When Opeth began as a death metal band in the early 1990s, no could have imagined their ascent to prog metal royalty – not least Mikael Åkerfeldt. In 2012, he looked back over the twists and turns of their career.
“The first songs we did, it was just amazing to me that you could play together with other people,” says Opeth’s Mikael Åkerfeldt. “You could play along with a drumbeat and someone else could play the same thing as you and it’d sound alright! It was a revolution for me!”
True revolutions, artistic or otherwise, generally evolve from humble beginnings. Despite the fact that they are now widely recognised and lauded as standard bearers for progressive heavy music and one of the most passionately admired metal bands on the planet, Opeth started life in much the same way as every other young band.
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Formed by vocalist David Isberg in 1990 as the Stockholm death metal scene hit its stride, the band could easily have become just another bunch of growling extremists to stand alongside the likes of Entombed and Dismember were it not for the arrival of 16-year-old Mikael Åkerfeldt, a former member of aspiring local metal crew Eruption. A flurry of lineup changes over the two years that followed resulted in Mikael’s accidental promotion to the role of chief creative force and, consequently, the adoption of a far more adventurous musical philosophy inspired by their new leader’s burgeoning desire to think outside the extremity box.
“That Stockholm scene was massively influential for me, especially Nihilist, Entombed and Therion,” Mikael recalls. “We played a few shows with Therion in the early days but no one really had any interest in what we were doing at the time, which was fair enough because we weren’t really doing anything out of the ordinary
“As I developed my songwriting, nobody really told me ‘That’s pretty cool and original sounding.’ I couldn’t even think about it in those terms until people from outside of my circle of friends told me that we had something cool going. We did a show in Gothenburg with At The Gates and a guy came up to us and said we had a pretty original sound, but I didn’t really think about it. It was the early 90s and I was into the death metal scene and the black metal scene a bit too, but I also started to develop an interest in 70s music and prog.”
As their Stockholm peers stuck to a well-established sonic formula, Opeth began to stand proudly apart from the pack, their sound morphing into a wildly inventive and ambitious combination of melodic extreme metal and elaborate song structures influenced by the Yes, Genesis and Camel records that Mikael was embracing in preference to the more traditionally metallic sounds that had informed his adolescent listening habits.
The quality of the band’s music was remarkably high, considering their relative inexperience, but it would take a dose of good fortune to enable Opeth to secure a record deal and begin their careers in earnest. They were eventually plucked from obscurity by Candlelight Records founder Lee Barrett, who heard a brief snatch of one of the band’s rehearsal tapes at the end of a compilation of unsigned bands that he’d been sent by Emperor guitarist Samoth. Entranced by Opeth’s distinctive sound, Lee offered the Swedes a deal and Mikael’s dream of becoming a professional musician kicked gently into gear.
“At that time Candlelight was a small label with one tiny office. It was a good start for us and it didn’t take long for us to work out how it worked on our level,” says the frontman. “It had nothing to do with how major labels operate, it was just about developing a friendship with a guy that could help you a bit. We clicked with Lee and became friends right away. He was a fan of the band and he based all his signings on whether he fucking loved the music as a fan. That was good enough for us; we just needed someone to believe in us.”
Recorded in the spring of 1994 with death metal legend Dan Swano at the controls and released the following year, Opeth’s debut album Orchid was an audacious account opener that revelled in its own refusal to fit into any pre-determined pigeonholes. With four of its seven tracks clocking in at well over 10 minutes in length, and plenty of fragility and elegant grandeur contrasting with the album’s heavier moments, it was a precocious first effort that garnered ecstatic reviews from the metal press. Due in part to the lack of live shows that Opeth were performing at that time, Orchid did not achieve the impact that it deserved, but those who discovered the band at this early stage were blown away by the sheer bravery involved.
“At the time, there weren’t any bands coming out of Sweden, or anywhere, that sounded like that,” Mikael states proudly. “Obviously it’s aged – some of it badly – but as a debut it is pretty cool. We’d never been in a studio; I was 19 and we made an album that’s over an hour long and the songs are 15 minutes each, y’know? I was very ambitious for a 19-year-old musician. I don’t think I’d do anything differently now. It came out how it was supposed to come out.”
Buoyed by the creative, if not commercial, success of Orchid, Mikael and guitarist Peter Lindgren began work on a follow-up. The last Opeth album with drummer Anders Nordin and bassist Johan DeFarfalla, 1996’s Morningrise, was an even more extravagant and daring collection of epic compositions that cemented their reputation as one of extreme metal’s most intriguing prospects.
On tracks like the poignant The Night And The Silent Water (inspired by the passing of Mikael’s grandfather shortly before the album was recorded) and the 20-minute labyrinth of riffs and folk-tinged frailty Black Rose Immortal, Opeth were almost being over- whelmed by the weight of their own ideas. And yet it remained apparent that the band were operating on a higher level than most of their peers and critical plaudits continued to pour in.
