A disappointment from top to bottom. The melodies, progessions and structures are very standard Opeth, with the usual dose of painfully effusive sentimentality (Åkerfeldt should really avoid trying to sing folk, it just comes off as comical). Far as arrangements go, other than a few new ideas on the drumming side (well, they do have a new drummer afterall, no major surprises there), there is really very little new here. It feels, in all honesty, like the tried and tested Opeth formula, and in terms of development only continues what they've been playing around with for the last 7+ years. These tracks might as well have been throwaways from the Ghost Reveries sessions.
It's simply just another reworking of Opeth, the result being a fairly generic prog metal album. It's not going to convert any new fans, nor satiate the more demanding among the older ones.
Other bad points include the fact that the studio work is SO evident on most of the guitar lines that it just sounds robotic. It might as well have all been done on midi using synthetic sounds. The human touch has been all but torn away from it and the result is, to say the least, extremely displeasing.
If Åkerfeldt knows what he's doing, he'll try something genuinely different next time and reinvent his band entirely, because hell, a makeover of drastic proportions is needed at this juncture. Then again, with the unduly great reviews the album is likely to receive, I guess they'll feel little need to change. Oh well. Pity.
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