Orchid

Decibel contributor Forrest Pitts reflects on Opeth‘s farsightedness and ability to manipulate our collective imagination.

On its sometimes utterly unhinged, sometimes heartrendingly beautiful E.P. Title Track, Portland quartet Dowager crams a lot of divergent influences, elements, and combustible sonic materials into its atomic artcore reactor with improbable cleverness and success. The subsequent explosion can be mesmerizing, calling to mind American Football and Mineral as much as Orchid and early Converge.

Shredding in metal dates directly back to Tony Iommi, who is inexplicably still writing riffs and will be a big part of the new Black Sabbath album due next month. So, we figured it was a good time to invite a new generation of doom shredder into the studio this week. Mark Thomas Baker of…