Originally posted by Hammurabb, from Brave Words:
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Q: What's been happening since Damnation?
A: "Well, eventually we stopped touring! The last gig was Sweden Rock last summer, so since then I became a Dad and that's basically all I've been doing for months, looking after my wife as she was about to pop, so to speak, going to the doctors, having a kid, which was awesome, and hanging out with my family... and obviously I've been writing the new stuff. I set a date when I knew I had to start writing for real."
Q: Has Ghost Reveries been written on your trusty battered acoustic?
A: "Yeah, it has actually. I've done a lot of stuff on that old guitar. I've got a whole 8-channel recording thing at home now, so I did all the demos at home. As before, the guys came over, I did them CDs of the demos. We actually started rehearsing this time too! We rehearsed for two or three weeks. We figured we'd be recording the album in three weeks, but we started March 15th and I just got home. It was the total opposite of what we expected."
Q: So what should we expect from Ghost Reveries?
A: "Oh, it's still Opeth. You can definitely hear it's us. I guess it's heavier. It's not as fast as Deliverance, but definitely faster and heavier than Damnation. I think the songs are overall much better. Before I've always had the odd riff where I though I'll fix that later', and there's always
been lots of riffs that have been going on for too long or whatever. It's got the beauty and the heaviness and all the things we've had in the past but overall the songs are much more well structured. And obviously we've got Per (Wiberg, keyboardist) joined the band and there's a lot of Uriah Heep from 1971, distorted Hammond organ stuff!"
Q: Full-on July Morning-style shit?!
A: "Yeah, exactly like July Morning'. In fact, there's one song that had the working title Uriah Heep'. We share our rehearsal space with another band and they were listening and they asked us, Which Uriah Heep song is that?' It's Uriah Heep with death metal vocals! I think right now, even though I've been working with this album for so long, I think it's our best. I hope the fans will like it. It's hard to get into, though. There's so much stuff going on!"
Q: Are there any purely mellow tracks?
A: "Yeah, there's one song that could've been on Damnation. I wanted to make the best song of
that type that I possibly could and I think I've done that. It's a really good song. There's another song that was meant to be instrumental but then I put some vocals on there anyway. It sounds like a soundtrack, film-style thing. Then there's one that's pure sixties psychedelia. That's the oddest song we've ever done. And then there's five heavy songs, with lots of different things going on and they're all about ten minutes long. It's about seventy minutes in total."
Q: What made you decide to sign with Roadrunner? A lot of people were surprised!
A: "Yeah, we got flamed! But we got offered so many deals. Roadrunner... I don't know, the kids today seem to think it's some kind of nu-metal label because that's all they know, but there's all those guitar albums from the 80s, the King Diamond stuff and many other things. I'm not fond of their roster today, but then I'm not fond of anyone's roster at the moment. We chose Roadrunner because we wanted to make the album available everywhere and I don't want people saying they
can't find the album anywhere. I'm sick of that. If people think we signed for the money then that's not the case. It really wasn't a great deal money-wise. If we wanted money we could've chosen plenty of other deals!"
Q: And if you wanted to make money you probably wouldn't play this kind of music, right?
A: "Exactly. Some people think we're going to go mainstream! That's just impossible. The thing is, we met Roadrunner. We traveled around and met up with all the main contenders. When we came to New York we'd just been to Los Angeles and hung out with Robert and Century Media. They treat us so good, and I love the guy, so we were pretty much set to sign with them. But then we met the Roadrunner people and we were floored by how professional they were. I was really impressed.
Roadrunner to me is like how Music For Nations was when we signed to them. You just have to think about their history. I don't want anyone not to be able to get hold of the album this time. But we only signed a couple of weeks ago, so there's still lots to prove!"
Q: What are you hopes for the rest of the year?
A: "We're on the Sounds Of The Underground tour in the States this summer. I don't really know what it's going to do for us. I hope a lot of people who've never seen us before will come and see us play. The decision to do that tour has a lot to do with when I became a dad. It's not so cool to be on tour for a long time anymore. I've been away for so long recording the album as it is. But I'm looking forward to these shows. We've been doing this for such a long time. I want to do well. I want people to understand what we're doing. I just hope we have some good fortune."
