Honest opinions on Watershed

Not my favourite, but it has two new members, so give 'em time. They will be better next time around.

Imo, watershed lacked the "autumn" feeling, which there is plenty of on the previous albums. Blackwater Park, Still Life, Ghost Reveries, Damnation, Morningrise in particular, created such awesome "images" in your head, if you know what i mean. Watershed didn't give me any cool images, but it was still a great album.
 
It is a great album imo....it is BETTER than "Ghost reveries" ( yet definetely not as good as the band's milestones, "Blackwater park" and "Deliverance" )

"Heir Apparent" is a real killer- a great brutal song... its less noisy moments are also very beautiful, they sound really evil.

"Hessian Peel" is the album's epic, its peak. Every part of it sounds really great and Opeth once more manage to create a song which inspite of having dozens of riffs, melodies, themes, it has also UNITY... it doesnt sound just like a complex collection of riffs, but as a complex song whose every new riff/melody etc. brings us closer to the dramatic end.

"Hex Omega" is just a personal favourite. I know that many people are not impressed by it, but I am just in love with it.

"Coil" is a really beautiful acoustic song, the vocals of Nathalie are a very pleasant surprise and they give more colour to the song. The song has a very hopeful feeling, a feeling of rebirth which comes to constrast with the classic bleak and desperate Opeth atmosphere...

"Burden" is also a great song, but not my cup of tea. Although I certainly recognise the musical quality of the song, it just doesn't affect my feelings as much as the previous song.

"Lotus eater" is a quite strange song. There are parts of it that I really love, yet other parts sound to me not as good. I did not really like the combination of the clean vocals with the blastbeats.. but overall it is a great song and a very experimental one. And after all this is why I loved Opeth from the beginning, because it is a band which is not afraid to experiment with new sounds/new ideas etc.

"Porcelain heart" is obviously the most mediocre sonf of the album, and one of the very few mediocre songs that this very band has ever written...

Overall a great album in my opinion. Yes, it lacks the "autumn" feeling, yes the sound of Akerson is quite different to that of Lindgren, but I think that after all this is the MAGIC of this band, the fact that it always experiments, it always searches for new sounds, new ideas etc.

In conclusion, the sound and the style of "Watershed" may be quite different than that of the previous albums, but the "Opeth SPIRIT" is still alive just as it was from the first day of this band.
 
I was listening to it this morning and i removed Porcelain Heart since the start, and I really enjoyed it alot !! all the songs seemed connected to each other when PH was absent !! dunno, that's what I felt ! Good album and I love it !!!!!!
 
at least ghost reveries didn't have such horrid lyrics like "will the children cry when their mother dies?" :erk:

clean vocals over blasts isn't a new idea whatsoever either, guys. it was done by akercocke, and before them I believe...arcturus? had done it. (or maybe borknagar.) and before them etc etc etc
 
GR >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> WS indeed.

And Lopez fanboys need to get it through their heads that the person behind the drums doesn't come anywhere close to defining any aspect of Opeth's sound. Opeth's sound = whatever the fuck Mike wants it to be. Period.
 
at least ghost reveries didn't have such horrid lyrics like "will the children cry when their mother dies?" :erk:

clean vocals over blasts isn't a new idea whatsoever either, guys. it was done by akercocke, and before them I believe...arcturus? had done it. (or maybe borknagar.) and before them etc etc etc

+1, and I am pretty sure Borknagar is the name you were looking for. Can't remember Arcturus ever having clean vocals over blastbeats.
 
Personally I like Ghost Reveries more than Watershed, but Watershed is still an awesome album. I could go on for hours about the things I love about it, but I'll spare myself the effort of writing about 6 paragraphs.

However I will say that the songs this time around seemed a bit disjointed at times, especially some of the keyboard transitions, like a couple of parts in TLE and during the midsection of HP when things are just about to get heavy. Also, I'd personally enjoy it, if the next time around there were a few more heavy tracks with lots of growling/clean vocals interspersed throughout (i.e tracks like TLE, Deliverance, When, etc.), and maybe a good solid stripped down acoustic song like Benighted or Patterns in the Ivy II.

Any who, anything that could be taken as criticism above is meant constructively (i.e. I still think Watershed is kickass). If I could make better music that Mikael Akerfeldt I'd be off somewhere doing that instead of spending time on an Opeth forum. But I can't so I have no room to bitch.
 
at least ghost reveries didn't have
clean vocals over blasts isn't a new idea whatsoever either, guys. it was done by akercocke, and before them I believe...arcturus? had done it. (or maybe borknagar.) and before them etc etc etc

Personally, the exceptionnal stuff here is 1) Opeth added blastbeats 2) These blastbeats are even more special since there is clean vocal 3) It's Mikael's voice. I don't think anyone said it was new, maybe, but they don't know shit.

