continues to reveal new sides of itself upon multiple listens: I definitely liked it the first time through (which is more than I can say for other recent, highly-anticipated albums — at least by me), despite finding it pretty easy to navigate through/wrap my head around (when I would have preferred a bit more density/complexity from an Opeth record)… And yet, since, I have found myself defending and re-defending the album to…myself? Because I know somethin ain’t entirely right here.

For my money, more than half of Watershed is pretty awesome, but the remaining snooze-a-thons continue to confirm the sad truth that we already knew: the Opeth of yesteryear — the band of ‘no they didnt’ superhero-dom — is on its way OUT.

(three out of five hornz)

-KW