Staff picks

It's hard to believe that human civilization peaked on March 12, 2001, but we of Metal Storm are well aware of the fact that Opeth's Blackwater Park is the single most important and amazing work of art ever to grace our unworthy human senses - and today this pillar of sonic achievement turns 20 years old.

Now, iconic reviews aside, I don't actually believe that Blackwater Park is the greatest album ever released - in fact, it's not even my favorite Opeth album - but there's no denying that it is a milestone in its genre, easily one of the definitive recordings of progressive metal. It ranks among the most significant and influential works in its sphere, standing tall even within Opeth's discography; with a career practically founded on the production of successive magna opera, Opeth will likely never have a single, incontrovertible outlier to be crowned their best, but Blackwater Park does have something like a mythology surrounding it. Maybe you don't have to treat it like the apex of heavy metal, but it's still a damn good progressive death metal record that we can all enjoy, and what more reason do you need to give it a spin?