BLACKWATER PARK

Blackwater Park is special in that it was the first Opeth record that Steven Wilson produced, so it sounds absolutely fantastic. Some might say the rawness of the band lost a bit of edginess, especially when the band is at their most rocking, which is a fair point, but the overall sound is still a treat to crank up on a good stereo.

The best thing about this record is that it features four of the best songs Opeth has ever done: Bleak, Harvest, The Drapery Falls and Blackwater Park. Those four songs are, by any measure, among the best these Swedes have ever written. Patterns in the Ivy is an absolutely gorgeous piano/acoustic tune, and then the rest is a mixed bag in that they are all songs with great moments - the piano outro in The Leper Affinity; the gorgeous electric guitar outro in Dirge for November; the rad as hell acoustic intro in The Funeral Portrait - but overall those songs are all fairly run of the mill Opeth songs; not really standouts songs, and they prevent the album from being anything more than 4 stars for me.