Benjamin St. Pierre
Connector Contributor
On Aug. 25, 2014, Swedish progressive metal titan Opeth released their 11th studio album, “Pale Communion.”
Opeth is globally renowned among metal fans for their cerebral lyrics, haunting yet beautiful melodies and the ability to seamlessly blend clean (regular singing) and growled vocals (both done by Mikael Akerfeldt, the only constant presence within the band since it formed in 1990) into songs that typically end up around six to ten minutes each. They are also famous (or infamous for, depending on who you’re asking) for their avoidance of reproducing the same kind of music, per se, on each album.
Opeth continues to live up to their “progressive” title by never quite making the next album similar to the album prior. And, as one might expect, deviation from the norm, and deciding to abandon what made Opeth special in the past, has not always sat well with hardcore fans.
Many college students are not familiar with metal, let alone Opeth, but I see this as an opportunity to bring the whole culture to the surface and to, perhaps, bring about new fans. “Pale Communion” is an album in which the band abandons its prior what-could-be-dubbed heaviness and darkness in favor of a lighter, freer and continually “progressive” sound. The album, eight songs in length in its standard version, runs rampant with guitar solos, extended periods of time without vocals, fully-instrumental songs and only clean vocals.
Overall, the album is softer in comparison to the band’s previous works. I don’t intend for that to have a negative or positive connotation, but for a band that has showcased such aptitude, finesse and ease in making dark melodies sound beautiful, like on their magnum opus “Blackwater Park” (2001), this album is most markedly an outlier in terms of overall sound. Certainly the band has collectively aged and “matured” since 2001, and consequentially, their music has lost some of its violence.
If anyone is interested in expanding their musical horizons, and maybe heading down a metal path, this album is definitely a solid starting point. It’s light and airy, but the death/doom metal influence is apparent, and Opeth has a large and varied enough discography in which you can find at least a song or two you would enjoy.
“Pale Communion” is definitely not their best work, but it’s an accessible album for everybody who enjoys guitars in their music. So while it may indeed be a weaker, more “frail” album in comparison to their earlier ones, this may be in the band’s benefit, as perhaps its audience can grow.
Opeth is a music titan, whether you’ve heard of them or not, and “Pale Communion” is just the next installment of an ever-progressing Opeth sound that will surely continue to change in their next release.
