OPETH — Orchid (review)

Album · 1995 · Progressive Metal

4/5 · 2010-04-07
arcane-beautiful

To be honest, I don't think it's fair to compare this album to the later Opeth releases, due to the fact that there other albums where achieved when Opeth really had achieved the sound that they were searching for.

Many fans of Opeth (I have seen Lamentations, and I think that the testoesterone driven metal fans have only respect for the death metal side of Opeth, and seem to ignore the brilliant musicianship that was presented in their acoustic passages, the trait which attracted me to them in the first place.) seem to not have any real respect for this album, being ignorant to the fact that the album was basically a demo, the production is quite bad due to the fact it was their first recording and that (in my non perfectionist way), the music is still present, so stop worrying about the production and listen...with ears.

The songs aren't the strongest Opeth songs, and they didn't really seem to have much hooks. The music presented is well crafted and their some lovely folky like acoustic passages. The vocals, which seem to be growls throughout nearly, I really enjoyed. When it comes to growlers, Mikael is probabbly one of the most unique and one of the best. His early growls almost have a Cradle Of Filth ambient feel to them.

Some people may say that the songs have no real structure, but I did develop a pattern. Most of the songs followed this specific pattern.

I. Instrumental section II. Verses with growls III. Acoustic section. IV. Return of verses with growls V. Another acoustic section. VI. Instrumental outro

I like this way of organising music. It reminds me of classical forms like sonata, binary and rondo. My band Eternia, also organise our long songs in a similar fashion.

The lyrics seem to have a concept, but to be honest, if it is, it's about a man who is journeying through...A FOREST (nudge nudge nudge wink wink wink), trying to find his soul, who appears to be a woman.

1. In Mist She Was Standing - After an early Fates Warning and Iron Maiden like melodic metal intro, mixed with black metal undertones (kind of like early In Flames), the song then portrays elements of Genesis like dramaticism and a dollop of Morbid Angel like growls. The slow section is very reminiscent of Pink Floyd. The random screams add to the atomesphere of the almost folk like passages. To be honest, the music is spectacular. The song seems to be quite lengthy, but due to the fact it is almost like a musical journey...it really succeeds itself.

2. Under The Weeping Moon - This song is very doom orientated, and sounds like My Dying Bride (the kings of doom). The middle section sounds like the dark sections in Rush' Cygnus suite. The instrumental sections ae very dark and eerie and leave you feeling uncomfortable, but in a good way. To be honest, to spot a production error, there is way too much echo on Mikaels clean vocals.

3. Silhouette - Weird piano instrumental. The production is quite poor, but it adds to the ghostly feel to the song.

4. Forest Of October - A very Candlemass like intro, with a cool scream from Mikael. This is another dark piece, with some random acoustic sections. But they work...somehow. Another doom filled piece.

5. The Twilight Is My Robe - A darker version of Iron Maiden (isn't that Cradle Of Filth?) I feel that the acoustic passages could have been extended. This song sounds alot like The Carpenter by Nightwish. Probabbly the most interesting song on the album.

6. Requiem - A nice wee interlude.

7. The Apostle In Triumph - The intro of this song is very folky and reminds me of traditional music. The acoustic parts with added percussion are cool. The middle section is quite eccentric and reminds me of Antonius Rex. The layered vocals on this song sound quite good as well.

CONCLUSION: If you love Opeth, don't buy this album, buy the rest, then buy The Candlelight Years. This album is great album, and is amazing as a debut, but buy albums from Still Life to Ghost Reveries first (to be honest, Watershed was a bit of a let down.)