Links, Opeth signed to Roadrunner?

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"Tzaaa, Swedish Death Metal"-New Paltz local imatating Swedish accents.

I found out through Blabbermouth.net and Opeth's (Swedish progressive/melodic/death/doom band) official forum on Ultimate Metal that Opeth are close to signing a record deal with Roadrunner records out of NYC.

Strange that Opeth would sign to Roadrunner considering that the label has a bad reputation of screwing over bands in underground (death/thrash) genres. Although Roadrunner started off as an "extreme" label with bands such as Obituary, Death, Deicide, Life of Agony, Sepultura, Fear Factory ect, over the last ten years the label has signed nu metal acts and spent more money promoting trendy, nu metal and metal core.

  Crappy nu metal bands such as Nickleback, Chaimiria, KSE, Machine Head have gotten tons of promotion from Roadrunner while acts such as Type O Negative, Deicide, Sepultura, Death (RIP Chuck Shuldiner), Fear Factory have jumped ship for greener pastures where they wouldn't have to comprimise thier musically intergrity for trends or CD sales.. Cradle Of Flith, fresh off a stint with the major lable SONY have recently signed to Roadrunner, but we all know that COF's best days are behind them, as thier are no longer "troo" BM.

I'm not sure if Opeth signing to Roadrunner is a part of a larger concept of "selling out" and promoting/marketing themselves to the Hot Topic, mallgoth/nu metal/metal core kids, or if Opeth plan not to comprimise thier music.                                  Perhaps Opeth are signing to Roadrunner because after all, Opeth are far more accesible, with less death, grind, and thrash riffs,(some people are bored by Opeth's lack of outright brutalty/technicality calling them BLOPETH) and melancholy acoustic interludes than thier more brutal counterparts in death and extreme metal. Perhaps Opeth couldn't resist the $ offered by Roadrunner..

Just in the fact that the sounds of The Underground tour (mostly nu metal/hardcore/metalcore featuring Opeth) is in part promoted by Roadrunner and Hot Topic goes to show you the direction that Opeth may be going in the future.

Although Steven Wilson (Porcupine Tree) did a good job producing Opeth's Black Water Park, Deliverance and Damnation. Many complained that as good as Steven Wilson's production was, it brought a more American, commercial sound to Opeth, hence the raw, atmospheric sounds of Morning Rise, Orchid, Still Life, and My Arms your Hearse are long behind them.

The only personal benefit to Opeth signing to Roadrunner (Roadrunner's USA offices are out of NYC) as I won't feel so obviously guilty about perhaps doing an internship with (the blantly commercial NU METAL/metal core) Roadrunner as I've avoided working with that label as I was offered an internship with the now defunct Hammerheart (Pennslyvania) in 2001, but turned it down because the label was being bought off, and I would have to relocate to Pennsylvania.

Hence the music bizz these days, with P2P file sharing (more on my opinions about P2P file sharing in a future entry) corperate conglomerate labels are folding as the music bizz has been turned upside down, problably for the better.

Too bad Opeth's old label Music For Nations (long known as one of the better underground extreme labels) folded last year, as the label merger left Opeth out in the cold and dropped.

As someone on Opeth's official forum (Ultimate Metal) said, "My life is no longer worth living, good bye"..LMAO.

Stay Metal and Stay Brutal-Tee \m/ -l-