What Opeth had lacked up until this point were opportunities to tour and spread the word about their music via more impactful means than word of mouth. A 26-date European tour as support to Cradle Of Filth presented them with their first bona fide chance to step out from the underground shadows, and having had a glimpse of what the wider world was offering, Mikael began to crave bigger and better things as his songwriting skills began to bear ever greater fruit.
The final piece of the jigsaw fell into place with the recruitment of Uruguayan rhythm section Martin Lopez and Martin Mendez, who’d answered a newspaper advert placed by Mikael and Peter upon the departure of Anders and Johan, and the recording of third album My Arms Your Hearse. A darker and less ornate record than its predecessors, it boasted a warmer and more obviously 70s-influenced sound while also being the most aggressive Opeth record to date.
“We were so discouraged because we’d made two records, neither of which had made a big impact. I was thinking about splitting the band up but I had these songs, like April Ethereal, which I really liked,” Mikael recalls. “I loved that song. I really wanted to record it. I didn’t have anything else to do. I didn’t have a job or any money. I was living with my mom, who was like, ‘When are you gonna move?’ So I didn’t know what the fuck I was gonna do.
“So we did that one record, thinking it was going to be the last one, and maybe we’d get lucky and in 20 years’ time someone like me would come up and say ‘I really loved those obscure records you put out!’ But I think My Arms Your Hearse was an important record for us. We changed our sound a little bit. We didn’t tour much but we did a few shows, still in the black and death metal circuit, and we had a new lineup with Lopez and Mendez. We did a few shows and started rehearsing and soon enough we had a new record deal with Peaceville Records and I got excited about playing again.”
The result of Mikael’s renewed enthusiasm was Still Life, an album that strengthened Opeth’s credentials as one of metal’s most adventurous bands, as those all-important prog influences began to play a more significant role. Released by Peaceville in 1999, the album received far more attention than its predecessors and also piqued the interest of a man who’d soon become an important ally in the Swedes’ ongoing rise to prominence.
“I was a massive fan of Porcupine Tree and one day I got an email from Steven Wilson,” Mikael explains. “They were my favourite band, so it might as well have been Ozzy, you know? I was like, ‘What the fuck!’ There was no real purpose with the email, he just wanted to say that he liked Still Life. Somehow I got on a flight over to London to meet him. He was interesting and very different from everyone that I hung out with. He was my hero, my idol, so I was like a sponge, just waiting for him to namedrop a band so I could memorise it and go back home and buy their records. I asked him then and there if he wanted to produce our next album and he said yes on the spot. The rest is history!”
A pivotal record in Opeth’s career, 2001’s Blackwater Park was the first fruits of a creative partnership between Mikael and Steven, as the latter assumed the mantle of co-producer. Having moved to legendary metal imprint Music For Nations, Opeth were in the perfect position to click into a higher gear and so it proved, as the album received universal praise and was widely hailed as a masterpiece by an increasingly rabid fanbase.
Songs like The Drapery Falls and the largely acoustic Harvest also confirmed that the band’s sound was maturing and evolving into something truly special. Buoyed by the record’s success, Opeth also began to tour more extensively than they’d done in the past. Suddenly this once-obscure progressive death metal band found themselves edging towards the upper echelons of modern heavy music, even though Mikael remains typically self-effacing about the importance of Blackwater Park within the Opeth catalogue.
“A lot of things happened after Still Life; we were forced over to Music For Nations – a bigger label – and we had proper US distribution and we made Blackwater Park,” he says. “I didn’t think it was any better than any of the other records, to be honest. I was happy with it but I didn’t think it was any better than Still Life. But it was a breakthrough for us. I don’t think it had much to do with the quality of the album. It’s a good record, but MFN had more power and we started to work with Andy Farrow at Northern Music, who helped us a lot with agents, and we started touring. That’s what really set us off. We had some kind of career, finally.”
The impact of Blackwater Park undoubtedly introduced Opeth to a much wider audience than before, but the majority of the band’s support was still from the metal end of the music spectrum. It wasn’t until they embarked on their most ambitious project of all, the dual album extravaganza of Deliverance and Damnation, that Opeth really outgrew their roots and were fully embraced by the prog rock community too.
Deliverance was the more predictable of the two records: a pitch-black and predominantly brutal affair that delighted long-time fans. Damnation, on the other hand, saw Opeth abandon crushing riffs and death growls in favour of a largely acoustic, pointedly mellow musical approach that confounded as many people as it pleased. Unfortunately, the process of recording two albums – effectively for the price of one, due to budgetary limitations – proved to be hugely stressful for Mikael in particular. Upon the completion of Deliverance in 2002, the frontman found himself in an alarmingly fragile state of health.
