Blackwater Park

[NAD]

Can I play?

1. Deliverance
2. Still Life
3. My Arms, Your Hearse
4. Damnation
5. Blackwater Park
46. Orchid
914. Morningrise

EDIT: changed the list, I forgot that MAYH is actually pretty good. I never listen to Orchid or Morningrise, they both bore me to tears.

 

[J.]

my order is easy. They've gotten steadily worse with each release. Orchid is bonertastic. Deliverance was an abomination. Somewhere in the middle is everything else.

 

[Demonspell]

Blackwater Park would be somewhere in the middle of my Opeth rankings, and while nothing here offends me (although the randomness in Dirge doesn't work at all and some tracks are overlong), it only contains two songs that would I rank among their best: The Drapery Falls and Bleak.

 

[JayKeeley]

4. Damnation
5. Blackwater Park
46. Orchid
914. Morningrise

So let me get this straight....

Damnation > BWP >>>>>> Orchid >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Morningrise

Correct?

 

[General Zod]

...what I considered to be just dragging on and boring. And the seamlessly interwoven death/prog/acoustic passages, just seemed to me like acoustic intro-death-mellow-death-mellow...

Just out of curiosity, do you dislike "Blackwater Park" or Opeth in general?

Zod

 

[NAD]

So let me get this straight....

Damnation > BWP >>>>>> Orchid >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Morningrise

Correct?

I actually crafted this list based on my listening preferences for Opeth over the last year or so. Fact is I never listen to Morningrise or Orchid, and last time I listened to BWP I flung the headphones to the floor in mid-sleep annoyance (this never happens, I was quite surprised actually). Honestly I probably listen to Damnation more than Still Life and MAYH, I can't rank it above them.

Oh yeah I started listening to them with Morningrise and never enjoyed much of it, thought the concept of long songs with soft passages was good but the execution was dreadful. Then when I heard praise concerning BWP I gave them a second look and enjoyed (for awhile) the other albums, except maybe Orchid.

 

[NAD]

As usual when I criticize Morningrise well against the popular opinion I feel compelled to give it another try and see what I might be missing. Guitar work is pretty impressive. Don't like the screams except at the end of Black Rose Immortal, but the clean vocals are great. Rhythm section is quite talented but utterly devoid of any emotion whatsoever and their jazz influence just plain doesn't fit here. My main gripe is the songwriting: I've never been able to make sense of these songs (except To Bid Your Farewell, which I actually enjoy almost all the way through). The riffs and sections sound completely pasted together in random order. Any riff could go anywhere else on this album and it wouldn't make a lick of difference.

Time to officially give up on this album as it's been like 5 years now.

 

[M.Lehto]

I think BWP is the worst Opeth-release so far. The only reason I haven't sell the damn cd is, that this 2cd-version also has 2 very good acoustic songs as bonus. But when I find a person who's willing to trade this to 7" containing those 2 songs, this will be gone.

Morningrise-> Orchid-> Still Life-> Damnation-> MAYH-> Deliverance-> BWP

I just hope Wilson is nowhere near when the next album is recorded.

 

[General Zod]

I just hope Wilson is nowhere near when the next album is recorded.

Though I quite like "Blackwater Park" (obviously), I would agree with the above. I'd like to see Opeth return to a less polished sound, which probably means extricating themselves from Wilson.

Still Life
Morningrise
My Arms, Your Hearse
Blackwater Park
Damnation
Deliverance

I left "Orchid" off. Although I own it, I've not spent enough time with it to know where I'd rank it.

Zod

 

[JayKeeley]

Wow, so some of you guys hold Damnation pretty high up -- or at least not on the bottom like me.

Aren't Opeth a bit like Maiden, Amon Amarth, Iced Earth, or Bolt Thrower where you either like the style or not? I mean, seriously, is Deliverance THAT much different to, say, Morningrise? I do recognize people not liking the style altogether, but it is odd how the albums are thrown into these individual silos when in reality, they tend to all sit in the same pot, no? (Except maybe Damnation).

 

[NAD]

There have always been two forms of Opeth to me, with the cutoff between Morningrise and MAYH. Completely different styles between the two.

