This.

Opeth performing one of my favorite Opeth songs, “The Grand Conjuration”, live at the U.K. installment of the Sonisphere festival, which was held July 8-10, 2011 at Knebworth House. Professionally filmed, multiple camera-perspectives (including a great shot of Martin Axenrot’s concentrated face viewed through a hole in a cymbal), awesome sound, smoke.

This is one of the reasons we recognize Exceptions to the Rule of no clean singing.

Equally superb clips of Opeth performing “Face of Melinda”, “The Lotus Eater”, “Master’s Apprentices”, and “Hex Omega” can be viewed here.

Opeth’s new album, Heritage, will be out September 20 on Roadrunner Records.

I’ve never been entirely sure about the point of metal news releases about music you can’t yet hear, albums you can’t yet buy, and tours for which you can’t yet acquire tickets, but people still seem to be interested in this kind of shit. Not me, of course. I’m so fucking zen-like in my outlook that these kinds of pointless cock-teasers just flow over me like a soft summer breeze, barely ruffling my hair. My pulse rate doesn’t move a beat from its normal, slothlike resting state. I remain as steady and unmoving as a hummingbird.

Wait, that didn’t end right. Okay, well maybe it did. Truth is, I am metal-nerd enough to get excited about this stuff, though I can’t provide any rational reason why. In keeping with our unintentional Finn-centric theme of this week’s posts, several of these items focus on Finnish metal.

So, here’s the top-level summary of news for this post: Announcement of two new European tours — one featuring Gorgoroth and Vader and the other headlined by Machine Head; a progress report on Insomnium‘s new album; word of an all-star album (and the label “all-star” is no bullshit) in the planning stages from Finland’s Spinefarm Records; and perhaps the most glaring example I’ve seen in months of an interviewer failing to ask a follow-up question (in this case, about Opeth‘s new album).

While I’ve got your attention, I might as well also throw in some music you can actually hear right now — high-quality footage of Suicide Silence performing a song from their forthcoming new album.  (all that stuff after the jump . . .)

Do you think we’re overdoing it with these Opeth opdates? Nah. Not possible, is it?

Especially when this opdate concerns the initial dates for a North American Opeth tour with Katatonia. Yes, you read that correctly. Tour news! Here are the dates that have been disclosed so far:

Sep. 19 – Worcester, MA – Palladium
Sep. 20 – Hartford, CT – Webster Theatre
Sep. 21 – New York, NY – Webster Hall
Sep. 22 – New York, NY – Webster Hall
Sep. 26 – Columbus, OH – Newport Music Hall
Sep. 28 – Nashville, TN – Cannery Ballroom
Sep. 29 – Charlotte, NC – Amos’ Southend
Oct. 06 – Kansas City, MO – Beaumont Club
Oct. 08 – Winnipeg, MB – Garrick Centre
Oct. 16 – Portland, OR – Roseland Theater
Oct. 21 – Pomona, CA – The Fox Theater
Oct. 25 – Denver, CO – Ogden Theater

More dates will be coming in the near future. Seattle better be one of them or there will be hell to pay. I can sense Opeth trembling in their boots already, just imagining the awful wrath of NCS if Seattle is snubbed.

But that’s not the only opdate we have. You may be asking yourself, “Self, how will Opeth play live shows without a keyboardist?” Answer: There’s reason to believe Opeth has found a replacement for Per Wiberg, who was relieved of his duties in April. For the latest word on that, continue on after the jump.

Damn, I’m finally able to go outside without shivering and being beaten about the head and shoulders with high winds and rain blowing sideways. That must mean it’s June in Seattle!  And so it is. A largely dismal May is behind us, the Seattle Mariners are astonishingly only a game and a half out of first place in their division (that’s baseball for you outlanders), and the summer lies ahead.

