PALE COMMUNION

Despite having a prog-heart at its core, I have almost always preferred the classic Opeth era until 2008, originally because of its progressive metal leanings but later even more because of the ominous and serious atmosphere, riffing style and acoustic vs brutal contrasts. Opeth have opened several doors for me: death-metal and other progressive extreme metal such as Enslaved. In 2012, at the time of the "Pale Communion" release, my expectations were relatively low after the average "Heritage" album. This album marked the most evident stylistic permanent change but still kept enough roots into progressive metal. 3 years later, Opeth paved way to a much higher dose of symphonic/psychedelic and 70's retro progressive-rock ( around 1970-1973. The improvements over Heritage is improved songwriting, more streamlined output as if Akerfeldt felt now more comfortably to ask as a prog-rock musician. Having said that, it's also the Opeth album with the highest amount of cliches (borrowed from prog-rock/hard- rock) and their own recycling a la Watershed unless Sorceress. We have three categories of songs, I'll start with the one I plainly dislike - straightforward hard-rock anthems. It was "Slither" on "Heritage and it's "Cusp of eternity" here. They have a good melody and a likeable guitar solo but the songs as such are boring to me.

The second, most populous category, is represented by retro prog songs. Here, I can't stop the feeling that many such intensive moments are more self-indulgent than they are good. Examples are overly loaded riffs, not naturally busy drumming, compare it to a normal car that gets 6 wheels instead of 4. "Goblin" is an example of an elaborate instrumental which plays more than what is has to offer.

The third category are mellow moments where Akerfeldt's voice, now having its clean vocal improved from the past, really shines and there is suitable instrumentation. "Moon above, sun below", "Elysian woes" and "Faith in others" are good examples. These two songs also convey that Akerfeldt is a good songwriter in the classic sense, having sense of melody, motives and exquisite taste of chord sequence. If you listen to the final chord sequence at around 5:25 mark in "Faith in others", it feels like a fork entering your heart, a true beauty.

My verdict is mixed - Opeth doing prog is not as good and original as Opeth doing death/prog metal. I'm saying that as a seasoned progger who listened to hundreds of prog--rock/metal albums. For a casual prog listener, this could be a much more rewarding listen. Regardless of any of my criticisms, this is the best Opeth album of the 2010's followed by their 2019 output. I will give it 4 stars because there are still multiple moments of treasure and beauty to be found.