 

[matt99_crew]

This changes, but right now I'd say:

My Arms Your Hearse
Still Life
Deliverance
Blackwater Park
Morningrise
Orchid
Damnation

 

[JayKeeley]

There have always been two forms of Opeth to me, with the cutoff between Morningrise and MAYH. Completely different styles between the two.

Yeah, but it's still Opeth at the end of the day. Seventh Son is radically different to Killers, but it's all still Maiden. And when you see "Wrathchild" played live back to back with "The Evil that Men do", people are out of their seats. Just as if Opeth played "Deliverance" back to back with, say, "Black Rose Immortal", people do go nuts. I can't believe that some would make such a massive distinction where they would actually enjoy one and not the other.

 

[Black Winter Day]

I think they are separated into "quality" eras:

First 4
The rest, not quite as good or interesting

 

[NAD]

They won't play Black Rose Immortal live.

I see a huge difference, the only similarities between the two forms of Opeth are long songs, good lyrics, and similar style clean vocals. The riffs are completely different, the song structures changed drastically (probably more with Still Life than MAYH), and the jazz/experimental vibe of the first two is compleltely lacking past Morningrise. Even Mikael's growls are completely different!

EDIT: Compleltely. That looks good.

 

[Black Winter Day]

They won't play Black Rose Immortal live.

I see a huge difference, the only similarities between the two forms of Opeth are long songs, good lyrics, and similar style clean vocals. The riffs are completely different, the song structures changed drastically (probably more with Still Life than MAYH), and the jazz/experimental vibe of the first two is compleltely lacking past Morningrise. Even Mikael's growls are completely different!

EDIT: Compleltely. That looks good.

Goddammit! I was going to quote you before you edited and make you look like an idiot! DAMMIT!

 

[JayKeeley]

They won't play Black Rose Immortal live.

Oh you know what I'm saying you dirty gook.

Yeah, I'm not disputing there is a difference, but are you telling me that IF Opeth played "Nectar" or "In Mist She Was Standing", that you would not like it, but if they played "The Leper Affinity" and "Master's Apprentice" then you would?

Sounds extraordinarily pedantic to me, I dunno. I mean, we're not talking about Limp Bizkit songs back to back with Black Sabbath.

 

[NAD]

Yeah, I'm not disputing there is a difference, but are you telling me that IF Opeth played "Nectar" or "In Mist She Was Standing", that you would not like it, but if they played "The Leper Affinity" and "Master's Apprentice" then you would?

Sounds extraordinarily pedantic to me, I dunno. I mean, we're not talking about Limp Bizkit songs back to back with Black Sabbath.

Okay I see what you mean. The level of distinction is pretty specific, but back to your "fans of metal" thread I think most people here are extremely nitpicky about the metal genre, because we all notice the minute nuances and such. So I'm not going to sulk if they play stuff from Orchid in concert, even if I never want to hear it at home. I don't hate even Morningrise, I just think it's lackluster compared to their good stuff (probably give it a 5 or 6/10).

Goddammit! I was going to quote you before you edited and make you look like an idiot! DAMMIT!

Never miss a chance to poke fun at yourself before somebody else does, because if you beat yourself first, nobody can touch you.

 

[JayKeeley]

I don't hate even Morningrise, I just think it's lackluster compared to their good stuff (probably give it a 5 or 6/10).

Oh really!? OK that explains it, because to me, not including Damnation, my least favourite Opeth album would get a 7.5 or 8.

 

[SonOfNun]

While Orchid and Morningrise are obviously different than the rest of the band's work in some ways, maybe guitar tone or vocal pitch, I find it extremely hard to believe that someone could dislike either era significantly and enjoy the other. Everything that makes Opeth be Opeth and everything that makes me recognize and enjoy the band are present in all of their albums and although sometimes different, they are in many ways the same and have always linked up together very well in my book. It's hard to put a finger on it, but everything that makes the band Opeth is always distinctly there and I find it odd that someone could despise Deliverance and call it unorganized or lackluster and worship Orchid or vice versa, that's just strange to me.