The phrase ‘When one door closes, another opens’ is a fitting one when describing the transitional period Swedish progressive death metal act Opeth have made within the last twelve months.
After a successful partnership with Music For Nations that lasted for the better part of three years (After having moved on from Peaceville Records after 1999’s ‘Still Life’), Opeth found themselves without a record label after Music For Nations decided to close its doors in June 2004, and their parent company B.M.G./Zomba Records decided not to retain the band on their roster.
Speculation as to just who Opeth would sign to led many to believe that the band would sign to a major label, and in mid May 2005, Opeth finally revealed that not only had they signed to Roadrunner Records, but their newest addition to the line up in keyboardist Per Wiberg (Who is also a member of Spiritual Beggars).
Both fear and anticipation were held with Opeth’s eighth full-length release (The follow up to 2003’s ‘Damnation’), but in the short time since it’s release (Back in late August), ‘Ghost Reveries’ has been overwhelmingly viewed as easily one of Opeth’s strongest, and most experimental releases in recent years.
While out on tour in the U.S., I tracked down guitarist Peter Lindgren in Detroit (Michigan) to discuss the introduction of Wiberg into the Opeth fold, the different approach the band took when making their latest album compared to the past and their current touring plans, and where they anticipate the road will take them in the new year.
First however, I wanted to take a step back six months, when the band first announced their decision to sign with Roadrunner Records. Given the reputation the label had for spearheading the nu-metal movement through the latter part of the ‘90’s, there were more than a few fans that openly questioned, and criticised Opeth’s decision to go with the label, and feared that ‘Ghost Reveries’ would somehow suffer with record company involvement. Needless to say, the ever open minded Opeth members were less than happy with the close mindedness of some of their fans.
“At first, it sort of pissed us off. I mean look at us. We’ve been doing our own thing for fifteen years. We weren’t going to sign with Roadrunner Records and suddenly turn into a nu-metal band you know. I think people are stupid when they believe that a record label like Roadrunner Records can change an old band like us. It’s not like some American record label dude is going to turn up and tell us to start wearing baggy jeans. Are Roadrunner Records going to tell us to have a rapper on the next album? No. It was never going to happen. We don’t even have producers involved when making music because we don’t trust anyone. I guess most of the criticism has come from a bunch of kids. They found out that we have signed to this so-called nu-metal label, and in turn they believed that we would turn into a nu-metal band. Hell, even some of the new pictures we had taken of the band were criticised. Some kids out there complained that the grass didn’t look green enough. Get a life! (Laughs) In the end, we just give up caring what those people thought. They should know better. After all the years that we’ve been doing our own thing, we’re never going to change for anybody.”
Any lingering criticism for the label change for Opeth was soon cast aside with the release of ‘Ghost Reveries’ of course, so much so that many are claiming the album as one of Opeth’s best in years.
“The reviews have been awesome! It’s almost so good that it’s embarrassing! (Laughs) Fans seem to love the new album, and it’s hard to disagree with them because we think it’s really good too. The album is still sort of new to us, so of course we’re going to like the new album as well, but I think in a couple of years, ‘Ghost Reveries’ is going to be considered one of our best albums, if not, the best.”
There are several reasons why ‘Ghost Reveries’ stands out compared to Opeth’s output from their last two releases (2002’s ‘Deliverance’ and 2003’s ‘Damnation’), but if Lindgren were to put out one major reason for that, it would be preparation.
“We really took a different approach with ‘Ghost Reveries’. The idea for the last couple of albums was to be fully prepared and well rehearsed, but that really hasn’t happened until this it came time to make this album. We really made sure this time that we had time to write the songs, and have them all well rehearsed before we went into the studio. So that’s a big change from the last couple of albums, because they were recorded in a hurry. We would book a studio, start work and then run out of time before we finished. Instead of pushing the release date back, we thought we would go into the studio with at least half the songs that we would actually need, and it would mean that at the end of our time in the studio, there was a lot of unnecessarily stress to finish things up. We were seriously lacking in sufficient time to do our best. Knowing that you have two or three weeks to go, and you still have to write a couple of songs can be really stressful. We don’t blame anyone for the lack of preparation we did for those albums on anyone but ourselves! (Laughs) It’s just how we worked at that point in time. But with ‘Ghost Reveries’, we actually did rehearse, and have everything prepared beforehand. We actually went into the studio with everybody knowing the songs, and knowing what they were doing. It meant that we could think things through more in the long run. We always want leave some room in the studio for some experimentation, because that makes it all the more interesting for us as well. That’s what every band should do, and probably are doing. It’s taken us a long time to get to that point where we were fully prepared! (Laughs) In a sense, all the small details we brushed over in the past due to time restriction in the studio have been perfected on this album. We’ve never done that before. It’s a big change, and I think you can hear it in the outcome as well. It’s made the album stand out a little more, so I’m pretty happy that it turned out this good.”
Another change Opeth made from the past was a change in studio facilities. Rather than use the well renowned Studio Fredman in Gothenburg, Opeth opted to use Fascination Street Studios in Örebro.
“We have used Studio Fredman in Gothenburg to record so many times in the past, so we decided to move someplace else, which ended up being Fascination Street Studios in Örebro. This guy who runs the studio, Jens Bogren (Who co-produced, engineered and mixed ‘Ghost Reveries’), isn’t a big name. He’s young, maybe 26 years old, but he’s super professional. Working with Fredrik Nordström (Who has been involved with Opeth since 1998’s ‘My Arms, Your Hearse’), we got used to the fact that he’s busy with all these other things, and that he’s rarely in the studio with us. Bogren was there all the time. He pushed us hard too. He made us play better than we’ve ever played before, and I think that has a lot to do with the reason why ‘Ghost Reveries’ sounds like it does too.”
