Opeth: holy ****

[Stanley Nickels]

So, I'm typically very indie rock when it comes to music; I also like a lot of old blues and even some bluegrass.
I usually HATE metal. I think it sounds annoying and gives me a headache. I don't mean that faux-metal they play on 98.9.. I know what death, grind, and black metal are, and I typically believe they're just different genres for me to be annoyed with.
But I recently started listening to Opeth, and I absolutely love it. Holy shit. I bought their album Blackwater Park, and I really like it. I'm not sure how I made it this long without hearing them, but it's not like that type of metal is necessarily mainstream.

Anyway, I'm a convert. Even when he growls, the music behind it is so densely layered and complex that I still really like it. Anybody else like Opeth? Good recommendations for a second purchase?

[NewChief]

Originally Posted by Reaper16

For NewPhin (and whoever else), a list of metal albums that blend heavy & light passages, blend genre, are good.

*Legend*
Band Name (brief description of band):
Album Name
Album Name

Agalloch (An Oregon band that expertly blends Post-Rock, Black Metal and European Folk music. I think they are the best band in America.):
Pale Folklore
The Mantle
Ashes Against the Grain

Angra (a Brazilian Power Metal band. The compositions are awe-inspiring. So much Latin influence):
Temple of Shadows
Aurora Consurgens

Ansur (progressive metal. The vocals suck but the instrumentals are the kind of thing you're looking for if you like how Opeth blends heavy and melodic so well):
Warring Factions

Athiest (Death Metal has always been the subgenre of metal that has played up the genre's inherent jazz influence the most. Athiest, perhaps moreso than any metal band, is jazz music. Crazy-good.):
Piece of Time
Unquestionable Presence
Elements

Baroness (Southern-fried, sludgy, subversive use of minor and major scales):
Blue Record

Crotchduster (a comedy side-project from members of death metal band Capharnaum. They shift complete genres on a dime with multiple song parodies within a single song. The album has to be heard to be believed.):
Big Fat Box of Shit

Dan Swano (an influential producer and member of numerous metal bands. Does rare solo work. If you like Opeth you will like):
Moontower

Disillusion (German band. Fits the description of musical blending. Title track is tremendous):
Back to Times of Splendor

Edge of Sanity (A Dan Swano band. Both of these albums are twisting, turning, tornadoes of musicality. Both albums consist of a single 40-50 minute long song):
Crimson
Crimson II

Kalisia (French band. They put out an EP in 1994. They're full-length concept album didn't come out until last year. It was my second fav album of 2009. This band is insane in an organic, uncontrived way):
Skies
Cybion

November's Doom (a Chicago-based band that meshes Doom & Death metal. Tons of light/dark interplay):
The Pale Haunt Departure

Persefone (a lot like Kalisia. Balls-out crazy. So Exciting yet altogether musical):
Core
Shin-ken

Sigh (a Japanese band that was originally a band heavily inspired by Scandinavian Black Metal but grew increasingly and rapidly more experimental. Their most recent album, for example, is musically accomplishing the blending of bombastic German symphony, German thrash metal and Japanese pop/rock. It is far from their most experimental album):
Hail Horror Hail
Scenario IV: Dread Dreams
Imaginary Sonicscape
Gallows Gallery
Hangman's Hymn
Scenes from Hell

UneXpect (a Canadian band that makes surprisingly organic, natural sounding music that also happens to be chaotic. Opera, free jazz, circus music, and all kinds of disparate shit join up in the effort):
In A Flesh Aquarium

So, 25 albums isn't a bad starter list. I could have listed an infinitely large number of other bands that are more straightforward (and yet not straightforward at all). The albums that did get listed are the ones that are complex and perpetually exciting, the ones that keep you on the edge of your seat because you don't know what will happen next, the ones that accomplish all that without sounding gimmicky or sounding like they are "forcing it."

Bumping as I've discovered a "source" for music, and I'm about to start working my way through obtaining and listening to this list.

[siberian khatru]

Originally Posted by NewPhin

I can't stand the unrelenting shit that just stays hard hard hard. I like the stuff that has variety. Goes from beautiful and melodic and uplifting to nasty and evil. I like the contrasts.

Porcupine Tree, baby.

[NewChief]

Originally Posted by siberian khatru

Porcupine Tree, baby.

They're definitely on my list. Which album would you recommend to get me started?

[siberian khatru]

Originally Posted by NewPhin

They're definitely on my list. Which album would you recommend to get me started?

If you want balance between heavy crunch and softer melodies, I would suggest "In Absentia" (2002) or "The Incident" (2009). "In Absentia" was where I came in, when it first came out.

In between those two, "Deadwing" (2005) and "Fear of a Blank Planet" (2007) put the thumb a little more on the heavy side of the scale.

Prior to "In Absentia," their work is more melodic, more progressive (and prior to 1996's "Signify," it's spacey-electronic-psychedelic). I like all of it, but the stuff from "Signify" through "In Absentia" is closest to my heart. Although "The Incident" is right up there, too.

