PALE COMMUNION

It isn't as though this wasn't expected. Opeth had been steadily drifting away from their death metal roots for a good long while by this point, with 2003's Damnation avoiding it entirely, so it's hardly an enormous surprise that Pale Communion finds the residual metal thoroughly flushed out of Opeth's sound. In its place stands a hard-rocking tribute to the heavy psych roots of progressive music, which I'm sure is a subject that the band and Steven Wilson collectively have a whole bunch of insight into - and indeed, their take on the style is an effective update of it.

On previous listens, this (and much of Opeth's earlier back catalogue) left me a little cold; it took listening to their discography from the start for me to really get my head around where they are coming from and what they're trying to do. Now that I've readjusted my expectations of what Opeth are about, I can find a lot to like here; it's essentially a development of the approach of Heritage (right down to the Steven Wilson mix), and I think if you liked that you will enjoy this. I even think Mikael Åkerfeldt's clean vocals, which I've always felt were a bit of a weakness of the band's sound, has improved here compared to Heritage. Don't expect the sort of innovative prog-death metal mashup they did in their lean, hungry years, but do expect a prog album with lots of retro touches but cutting-edge modern production.