V... Pit of scorn? Penis gone? Tss.
 
Got to comment a little here. It's just my opinion against yours of course but it is interesting to see how different views we have yet love the same band.

It is a great album imo....it is BETTER than "Ghost reveries" ( yet definetely not as good as the band's milestones, "Blackwater park" and "Deliverance" )

Watershed better than Ghost Reveries? Not even at its best. Blackwater Park and Deliverance milestones? You must have confused them with My Arms Your Hearse and Still Life.

"Heir Apparent" is a real killer- a great brutal song... its less noisy moments are also very beautiful, they sound really evil.

Well ok we kinda agree here, but I don't feel it's a killer - the pace is too slow and the riffs are uninspired.

"Hessian Peel" is the album's epic, its peak. Every part of it sounds really great and Opeth once more manage to create a song which inspite of having dozens of riffs, melodies, themes, it has also UNITY... it doesnt sound just like a complex collection of riffs, but as a complex song whose every new riff/melody etc. brings us closer to the dramatic end.

I feel this song is indeed just a random collection of parts and the brutal part doesn't fit with the rest at all.

"Hex Omega" is just a personal favourite. I know that many people are not impressed by it, but I am just in love with it.

"Sleeping Pill" would be a better title for the song :p

"Burden" is also a great song, but not my cup of tea. Although I certainly recognise the musical quality of the song, it just doesn't affect my feelings as much as the previous song.

Love this song although I agree it doesn't fit the album/band that much.

"Porcelain heart" is obviously the most mediocre sonf of the album, and one of the very few mediocre songs that this very band has ever written...

It is, it is.

In conclusion, the sound and the style of "Watershed" may be quite different than that of the previous albums, but the "Opeth SPIRIT" is still alive just as it was from the first day of this band.

True, but I like autumn :loco:
 
I've been fan for almost 10 years now and Watershed is't really anything special compared to all other Opeth albums... I'd say it first album that is feels worse than previous album... actually worse than almost all previous albums... saying that makes me really sad... the album has no flow, no style, no sound... just bunch of riffs thrown together... even worse and more uninteresting than Orchid...which turned me into Opeth and was favourite for years... on the other hand Morningrise - GR are beyond excellent... almost all band who have made so many albums have one or two "bad" albums... Watershed is actually listanable in 5.1 ... it sounds like it was ment to be 5.1!

the biggest loss which Opeth had is Lopez leaving Opeth... there is no other like him... his drumming was beyond anything imaginable... his drumming gave much of Opeth sound...

I think your "." key is stuck.
 
I've been fan for almost 10 years now and Watershed is't really anything special compared to all other Opeth albums... I'd say it first album that is feels worse than previous album... actually worse than almost all previous albums... saying that makes me really sad... the album has no flow, no style, no sound... just bunch of riffs thrown together... even worse and more uninteresting than Orchid...which turned me into Opeth and was favourite for years... on the other hand Morningrise - GR are beyond excellent... almost all band who have made so many albums have one or two "bad" albums... Watershed is actually listanable in 5.1 ... it sounds like it was ment to be 5.1!

the biggest loss which Opeth had is Lopez leaving Opeth... there is no other like him... his drumming was beyond anything imaginable... his drumming gave much of Opeth sound...

Interesting post. Bands change and people change. If you aren't moving in the same direction of the band, just enjoy the records you already own and stop lamenting the changes in the band. It's pointless.
 
Bands have to evolve for the sake of progress.... Watershed isn't even remotely comparable to Orchid.... And as such, you really shouldn't judge a modern Opeth work compared to any past work. It's not like you're judging two Nickelback albums here, though with them being label-mates, there is always the possibility of a collaboration between Opeth and Nickelback. I'm kidding of course. But I have to make it clear that I'm kidding because a lot of people are dumb.
 
Well, since this thread is called "Honest opinions on Watershed" then it is just my honest opinion, and I am not bashing the band becouse I don't like Watershed so much. I am happy if Mikael is happy... and I am also happy that most albums and most songs are my favorites anyway.
 
as one of the people said earlier in this thread, it feels like a transitional album to something bigger, but also as more "mature" album. lyrically, i don't think it's as strong, but in general, it feels like a more mature sounding album for Opeth, which isn't exactly bad, and i was iffy at first about the change in the "type" of music, but even though it's not as good musically in my opinion as the previous albums, it sounds very "new".