Opeth
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We’re a good four months removed from Opeth’s newest effort Watershed and if early indications are to be believed, the band has another career milestone on its hands. Brooding, with some new twists and turns around every corner (see: new drummer Martin Axenrot’s blasting on “The Lotus Eaters” or the unsettling de-tuning at the end of “Burden”), Opeth have added new dimensions to their sound at a stage when most bands are content and ready to phone it in.
As singer/guitarist/bandleader Michael Akerfeldt will tell you, it always wasn’t this easy. The departure of longtime guitarist Peter Lindgren in early 2007 was a surprise and the dismissal of drummer Martin Lopez in 2006 could have thrown a monster wrench into Akerfeldt’s plans, but the band has maintained a stream of cohesion that few in metal can match. Now with Axenrot, longtime bassist Martin Mendez, keyboardist Per Wiberg, and new guitarist Martin Akesson (ex Arch Enemy), Opeth’s lineup is stabilized and ready to tour the world over.
Calling while on the road, the affable Akerfeldt was subjected to Blistering’s queries about everything but the new album (c’mon – there’s a shitload of press on it already), so we decided to switch it up and hit Mr. Akerfeldt from some new angles. Here’s how it went down…
Blistering.com: The last album that you had major lineup turnover like this was for [1998’s] My Arms, Your Hearse. What was the situation like in the band around the time?
Michael Akerfeldt: It was not a good recording. It was turmoil and chaos that just was there all the way through, to be honest. We just got Lopez in the band and was a bit green and have never really recorded before and I the first time I heard the material, I thought it was shit. I like it now…the band wasn’t in such a great shape. Peter and I were still working together at that point, which was cool. On that album, I started writing more material on my own, so that album he didn’t contribute as much. I had more weight on my shoulders and especially with Lopez coming in, making him feel comfortable…I had to pep-talk him all the time during the recording and he hated (producer) Fredrick (Nordstrom) as well. They were not getting along at all.
The recording…the sound is special - bleak and cold, so it’s not a good sounding record. And we were very sloppy with everything and I remember recording the drums – some of the punch-ins were just horrible. We forgot to the tune-up the snares. In the same song, you can hear it change pitch.
Blistering.com: That was during the time when the band wasn’t rehearsing much, so how did you pull that off?
Akerfeldt: We did rehearse a little bit, but we didn’t have a rehearsal room and we didn’t have any equipment, so we paid by the hour for a rehearsal room in the suburbs. The songs weren’t really finished. I wrote all the lyrics in the studio and ended up arranging most of the songs in the studio. We didn’t really rehearse in the studio, we did one or two riffs, then started practicing for the next two riffs and did it that way.
Blistering.com: So the whole album is one big cut-and-paste job?
Akerfeldt: Yeah. Most of those albums with Lopez were pasted together because we didn’t rehearse much.
Blistering.com: That was the album where you had the idea of doing one long song. Didn’t Edge of Sanity’s Crimson derail that idea for you?
Akerfeldt: No, (Edge of Sanity mainman Dan) Swano is the king of doing a song like that. We did think about doing an album like the Crimson record. It doesn’t matter, I guess we were getting carried away with the whole long-song thing. I guess the reaction was the songs came out shorter. Those songs are shorter than everything before it at that point.
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