I havent really had a chance to hear the new album but the first thing that registered were the use of the harsh vocals. (Note, havent heard in cauda much).
He (Åkerfeldt) talks about it cynically in interviews, saying that it feels like the growls are all anybody ever cared about in the band’s music. And it seems like this is a little bit true, at least for some fans; for a lot of people, the first reaction to hearing “Paragraph 1” was to proclaim that Opeth is “finally back,.*
I dont know what reviews were referenced, but if true, just curious as to whether prog listeners agree that it was always about the growls... Lets face it metal fans can be heavily OTT with change.
I don't love that this is his perspective. Damnation is one of my favourite albums of theirs and it had no growls, what I dislike about the "third era" is how much it just sounds like 70s prog rock which doesn't interest me in the slightest
Thats the weird thing, Damnation is probably my favourite Opeth album, just ahead of Ghost Reveries, and I DO love 70's Prog, and I still didn't care for their recent albums. It just weirdly didn't seem like Opeth to me, somehow. Felt like them doing a 'thing'.
Edit: corrected Deliverance to Damnation. Whoops. [6]