OPETH Announces 'Evolution XXX: By Request' 30th-Anniversary Tour

Sweden's visionaries of OPETH have come a long way within the past three decades and evolved from raw death metal to virtuousic progressive vintage rock. Always following their own path, the band forged 13 albums, each being a new milestone within its genre and soon, the band led by Mikael Åkerfeldt is celebrating its 30th anniversary.

So, of course, the time has come to hit the road again and today, OPETH announces its very special "Evolution XXX: By Request" tour for October 2021. For these 8 exclusive shows, fans can vote, which songs they would like to hear from the band's long career. The voting will start on Monday, September 7 at Opeth.com.

Åkerfeldt comments: "So, we're planning to celebrate a belated band-birthday, also known as BBB. How do we celebrate a thing like this, you ask? Well, we go to work. We are planning a very few select shows in 2021 where you basically have the collective choice of picking the songs for the setlist. Since we celebrate 30 years, we would love to play a song from each album we've done. All 13 of them. If you can help us and pick your choice of one song per album from the list, and then we'll simply play the songs with the most votes. It's been done before, but not by us. I am reluctant and nervous, but also excited to see what songs you will choose. I can't really believe we've been around for 30 years, but there you go. So please help us. And be gentle. The final setlist will have 13 songs. One from each album. Your call…"

"Evolution XXX: By Request" tour dates:

Oct. 13 - Berlin, Germany - Admiralspalast
Oct. 14 - Wiesbaden, Germany - Schlachthof
Oct. 15 - Paris, France - Salle Pleyel
Oct. 16 - London, England - Eventim Apollo
Oct. 18 - Wuppertal, Germany - Historische Stadthalle
Oct. 19 - Utrecht, Netherlands - TivoliVredenburg (Grote Zaal)
Oct. 20 - Utrecht, Netherlands - TivoliVredenburg (Ronda)
Oct. 25 - Lisbon, Portugal - Colisue dos Recreios

OPETH's latest album, "In Cauda Venenum", was released in September 2019 via Moderbolaget / Nuclear Blast Entertainment. The LP landed at No. 13 on the U.K. chart and No. 5 on the German chart. The band's previous effort, 2016's "Sorceress", peaked at No. 11 on the U.K. chart, while 2014's "Pale Communion" entered the list at No. 14 and 2011's "Heritage" landed at No. 22.

Regarding the decision to release "In Cauda Venenum" in Swedish, Åkerfeldt told Revolver: "Doing it in Swedish was just an idea that popped into my head, like, 'Maybe I should fry my egg in the morning instead of boiling it.' It wasn't any deeper than that. And I figured the music climate has changed so much, does it really matter which language it's in? That was it. And it didn't have me writing more lyrics — it just had me writing more music. And the music didn't sound more Swedish or anything like that. But it was a gateway that opened, and it was fun.

Mikael added that he is "not regretting" the fact that "In Cauda Venenum" was also recorded in English. "A lot of people [in the U.S.] are saying they only listened to the English version," he said. "So I was proven right, in a way. I can say a thousand times that the Swedish version is the original version, but it's up to people to choose. I can just hope that they check out both versions. But I do think the Swedish version is slightly better — only because it was first. It's more innocent. With the English version, regardless of what you think about it, that's me trying to copy a vocal line I had done in another language. So it's less exciting to me."