OPETH! This has been my first thought. "Orchid" and "Morningrise" still are absolute classics of Progressive Death Metal, mixed with various other styles, creating their own ingenious whole out of it. "My Arms, Your Hearse" then marked a change in sound, which didn't really hit my taste anymore, just to continue this path with "Still Life" - unfortunately...

Now you may ask, what the hell this has to do with NOVEMBRE's "Classica"-album. Well, a lot, because this with this CD they enter upon the succession of the Swedes, but not after the Isnogud-principle of "I want to be OPETH instead of OPETH!", but as a related band, whose roots are close to OPETH's, but either are going deeper or have reached different levels now.

I do not want to exalt any of the ten tracks, because they all form one sculpture of sound, which is so complexly interwoven that any try to do so would put down other songs.

Demanding, yet catchy. Heavy, with double-bass, crunchy guitars and Death Metal vocals, yet emotional with acoustic guitars and clean vocals, this is NOVEMBRE anno 1999.

Who liked the old OPETH has to have this album. All others should do so as well...