Ghost Reveries is the eighth studio album by Swedish progressive metal band Opeth. It was released on 29 August 2005. It was their first album after signing with Roadrunner Records, and first album since Still Life (1999) to not be produced by Steven Wilson.
Ghost Reveries is the first album by Opeth to include keyboardist Per Wiberg as a "permanent" member (although Wiberg contributed keyboard work to Opeth's live performances starting around the time of Lamentations), and it is the last Opeth album to include drummer Martin Lopez and long-time guitarist Peter Lindgren.
The album's only single is "The Grand Conjuration". A music video of the song was released, although about half of the song was edited from the video, due to the length of the song. Lopez does not appear in the video, as he was sick and was temporarily replaced by Gene Hoglan.
Background
Opeth returned home in 2004 to start writing new material for its eighth album; by the end of the year, they had finished writing it. For the first time since Still Life, the songs for Ghost Reveries were written for the album before going into the studio. This gave Opeth three weeks to rehearse and perfect the recording in the studio. The band had to decide whether to record the album at Fascination Street Studios in Örebro, Sweden, or at Sonic Ranch. They eventually chose Fascination Street Studios, as it was closer to their homes.
Opeth's European label, Music for Nations, closed its doors in 2005. After negotiations with various labels, the band signed with Roadrunner Records. Åkerfeldt said the primary reason for signing with Roadrunner was the label's wide distribution, ensuring the album would be available at larger-chain retailers.
Style
The album marks a return to the progressive metal styles of the previous albums and features death growls. However, it still includes some of the progressive rock elements of Damnation.
Ghost Reveries was initially intended to be a concept album, with numerous tracks linking together a story of a man's turmoil after committing an unconscionable act, symbolised by killing his own mother. However, Mikael Åkerfeldt commented:
The album only partly portrays a concept, not fully arranged in the poetic manner as previous releases such as Still Life and My Arms, Your Hearse.
Many of the album's tracks make use of an unusual open Dmadd9 guitar tuning, in contrast to the rest of the band's material, which is largely played in standard tuning.
"The Baying of the Hounds" is partially inspired by lyrics from the song "Diana" from Comus's album First Utterance.
Artwork
The artwork was created after the completion of the album. Åkerfeldt commented on the artwork, saying:
Release
Ghost Reveries was released in Europe on 29 August 2005, and in North America on 30 August 2005.
A special edition of the album was released by Roadrunner Records on 31 October 2006. It is packaged in a large digipak and contains a CD and DVD, along with new cover art and an extended booklet featuring extra album artwork and a letter from Åkerfeldt. The CD contains the original tracks from the album, as well as a bonus cover of "Soldier of Fortune" by Deep Purple, which was recorded as a live take with the band's new drummer, Martin Axenrot. The DVD contains a Dolby 5.1 surround sound mix (not including the bonus track), a 40-minute documentary, and the video for "The Grand Conjuration". This documentary details the making of Ghost Reveries, offering a behind-the-scenes look at the band's day-to-day life while recording and touring.
Some copies of Ghost Reveries were mastered using HDCD. Although it is unmarked, playing the album in a CD player able to decode HDCD will give superior sound quality.
"Ghost of Perdition" is included in the soundtrack for the video game Saints Row 2 on the radio station Krunch 106.66. As of 29 November 2011, it is also available for download for the video game Rock Band 3. "The Grand Conjuration" is included in the soundtrack for the video game Sleeping Dogs, on the radio station "roadrunner records". It is also included in the soundtrack for the video game Final Fight: Streetwise, being the boss battle theme song of one of the game's bosses, Famine.
Release history
{|class="wikitable"
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! Date
! Release
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| style="text-align:center;"|29 August 2005
|Europe
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| style="text-align:center;"|30 August 2005
|United States
|}