“By the time I got home with the finished album I was in such a negative mood,” he recalls. “We filmed interviews for the album and I was saying things like ‘This is the last album’ and ‘The album isn’t good and my performances are horrible’ and ‘Everybody is shit and this isn’t a band anymore!’ It wasn’t good. In the meantime, I was so sick. I had tunnel vision and couldn’t walk. I was crawling to the toilet and I thought I was going to die. I thought I had a terminal disease. My shit was grey. I went to the doctor and took all kinds of tests but I wasn’t sick. Per [Wiberg, Opeth keyboard player at the time of Deliverance] told me that it might be stress and he started describing my symptoms. As soon as I realised that it might be stress, I started feeling better. And my shit was brown again!”
As a result of his steady recovery, Mikael found the recording sessions for Damnation, which would be released in 2003, far more rewarding than those for its darker twin.
“Damnation had more good moments,” he recalls. “My memory of that album is better because I had some great moments working with Steven [Wilson] again. That was kind of fun. It wasn’t such a dark experience! Deliverance has some really great songs on it, but it ended up being a bit thrown together.”
With their status rising ever higher, Opeth joined forces with Roadrunner in 2005 and hit the studio to record their eighth album. Ghost Reveries, released in August of that year, would prove to be the last album to feature either Mikael’s long-time bandmate Peter Lindgren or drummer Martin Lopez, who departed after the album’s release due to health problems.
Another widely lauded triumph, the album contained some of Opeth’s most inventive material yet, veering from the brutal menace of The Grand Conjuration to the shimmering, Beatles-saluting psychedelia of Atonement. Lopez was replaced by Witchery/Bloodbath drummer Martin ‘Axe’ Axenrot in time for Opeth’s momentous show at London’s legendary Roundhouse in November 2006, while former Arch Enemy alumni Fredrik Åkesson was unveiled as Peter’s replacement for the band’s 2007 Progressive Nation tour with Dream Theater.
Revitalised by that injection of fresh blood, Mikael threw caution to the wind for 2008’s Watershed, by far the most challenging and unashamedly proggy record Opeth had recorded at that point.
“It’s not like we have to do something different each time,” Mikael says. “Watershed just came out that way, which is fucking awesome! Obviously we have a style and I don’t think we’re going to move too far away from that style, I just try to develop it. I don’t really think in terms of ‘Now I must do something different…’ On the contrary, I just wrote the songs as I normally do, but there were a few things that came out, like the electric piano lick on The Lotus Eater, that didn’t sound like Opeth at first. But somehow it all works. I love it.”
![Opeth - The Devil's Orchard [OFFICIAL VIDEO] - YouTube](https://img.youtube.com/vi/FxvN_GxgpF8/maxresdefault.jpg)
The ultimate proof that Opeth had come of age and become a genuinely important band came when they performed a head- lining show at the Royal Albert Hall on April 5, 2010, performing Blackwater Park in its entirety alongside one song from each of their other studio albums. It was an unforgettable gig for band and fans alike, not least because Mikael became the first person to do death metal vocals at the venue. For a self- confessed student of 70s hard rock, the event was a huge milestone and an chance to follow in the footsteps of some of the greatest and most revered bands of them all.
“It was crazy. Walking in there that morning it was like ‘Wow!’” Mikael remembers. “I went out on stage and looked around and started thinking about that Deep Purple sleeve, the one they did in ’69 [Concerto For Group And Orchestra], and the photos that Camel took outside. It’s got so much history, that place, and for me it was surreal, to be in a nice place like that. Without a doubt, it’s the most posh venue we’ve ever been to! I’m wondering what the fuck we can do next. Coming to London again and playing at The Forum, for instance, would seem boring now. And I said ‘cunt’ at the Royal Albert Hall! Apparently it’s a bit of a no-no! Ha ha! But what can I say? It was amazing. The biggest moment of my career.”
While many metal bands are content to stick to a proven formula, Opeth have managed to become one of the best-loved heavy bands on the planet by exhibiting a consistent disregard for repetition. As a result, it should not have surprised many people when they released Heritage in 2011: an album that bore no musical links to the Swedes’ death metal roots and that painted them as a fully fledged progressive rock band, arguably for the first time. Mikael’s intimated that his band may well make a partial return to more brutal territory on their next studio album, but for now the only thing that is completely certain is that followers of Opeth’s fascinating and frequently audacious story so far should expect the unexpected.
“It was a career risk, but for me it was not strange to do Heritage,” Mikael concludes. “Maybe one day I’ll rethink and do a nostalgia Blackwater Park tour, but at this point it’s much more important for me to maintain some kind of integrity. If everyone hates something we do, we’re fucked and I’ll go and work in a gas station again, you know? I’m not afraid of that. I’m more afraid of being chickenshit.”
Originally published in Metal Hammer issue 238, November 2012