What else lies ahead? A bunch of new metal, of course. And because it’s the beginning of a new month, we’re bringing you another installment of METAL IN THE FORGE, in which we collect news blurbs and press releases we’ve seen over the last month about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like (including occasional updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know their music yet. In this series, we cut and paste those announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

Remember — this isn’t a cumulative list. If we found out about a new album during April or preceding months, we wrote about them in previous installments of this series. So, be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported earlier. This month’s list begins right after the jump. Look for your favorite bands, or get intrigued about some new ones.

Yes, that’s the opdate, right op there at the top of this post — the just-disclosed cover for Opeth‘s next album, Heritage. The artist is the very talented Travis Smith, who has done many other Opeth album covers in addition to cover art for dozens of other bands you’ve heard of.

So, all you album art critics out there, what do you think? With one lingering reservation, I think it’s damned cool. I love the vibrant colors and the arrangement of fantastical images, and the suggestion of the demonic underground feeding life to the green Opethian tree from which an endless line of fans is feeding (or at least that’s how I’m interpreting it).

The lingering reservation stems from those heads of the band members in the tree. It adds to the psychedelic aura of the whole picture, but it’s also a bit campy.

Coming back to the colors, much of what Travis Smith has done for the band in the past has been sombre and monotone (though there have been exceptions). After the jump, I’ve collected all of the cover art he’s done for the band in the past. Take a look — and by all means, let’s hear what you think of this cover.

ALSO, I’ve now got the detailed reactions to this cover of NCS writer BadWolf. He and I each wrote our thoughts without seeing what the other thought. Among other things, he sees this cover as a sign (among others) that Heritage will not be a metal album. Check out what he has to say after the jump, too.

I’ve been thinking about Opeth, and it has affected my word formulation. It’s some kind of temporary phonemic speech disorder, I think. But I’m not sure. I’ll have to continue thinking opon it. But for now, onward and opward!

So yes, I’ve been thinking about Opeth because some additional details were released this morning about their next album, entitled Heritage, which will be their tenth.

First, it will be released on September 20 by Roadrunner Records. Second, it was produced by the band’s vocalist/guitarist Mikael Åkerfeldt and it was mixed by Steven Wilson (Porcupine Tree) and Åkerfeldt.  Third, Travis Smith (who has created many other Opeth covers) worked with Åkerfeldt to create, design and execute the album’s artwork.

Fourth, Åkerfeldt had a few things to say about the album: “It will be our 10th album/observation. I dig it; we all do. In fact, it feels like I’ve been building up to write for and participate on an album like this since I was 19.” He also had some intriguing things to say about the music — which we’ll quote for you after the jump.

Lots of you thought Ihsahn‘s 2010 solo album After was one of the best albums of last year, and of course all of you are huge Opeth fans. Aren’t you?  Yes, of course you are. We know these things.

If advance press reports are correct, Opeth entered Atlantis studios in Stockholm on Monday of this week to begin recording their tenth album for a fall 2011 release on Roadrunner Records, with the engineering work to be handled by Jens Bogren (Soilwork, Katatonia, Paradise Lost, Bloodbath).

Now, it stands to reason that Opeth will tour the world in support of that album, and the world includes the U.S., which means Opeth will come here to play for us. How does Ihsahn fit into this story? Well, our metallic brother BadWolf brought to our attention that a petition has been started on Facebook to convince Opeth to bring Ihsahn with them in support of that tour — which would be Ihsahn’s first U.S. tour if that were to happen.

That sounds like a damned fine idea. Maybe if enough of us on Facebook “like” that petition page, someone might be convinced to actually make it happen, someday, some way. Certainly can’t hurt, can it? To support that petition, here’s the link.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!  Did you see what we did?  We had to change the logo for this edition of SICKNESS.  Because 2010 is behind us, and the new year lies ahead.

We spent the last 30 days, as we’ve been doing for the last year, collecting news blurbs and press releases about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like, or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know them yet. And in this post, we’ve cut and pasted the announcements and compiled them in alphabetical order.