--------------------------------------------------
Q: What's been happening since Damnation?
A: "Well, eventually we stopped touring! The last gig was Sweden Rock last summer, so since then I became a Dad and that's basically all I've been doing for months, looking after my wife as she was about to pop, so to speak, going to the doctors, having a kid, which was awesome, and hanging out with my family... and obviously I've been writing the new stuff. I set a date when I knew I had to start writing for real."
Q: Has Ghost Reveries been written on your trusty battered acoustic?
A: "Yeah, it has actually. I've done a lot of stuff on that old guitar. I've got a whole 8-channel recording thing at home now, so I did all the demos at home. As before, the guys came over, I did them CDs of the demos. We actually started rehearsing this time too! We rehearsed for two or three weeks. We figured we'd be recording the album in three weeks, but we started March 15th and I just got home. It was the total opposite of what we expected."
Q: So what should we expect from Ghost Reveries?
A: "Oh, it's still Opeth. You can definitely hear it's us. I guess it's heavier. It's not as fast as Deliverance, but definitely faster and heavier than Damnation. I think the songs are overall much better. Before I've always had the odd riff where I though I'll fix that later', and there's always
been lots of riffs that have been going on for too long or whatever. It's got the beauty and the heaviness and all the things we've had in the past but overall the songs are much more well structured. And obviously we've got Per (Wiberg, keyboardist) joined the band and there's a lot of Uriah Heep from 1971, distorted Hammond organ stuff!"
Q: Full-on July Morning-style shit?!
A: "Yeah, exactly like July Morning'. In fact, there's one song that had the working title Uriah Heep'. We share our rehearsal space with another band and they were listening and they asked us, Which Uriah Heep song is that?' It's Uriah Heep with death metal vocals! I think right now, even though I've been working with this album for so long, I think it's our best. I hope the fans will like it. It's hard to get into, though. There's so much stuff going on!"
Q: Are there any purely mellow tracks?
A: "Yeah, there's one song that could've been on Damnation. I wanted to make the best song of
that type that I possibly could and I think I've done that. It's a really good song. There's another song that was meant to be instrumental but then I put some vocals on there anyway. It sounds like a soundtrack, film-style thing. Then there's one that's pure sixties psychedelia. That's the oddest song we've ever done. And then there's five heavy songs, with lots of different things going on and they're all about ten minutes long. It's about seventy minutes in total."
Q: What made you decide to sign with Roadrunner? A lot of people were surprised!
A: "Yeah, we got flamed! But we got offered so many deals. Roadrunner... I don't know, the kids today seem to think it's some kind of nu-metal label because that's all they know, but there's all those guitar albums from the 80s, the King Diamond stuff and many other things. I'm not fond of their roster today, but then I'm not fond of anyone's roster at the moment. We chose Roadrunner because we wanted to make the album available everywhere and I don't want people saying they
can't find the album anywhere. I'm sick of that. If people think we signed for the money then that's not the case. It really wasn't a great deal money-wise. If we wanted money we could've chosen plenty of other deals!"
Q: And if you wanted to make money you probably wouldn't play this kind of music, right?
A: "Exactly. Some people think we're going to go mainstream! That's just impossible. The thing is, we met Roadrunner. We traveled around and met up with all the main contenders. When we came to New York we'd just been to Los Angeles and hung out with Robert and Century Media. They treat us so good, and I love the guy, so we were pretty much set to sign with them. But then we met the Roadrunner people and we were floored by how professional they were. I was really impressed.
Roadrunner to me is like how Music For Nations was when we signed to them. You just have to think about their history. I don't want anyone not to be able to get hold of the album this time. But we only signed a couple of weeks ago, so there's still lots to prove!"
Q: What are you hopes for the rest of the year?
A: "We're on the Sounds Of The Underground tour in the States this summer. I don't really know what it's going to do for us. I hope a lot of people who've never seen us before will come and see us play. The decision to do that tour has a lot to do with when I became a dad. It's not so cool to be on tour for a long time anymore. I've been away for so long recording the album as it is. But I'm looking forward to these shows. We've been doing this for such a long time. I want to do well. I want people to understand what we're doing. I just hope we have some good fortune."
