#04 | Opeth

Title: Watershed

Label: Roadrunner

To hear Mikael Åkerfeldt describe the writing and recording of past Opeth albums, the phrase “giant clusterfuck” comes to mind. “We had always put ourselves in a situation where the songs aren’t written, we haven’t been rehearsing and nobody knows anything about anything, really,” he says of the stressful anti-process. The Watershed sessions were a different story entirely. “I didn’t have any problems writing this album at all. I felt a newfound freedom in some way,” he adds. “I felt very much that we’ve become a better band.”

Though the departure of longtime guitarist and drummer Peter Lindgren and Martin Lopez was “devastating,” the arrival of Fredrik Akesson on lead guitar and Martin Axenrot on drums has given Åkerfeldt, Martin Mendez and Per Wiberg a welcome kick in the pants. “It was just real cool,” enthuses Åkerfeldt, “to finally feel psyched about writing and recording again.” The singer even goes so far as to use the f-word: fun. “I think all of us ended up having more fun because we were so disciplined,” he says of the band’s newly acquired stringent work ethic.

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