Metal Monday – Opeth – Baying of the Hounds

Welcome another Metal Monday. Today I have a song that I feel fits so well with a book I just finished. I wonder if people would be able to guess what said book would be or if they would have had the same song (were they also into the same metal as I am into) stuck in their minds as I have had this past week.

Well my friends, any guesses? No? Oke, I was talking about The Hound of the Baskervilles by Conan Doyle. This not only means that there is sure to be another Sundays with Sherlock post up soon(ish), but that I also have a great song to go with this book. The mention of mires and moors and hounds within Baskervilles was mentioned so much that my mind just could not switch of from playing this Opeth song on constant repeat. There is a chorus with nice clear vocals talking about drowning in a mire that bares a very profound resemblance to the book that I just can not ignore. Lead vocalist Mikael Åkerfeldt has such a dynamic voice. This song starts with his almost demonic, almost houndish sounding vocals and later mellows out only to become that evil baying at the end that I imagined Holmes and Watson might have heard. I swear this song could have been an ode to the book had I known any better.

If you have the time and feel like being taken on an auditory journey, for this song reaches the ten minute mark, I highly recommend it. This song has such a catchy and groovy feeling to it, I have listened to it about four times while writing this post alone, it is that good to me.

Baying of the Hounds was one of my favorite Opeth songs even before Sherlock came knocking on my door. It now has even more of a special place within my mind thanks to Doyle. This song has as much atmosphere as the book had an I am forever grateful that I knew about it.

Please enjoy!

Lyrics:

I hear the baying of the hounds
In the distance, I hear them devouring
Pest-ridden jackals of the earth
Diabolical beasts and roaming the forests

In wait and constant protectors
Calling you to sit by his side
Your self-loathing image in his flesh
A revelation upon which you linger

His words are flies
Swarming towards the true insects
Feasting on buried dreams
Spreading decay upon your skin

His eyes spew forth a darkness
That cut through and paralyze
Casts light upon your secrets
Forced to confront your enemies

His mouth is a vortex
Sucking you into it’s pandemonium
Fools you with a helping hand of ashes
Reached out in false dismay

His body is a country
The cities lay dead beyond despair
Friends turned enemies unable to come clean
In a rising fog of reeking death

Everything you believed is a lie
Everyone you loved is a death-burden
So you take comfort in him
And you are receptive to stark wishes

No longer struggling to declare your stand
You would inflict no harm to others
They are unaware and in a loop of futile events
You are everything, they are nothing

Drown in the deep mire
Past desires
Beneath the mire
Drown desire now with you (X2)

Lined up verses on dead skin
The tainted lips of a stranger
Resting upon hers

And I embrace bereavement
Everything beloved is shattered anyway
I would devote myself to anyone
I would accept any flaws

I am too weak to resist
Tension vibrating with horror
Finding the outcast in my eyes
Pushing nerves on a puppet
Endless poison in my veins
Clean intent now tainted with death

And so, cold touch now inhumane
Every waking hour awaiting a reverie to unfold
And now they are calling me
Louder by the minute
The baying of the hounds
Calling me back to my home