[NewChief]

Starting with Agalloch Pale Folklore:


Liking the intro of first song, "She Painted Fire Across the Skyline Part 1" with wind noise in the background and a slow steady buildup. Feels like I'm in Siberia or some eastern european mountain range. And yes, there's a sweet transition at about the 4 minute mark where everything slows down. And nice, evil whispery vocals. Ooo, bonus for the operatic chick singing in the background. And we transition out of the slow and into a sort of crunchy section with "fanning" guitar chording and the whispering vocals getting progressively more evil. A second guitar comes in and starts doing a repeated solo lick over the top of the rest. Nice build of layers. Then slows down again at 7:00 and returns to the operatic singer. Oh yes, timpani at 7:30! Gotta love that. Sounds like an outro as the timpani takes over, nice melodic sparse playing of a guitar and the return to the mountain range as the howling wind returns to take us out of this song.

Yes indeed, I like the movement of that one.

Song 2: "She Painted Fire Across the Skyline Part 2"
Wind takes us into some sparse guitar picking that quickly picks up into an... almost upbeat... song. Until the evil ****er singing comes in and rips any upbeat goodness from it with the maliciousness of his voice. He sounds like what Grishnákh from the Two Towers would sound like if he started a band.

Alright, I'm just going to listen to the album now and not type. I have other shit to do. Anyway, I'm liking this quite a lot.

[Reaper16]

Originally Posted by NewPhin

Starting with Agalloch Pale Folklore:


Liking the intro of first song, "She Painted Fire Across the Skyline Part 1" with wind noise in the background and a slow steady buildup. Feels like I'm in Siberia or some eastern european mountain range. And yes, there's a sweet transition at about the 4 minute mark where everything slows down. And nice, evil whispery vocals. Ooo, bonus for the operatic chick singing in the background. And we transition out of the slow and into a sort of crunchy section with "fanning" guitar chording and the whispering vocals getting progressively more evil. A second guitar comes in and starts doing a repeated solo lick over the top of the rest. Nice build of layers. Then slows down again at 7:00 and returns to the operatic singer. Oh yes, timpani at 7:30! Gotta love that. Sounds like an outro as the timpani takes over, nice melodic sparse playing of a guitar and the return to the mountain range as the howling wind returns to take us out of this song.

Yes indeed, I like the movement of that one.

Song 2: "She Painted Fire Across the Skyline Part 2"
Wind takes us into some sparse guitar picking that quickly picks up into an... almost upbeat... song. Until the evil ****er singing comes in and rips any upbeat goodness from it with the maliciousness of his voice. He sounds like what Grishnákh from the Two Towers would sound like if he started a band.

Alright, I'm just going to listen to the album now and not type. I have other shit to do. Anyway, I'm liking this quite a lot.

And just think... I like Pale Folklore the least of Agalloch's three full-length albums.

[NewChief]

Okay,

Listening to Angra now... and I've figured out something else about what I "like" in metal. I don't like this type of vocal. I know it's the traditional way of singing metal and shows amazing vocal range... but it's just not for me. I still like the music a lot, and I can tolerate the vocals... but I prefer the vocals of Agalloch.

Though Angra did just use a really cool harmonized choir vocal on "The Voice Commanding You" that I liked. I just don't like the way the verses and choruses are sung, overall. It reminds me of watching headbanger's ball in high school.

[NewChief]

Just as I say I don't like the vocals, the song "Breaking Ties" completely changes my mind. Powerful, heartfelt vocal that I really enjoyed.

[NewChief]

I had to check out Sigh because they just sounded so weird. Got Scenes from Hell... and yeah. It's weird. A nonstop blitzkrieg of metal with totally incongruous almost cartoonish anthems layered on top of it. Sounds like taking the soundtrack from a spaghetti western or a bunch of oompa music and synching it up with death metal so that the two hit the same notes and rhythm. Very interesting. I'm not sure I'm going to just be grooving to it all the time, but it's definitely worth a listen.

Agalloch remains my favorite so far.

[NewChief]

Interestingly enough, as I was listening to Agalloch, I kept thinking: "A lot of this guitar work of crescendo/descent is like Explosions in the Sky or something."

Today I start reading up on Agalloch and find out that they're supposedly heavily post-rock influenced. Wow, I do know something about music.

[Reaper16]

Originally Posted by NewPhin

Interestingly enough, as I was listening to Agalloch, I kept thinking: "A lot of this guitar work of crescendo/descent is like Explosions in the Sky or something."

Today I start reading up on Agalloch and find out that they're supposedly heavily post-rock influenced. Wow, I do know something about music.

Yeah, Agalloch's musical formula is pretty much equal parts folk metal, black metal and post-rock.

[Bowser]

Can't go wrong with a group that titles an album "Big Fat Box of Shit". lol

[Reaper16]

Originally Posted by Bowser

Can't go wrong with a group that titles an album "Big Fat Box of Shit". lol

That album is really hilarious. Their transitions between genres and parodies of metal subgenres cracks my shit up. Take their song "Mammal Sauce" for example.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MbhPWud8kM


Here, and I may be leaving some things out since I'm doing this from memory w/o listening to the song again because my work computer has no speakers, Crotchduster transitions from rap to brutal death metal to soft rock to technical death metal to punk rock to vocoder pop ala Cher's "Believe," to the same style of pop only sung like Sam Kennison. That's one song.

[NewChief]

Grabbed "Blue Record" by Baroness tonight. Really, really enjoying this one at this point in time. Good hard stuff without trying to hit you over the head with how hard they're being. Lots of different sounds represented as well. Thumb's up for sure.

[Taco John]

Opeth reminds me of Faith No More with a stomach ache. The music is great, but I'd prefer a front man with the range of Patton over all the growling. Hard not to listen though. The arrangements are fantastic.