"I’ve thought about writing a will, just to make sure my daughters don’t throw my records away." With guest appearances from Ian Anderson and Joey Tempest, plus the return of death metal, The Last Wil
Once you've been greeted and waved inside by an amiable, top-hatted doorman, Gatsby's Room, located on the ground floor of five-star, Mayfair hotel The Beaumont, doesn't appear out of time, so much as benignly indifferent to it. Lined with vintage bookshelves, paintings of man and hound, photographic portraits of well-heeled patrons, and harbouring a grand piano in the corner, the spacious interior has an air of meticulous leisure.
For all the period 1920s decor, and the exquisite futurism of the art deco fittings, it makes you feel very much in the moment. Accommodated for. Hammer is here to partake in afternoon tea with Opeth frontman Mikael Åkerfeldt and guitarist Fredrik Åkesson. Mikael has dressed for the occasion, swapping the Jethro Tull t-shirt he was wearing earlier at the somewhat more rock'n'roll Sanctum hotel for a plain black shirt, but this isn't an entirely out-of-the-ordinary experience for either of them.
The previous night was spent with Jonas Åkerlund, the director of Lords Of Chaos and the Clark Netflix series Mikael wrote the soundtrack for, ending up at the equally salubrious members-only Groucho Club.
"I think we went to bed around 2:30, and we only drank beer," Mikael fills in, "but I'm a bit wobbly today, so we might... digress."
The current setting is also fitting for Opeth's latest, 14th album, The Last Will And Testament. A concept record set in the post-World War I era, it's centred around the reading of a wealthy patriarch's will, contested by a host of siblings, legitimate and otherwise. Gatsby's Room is exactly the kind of place you'd expect them to retire to, although after the album's unfolding revelations, the mood wouldn't be quite so genteel as a result.
"My own father is coming to see me in Stockholm in a couple of days," says Mikael, as a waiter wafts seemingly in and out of existence to explain the range of teas, sandwiches and fondant fancies on offer. "He's 80, and my girlfriend thinks he's secretly rich, but I don't think he is. He's just very tight with money. He's really old school. He turns up and doesn't say much. I had one drinking session with him, and I remember I told him that night, 'I love you, dad', and he was like, '...OK.' He never said it back. He's an only child and a spoiled bastard, but I do love him."
Although family, the question of what ties them together, and what we hope to pass on, is one of the core themes of The Last Will And Testament, Mikael's grumpy dad wasn't the inspiration for the story. Instead, it was something also very dear to his heart: his famed love of vinyl. As he relates, the story started germinating during the pandemic, when he was helping out a record store-owning friend in his hometown of Stockholm, buying other people's collections on the friend's behalf.
"I went to a house where the father had died, but he'd left a collection. It was beautifully categorised and in alphabetical order, but the children – and that wasn't the only time this happened – told me he'd never let them go near the records."
What he wasn't expecting was for the experience to lead to a bout of self-reflection. "To me, that was dark. But that's how I was. This person spent his whole life with this fantastic collection that he loves, but to the kids, it's just a burden that they need to get rid of. That did inspire me, because I will die someday, and I have two daughters. I've thought about writing a will, just to make sure that they don't throw my records away, but since I started working at that store, I'm much more open with them. We'll have a record on when we're eating dinner, and now I ask them to change the sides. My oldest is turning 20 and my youngest is 17, but for most of my life, I was like, 'Don't touch them.'"
Freeing yourself from possessiveness is a process any Opeth fan can relate to. Over the course of 34 years, the Swedes have been a mercurial, ever-evolving force, beholden to no one but themselves. But with world-building albums such 2001's sweepingly progressive, pastoral-cum-Angel of Death incantation, Blackwater Park , they've instilled a deep connection that some feel has been sorely tested since Mikael dropped his death metal vocals as the band went full prog on 2011's Heritage, seemingly never to return.
"I think of that connection like Iron Maiden," says Mikael. "I've heard so many complaints. I complained about some of the later albums, but they cemented themselves with records that were so important for many people that they're still huge. At one point, we had a lot of people in that place where there was a void that needed to be filled, and the name is worth a lot to people. Even if we do a string of records that they don't like, there's one record that they love more than anything else, and for that reason they'll show up when we play... or check out the new songs and get disappointed again."
The Last Will And Testament presents a new challenge. Those deep growls, among the most distinct and powerful in the extreme metal scene, are back. But with the host of characters that inhabit the album's tale, the theatricality has been dialled up and the prog flag is flying higher than ever. Still constructed with the utmost flair, yet seamlessly blurring the line between inventive freedom and organic, naturally occurring musical chemistry, the album's deft turns, misdirections, hyperactive dialogues between musicians fully locked into the overarching drama and final, transcendently emotional resolution are inseparable from the story being told.
