DELIVERANCE

Deliverance, the album that was made to be Opeth's heaviest, is quite infamous for Opeth fans who see that it is divided between albums of heavy lineage, it came after Blackwater Park, which was highly acclaimed and evolved into what the predecessor Still Life did, to be honest, Deliverance is almost a 5, ALMOST, but I feel like it's let down by the not very good mixing, and that's probably one of the reasons why a lot of people don't like it very much, coming after the aforementioned Blackwater Park doesn't it helps, as it was a very remarkable album due to its very high level mixing, here, the sound is more rigid and closed, which actually suits the album, but I will be critical when I say that it could be better, in all other ways, I like very very much Deliverance, the 5 songs (For Absent Friends is an interlude) present a lot of versatility and consistency that rivals much of the band's best works, it's an album that I always find myself revisiting and rarely not finishing, because of how interesting and consistent it are the songs, the album has a great sense of direction from section to section, as it is focused on being heavy, the acoustic moments are not as present, and that is an interesting choice, when they appear, they are very climactic and mysterious always, every time. the songs are essential to the album and none are weak with the title song of the album, being the best heavy song that Opeth has ever done, 13 mind-blowing minutes, all the musicians are incredible here, Martin Lopez as the drummer is phenomenal here, Peter Lindgren and Mikael Åkerfeldt release killer and incredible riffs all the time, and Martin Mendez and his bass are quite consistent and the tone is great, unfortunately, what doesn't make it a masterpiece is precisely the mixing that doesn't do justice to how good the compositions are, otherwise, Deliverance is excellent, but it loses to the other albums due to its not very good production, but it gets it right in every way and I highly recommend it, unless you don't like heavy music.