All of our previous monthly updates can be found via the “Forthcoming Albums” category link on the right side of our pages, and because we’re not keeping a cumulative list, you might want to check the last couple months of these posts if you want to get a full picture of what’s coming. The list that follows, in alphabetical order, are albums we didn’t know about at the time of our last installment when November ended, or updated info about albums we’d previously heard were on the way. And be forewarned: This is a really long list. There’s a massive slag of new metal coming our way, and man, does it look hot.

So, without further ado, let’s get started. See if there’s anything on the list that makes you moist, or tumescent, or just generally slobbery.

ABORTED: “Good news is that we are starting pre-productions for our upcoming record on January 4th. This means we will demo all the songs for the record, make sure everything sounds good and make the necessary adjustments to make sure they are all more lethal than a chainsaw in Mr. Leatherface’s hands. We’re all very excited about the material thus far and can’t wait to get this over with and proceed to the actual recordings later this year. Expect a fall 2011 release through our culprates in mayhem Century Media.”

AGNOSTIC FRONT: “The Godfathers of New York Hardcore, Agnostic Front, have just finished recording their highly anticipated follow up to their 2007 release, Warriors. The yet to be titled album features 13 new powerful and anthemic songs laid down by Erik Rutan (Madball, Goatwhore, Cannibal Corpse) at his Mana Recording Studio in Tampa, FL under the watchful guide of producer Freddy Cricien of Madball. The record was mastered by Alan Douches (Nile, Mastodon) and will be released in Europe of March 4, 2011 and in North America on March 22, 2011.”

(the list continues after the jump . . .)

If you’re a fan of Opeth (and really, who isn’t?), then you probably know that the band is on the verge of releasing a DVD of their live performance at London’s Royal Albert Hall on April 5, 2010.

What you may not know is that to promote the forthcoming DVD (scheduled for release on September 21), Roadrunner Records is making available a free mp3 download of Opeth’s live performance of “Dirge for November” at that concert. 

Roadrunner says it’s “the full album version” and clocks in at almost 9 minutes, but the copy we downloaded stops short of 5 minutes and omits the acoustic guitar and clean singing at the beginning of the song.  That’s disappointing, but regardless, the song is great.

The price you pay for the download is providing an e-mail address and a name.  You’ve then got to go to the e-mail account you provide in order to get the download link.  If you’re game, click this link.

Sight of Emptiness plays Gothenburg-style melodic death metal. But they’re not from Sweden, or from anywhere in Europe, or even from the U.S. Sight of Emptiness hails from — of all places — Costa Rica.

Costa Rica isn’t known for its melodic death metal. In fact, until stumbling across Sight of Emptiness, we didn’t know anyone in Costa Rica played any flavor of death metal. And for that reason, we probably wouldn’t have been tempted even to listen to this band’s musical output. But what changed our minds was the news that the band’s second studio album, Absolution of Humanity, which is expected to be released late February/early March, was mastered in Sweden by Jens Bogren, who has done similar duties for the likes of Opeth, Amon Amarth, Soilwork, Bloodbath, Katatonia, and Symphony X.

The band has posted three songs from Absolution of Humanity on its MySpace page, and has released a performance video of a fourth song, “Faceless Dream.” Based on this offering, the band is definitely following the trail blazed by bands such as Dark Tranquillity and At the Gates, but that’s not a bad thing.  As pathfinders go, those bands are peerless. And Sight of Emptiness has both good songwriting skills and solid musical technique, and we particularly liked the impressive vocal range of frontman Eduardo (aka “Filthy”) and the occasional touches of Spanish musical passages added to the mix.

This is some catchy, headbanging fun. The novelty of being an extreme metal band from Costa Rica may be the initial hook for these dudes, but there’s substance here, too. Sight of Emptiness is currently unsigned, but we’re wishing ‘em luck in finding a label.

Check out this video of “Faceless Dream” by Sight of Emptiness:

Sight of Emptiness – Faceless Dream from Sight of Emptiness on Vimeo.