Featuring both Mikael and Fredrik's personal hero, Ian Anderson from British prog/folk institution Jethro Tull, as intermittent flutist and narrator, as well as Europe's Joey Tempest in a subtle cameo role, The Last Will... is another sonic realignment with untold riches for those willing to dig.
"I don't know what people expect from us," Mikael muses, as tea is served and perfectly presented plates of various sandwich triangles are placed before us. "I hope they expect the unexpected in a way, which is what happened with this record. People had been moaning about me not doing the growling vocals for about 15 years, to the point where some of them may have given up, and some fans may have lost interest because of that.
And now people are surprised, and I'm hoping the next album is going to have the same effect. I was speaking to Fredrik about this, and I was saying, maybe the next time it's going to be instrumental, and Waltteri [Väyrynen, the band's new drummer] can only play with mallets. He's a death metal guy so he'd like that idea."
What is unexpected is the level of musical brazenness this time around, a new freedom in opening yourself up to absurdity, and all the dramatic tension that sailing close to the edge can give rise to.
"Why not?" says Mikael. "I mean, we've been called pretentious a billion times. To me that's a positive word, and it doesn't make a dent to my confidence. I'd rather have that than 'lazy', I guess. But I like that theatrical aspect. I wouldn't say we've done a rock opera, but it's a bit more theatrical, and having this concept, it's easy to conjure up images and the time where the story takes place. I try to illustrate the main character through different voices. So I'm doing the death metal voice, I'm doing that baritone-type voice and regular clean singing as well. I wouldn't want to go all King Diamond and do a really weird grandmother voice, but musical freedom is all there is. It has to be playful. There is some type of humour in there, even if it's not obvious. It has to be fun."
Opeth's longevity, the knowledge that 14 albums in, the creative well is still being replenished, could be attributed in large part to the notion that not only have they never fitted into any scene around them, they have managed the rare feat of being both forward-thinking and defiantly anti-modern.
While their music suggests bygone ages from which limitless possibility can still be tapped, that approach also extends to their devotion to a rock and metal past that some might question in terms of its relevance to our ever-accelerating present times. The concept of a contested inheritance, and the legitimacy of those who lay claim to it, could be seen in all kinds of different lights.
Does Mikael feel out of touch with the contemporary world? "Yeah. I do enjoy some contemporary bands, of course, but I often get recommended certain bands and people tell me I will love them, but I then I put them on and I hate it. I have been disappointed so many times.
"I have a really strong tendency to backtrack and find the sources of other bands' sounds. In a lot of cases, new bands make it too easy. For me, that's my joy, going back and reading interviews and music s, because, for instance, you suss out how Iron Maiden sound the way they do. If you read an interview with Bruce Dickinson and he mentions his influences, you go, 'Oh, that makes sense.' So that's been very beneficial for my own broadening of horizons."
Tell Mikael that Opeth sound like a band out of time, and he won't just take it as a huge compliment, that wry yet always warm demeanour will start to change in front of you, allowing the passion that's driven him for three and a half decades to seep through.
"I guess that's what I strive for. Maybe not consciously, but even though it's so hard to know why I do what I do, I know what I want to achieve, and I think that's it, at least partly. Something that just resonates with me is the type of music that makes you have some type of emotional reaction – when you cry and you don't know why. It doesn't have to be a sad song. It's hard for me to not talk about music, or the power of music. It's almost like a higher power. I would love to be able to explain it, or have it explained to me, why it's so powerful to me."
Perhaps emotions are more powerful when they're not connected to a specific incident, when your response to whatever's triggered it is a mystery you can't fully fathom.
"Yeah," says Mikael, "I'm a nostalgic person, but quite often, it's just feeling nostalgic in itself, as opposed to being a particular memory. It's just a feeling of nostalgia that can often pop up in music of course, or in a smell. It gives you a sense of comfort, and you don't know why, so you try to backtrack to your childhood, but often it's not anything definite. I remember specifically doing a long walk in snow to a song I'd listen to many, many times, Tarot Woman by Rainbow.
This time I played it, and this time, for some reason, I just started crying. And I don't know why, but it hit me. It happens now and again – sometimes you well up, sometimes it's connected to a memory, and, other times, it's an indescribable feeling."
What does Mikael attribute Opeth's longevity to, and the deep, if sometimes argumentative feelings people have towards them, though all the mercurial phases the band have undergone? He looks down as his cup of Earl Grey, as if the tea leaves will offer up some kind of clue.
"We're lucky that we put out records that a lot of people connected to – they were a bit odd for what was going on around them at the time, but maybe it was because of that nostalgic feeling that I think we all have. Maybe they saw an honesty in them, but there was something that resonates. Those fans haven't really gone away, and I don't know why! Ha ha ha!"