Although having been a part of Opeth since the ‘Damnation’ tour, ‘Ghost Reveries’ marks the first album Wiberg has recorded with the band as an official member of the band, with his presence definitely felt with a greater Eastern/blues influence into the bands trademark sound.
“We definitely wanted Wiberg on the latest album from day one. We wanted to incorporate his style of playing into the music. Even though (Guitarist/vocalist Mikael) Åkerfeldt just about writes all the material himself exclusively, everyone else participates, and that included Wiberg as well. He came up with plenty of ideas for ‘Ghost Reveries’, so he’s a full member in that respect as well. I think that most metal bands that have a keyboard player merely have them playing walls of choirs or over the top solos. Wiberg comes from the ‘70’s style of keyboard players, which means he can actually play! (Laughs) He’s one of the best musicians in the band, and we wanted to use his abilities as much as possible. We wanted to use all these sounds he can come up with, whether that be by Rhodes piano or a Hammond organ. So that’s another big change that’s really heard within our sound. We have a lot of influences, and the first time that those other culture influences really come through within Opeth was on ‘Bleak’ on ‘Blackwater Park’ (2001). That was a little more Eastern sounding I think. We always love to bring in all these other influences into our music. We’re always going to try and break the boundaries a little and push them a little more than we did on previous albums. We always want to do some more experimentation with sounds and uncover different sides of our music.”
Returning back to the subject of fans disapproval, talk soon turns to Opeth’s debut foray into music videos in ‘The Grand Conjuration’. Many claimed that while the idea of Opeth venturing into the music video domain was an interesting idea, the results are less than satisfactory. And it’s a view that surprisingly enough Lindgren more than agrees with.
“Uh oh! (Laughs) Here’s a little defence speech that we prepared earlier... We always said that we’re not really fans of doing videos, unless we do a full-length video of a full-length song. But obviously we realise that the idea of that ever working is never going to happen. Our songs are too long, and nobody is going to put the work in to doing a ten-minute video if nobody is going to show it. So we thought that the only way we could do it was to edit the song down. We don’t like edits ourselves, but we still decided to go ahead and do it. Roadrunner Records told us that we only had one evening to shoot all of our performance footage, and that it would have to be done while we were on tour. We asked about who was going to direct it, and they told us it was going to be Bill Yukich. We asked what the storyline was going to be, and they sent us three or four distinctly different ideas. So we didn’t know what was going on. The whole situation was so chaotic, in the end we just decided to go down to the shoot, get the footage of us all filmed and simply fuck off. And I think the final result is in accordance to that. We didn’t have a clue as to what was going on, and I don’t even like it how it turned out. It doesn’t have anything to do with the music, or even the lyrics. We asked Yukich a couple of questions, and he didn’t answer any of them. He was pissed off the whole time. I don’t know what the story was there. They sent us the final result, and it was awful. We soon decided that there were some fucking changes that needed to be made, and then that’s when our management and Roadrunner Records came back to us told us who this guy had worked with in the past (Foo Fighters, HIM, Probot) and all the work he put into this video. After having been in this band for all these years, we thought that the first time that we would do a video that it would turn out great, but instead it looks like my cat sat on it! (Laughs) So we were pissed off at the time, but at the end of the day, it’s just a video, so who gives a fuck. Having a video played on T.V. is probably a good idea. So any press is good press in a way. I think it’s going to fulfil its purpose. Then again, we have friends calling us saying, ‘This is the worst video I have ever seen in my whole life!’ And we agree. I just wish it had been a great video, but it wasn’t! (Laughs) I do like the ideas of doing videos. Even the Aphex Twin video for ‘Come To Daddy’ by Chris Cunningham is a great example of what is possible. But he’s also terribly expensive and semi retired, so we can’t use him. But we would like to have something more interesting than what we were given next time. I think we’re going to do more videos, but next time we’ll try and take control of things a little more.”
Turning to a subject more satisfying for Opeth is touring (Which started back in June), where Lindgren and company are currently holed up in Detroit midway through their current U.S. tour.
“We’re actually in the shittiest hotel Detroit has to offer, and possibly in the worst suburb as well. Last time we played here, the guard was a gang member, and he spent all his time in his car with a shotgun. Detroit is such a nice place! (Laughs) Other than that, the tour so far has been fine. We’re here in the U.S. for three more weeks, and then we have a week off, and head back to Europe once again. That will cover the southern parts of Europe that we haven’t done yet. That tour will last until Christmas. After Christmas, we’ll have a couple of weeks off, and then go out once again. I have seen a proposed schedule for next year, and I think Australia is scheduled for around April or May, followed by our first Japanese and New Zealand tours. I don’t know if there’s a big scene in New Zealand, because there’s not a lot of bands that manage to go over there. I’m more than happy to get over there as a tourist. I want to see some of the beautiful scenery and have a couple of days off to see some things. We always have a busy schedule, so we’ll see if that happens. Most bands tour Japan, and then use the money they’ve made to tour Australia. We have a great following in Australia, so we’re going to do things the opposite way around. If Australia was a little closer to Europe where all our family is, I would like to move there. We love Australia. Yes, it’s cheesy to say that, but every time we go there, we always want to stay there forever.”
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