Alternative Weekend: More Heavy Noisy Grunting Growling Stuff
It's weekend and there no rest for me at all. Tomorrow it's a hike to Kinder Scout in the Peak District. and Sunday is another Urbex road trip with NINE locations marked for visits.
I think I will need a day off to recover from all this. So let me leave you with some extremely noisy head-banging stuff suitable for @earthsea (aka @dannewton), and maybe nobody else.
The Lotus Eater – Opeth (Watershed -2008)
Was this the last great album before all the growling stopped and we were subjected to prog that just wasn't very good.
There's lots of monstrous music with some delicate moments thrown in. I love how they manage to change so easily from one type of sound to another.
Blackwater Park – Opeth (Blackwater Park -2001)
The name of this tune sounds heavy to me, and heavy it is. The beginning few minutes are just sublime, a wall of noise with harmony if you listen for it and with a touch of keyboards.
After several minutes of creepy eerie guitar music, we are on to the rest of the song, which took a lot longer to sink, at least for me.
At 12 minutes this is not a simple grunting growling song and takes some getting used to.
The Moor – Opeth (Still Life -1998)
I do realize I am going backward in terms of age. Any earlier than Still Life and I am not familiar with the band's music.
I know the purists will be shaking their heads at this proclamation. I just haven't gotten around to listening to it and that's the only reason.
The Moor has some great riffs, but again the song needs listening to, you need to get past all the ‘noise’ and hear the music.
A short Alternative Weekend on this occasion. Apologies if you hate heavy, fearsome crunching music that may break your speakers at the wrong volume.
Next week I will feature Des O’Conner, just to make it all up to you, or maybe some Bros?
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Opeth eh, that's more like it!! I do prefer the heavy noisy grunty stuff!!!
Yeah, I love them.. but they are tough to get into.. at least I found them so. You need to listen through the noise to hear the good stuff.
Yeah, it's like a lot of these bands, you have to dig in to find the gems
You misunderstand @slobberchops, the noise IS the good stuff, the soft prog stuff is the icing on the cake 😉
That was my approach when I first started listening (Bleak - for obvious reasons - the SW connection). It took some time to get into me and it's the same for every Opeth track I try to crack. I find I have to do this with each one before the flavour comes out!
I prefer Damnation when it comes to Opeth, even though I usually go with heavy noisy stuff haha.
Damnation is a beautiful album!
Damnation was my introduction to the band, as it's a much softer album. I then got a bloody earworm with 'In My Time of Need' and it wouldn't go away for weeks.
That one is my favorite as well. :)
Oh no, it's my favourite kind. I haven't listened to Opeth in a while but I do like them.
Have a great weekend!
You continue to surprise me, Opeth are not for everyone. Good to hear some on here like growls and noise. My daughter tells me off when I put it on, comes in screaming at me!! I thought the father was supposed to do that to the daughter?
I grew up listening to my Dad's Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, AC/DC. By the time I hit my teenage years I was into Slayer and Megadeth. I love all kinds of metal (not so much power) but thrash is my first love.
Have you tried Gojira? They're a bit more out there than Opeth, but I like 'em.
I know the feeling re: role reversal. I had much the same when my daughter was growing up. She used to complain about most stuff I listened to (but hey, I had to endure Spice Girls and S Club 7 from her, so you know!). Now she listens to metal too. Never could get her to like Springsteen or Dylan though. Ah well, you win some you lose some!
LOL about your daughter. Mine is not mainstream, loves the Beatles, Pink Floyd, and eighties music.
Dad - 'Why don't you like today's stuff'
Her - It's mostly crap.
It was mostly good for me when I was 16. I feel sorry for her not being able to hear new great stuff as it no longer exists.
I would argue that this happened on the Ghost Reveries album... but yes I would agree with your sentiments here, I flippin' love Opeth, and I flippin' love Prog Rock, but Opeth trying to do Prog was so... disappointing I guess.
What I originally loved from Opeth was the balance between the loud and soft, between the angular aggression and the sublime beauty. And they lost that uniqueness when they became just another generic prog band.
I love Ghost of Perdition but the rest of the album has yet to impact me. Watershed has Burden, The Lotus Eater and Hessian Peel.. what a song!
On the whole I think I prefer less grunting and growling as he has a decent voice otherwise, but if there's a mix of both then I find it listenable. I still only scraped the surface of their output. May have to line up some albums on Spotify. Can you suggest a list to try?
Try Hessian Peel from Watershed. It's very proggy, and there are no growls until the second part. Bleak is a no brainer as Mr Wilson sings in it. Windowpane is more proggy with no growls. That's a good start.
Ohh love this music. Every time Vevo make Amazing music. Thank for share. Keep it up.
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Opeth is one of those bands that I have tried to like more than I actually do. Some of their stuff reminds me of Y's video-game soundtracks, which is always cool. I'm more of fan of Ghost and Trivium which given the hundreds of categorizations of metal are probably totally different genres. I'm sure you are familiar with them both but if not, give em a look!
I'm not familiar with either, the music has to have some note of prog in there or it won't fit my tastes.
I think you would like the both of them. But Ghost's music is almost exclusively about Satan... don't know if that sort of thing bothers ya.
No, not bothered. I will give them a try.. ta!