I can’t help it… I simply love OPETH. I am aware of the fact that such an exclamation doesn’t correspond to a serious journalistic evaluation of a band, but hey… I don’t give a fuck! Loving a band doesn’t mean that you’d take anything. Opeth have done a brilliant job once again. The recording has been mastered excellently, Mikael’s vocals are so dazzlingly beautiful and moving, the chord-complexes of the guitars on this record are magnificent, not predictable whatsoever due to the fact that these guys know how to play. They certainly have a formal background that can be sensed in every single note. That is, the moods are so relaxed, jazzy, bluesy, melancholic. The bassist invigorates this generally beauteous atmosphere of the band with his effective and interesting licks – just awesome. The drummer plays these great varying patterns that make everything seem to float and flow. Then there is an organ (a Hammond organ I guess)… this instrument was, at times, integrated into OPETH’s sound already, and this time it works again. It has a consoling effect, it calms you down after a stressful day. This album is so very serene and silent… a release Mikael and the other guys in OPETH always wanted to embark in. Now they have done it, and it sounds enchanting. There are no heavy guitars or drum beats as one got used to considering the past albums. This output is completely relaxed and still. My favourite track is ‘Hope Leaves’… here, the vocals are so profoundly beauteous and moving I think. The lead guitar in this song is divine, the groove carries you away. I know that a lot of you guys out there assume now that I am gay or something. Well, first of all: fuck you! Secondly, I am gay in the original denotation of the word, which is happy. Happy that such grand musicians like the OPETH guys got together in order to bring forth this splendid music and caress our rotten society with some magic. I am very much into brutal Black / Death Metal stuff as well… but, y’know, reality constitutes a melange of various moods… one of which is a sense for beauty. OPETH records the soundtrack for this sentiment!