Having endured more than enough sonic bludgeoning during the course of my last trip to the Palladium, I was ready for something a little more cerebral and engaging. Last Friday night's lineup, composed of Nachtmystium, High On Fire and Opeth, was more of a penetrating deep-tissue massage, whereas Sept. 5's Carcass, Dying Fetus and Suffocation were more like a traumatizing rape.The eternal curse of Massachusetts highway traffic delayed me and my metal-brother-in-arms Dave "Only the weak use up one parking space" Goldstein '09, but we arrived just in time to hear Nachtmystium strum the opening strains of "One of These Nights" from their controversial new LP, Assassins: Black Meddle, Part 1. Some haters claim that the 'myst have ventured too far into experimental realms and abandoned their primal lo-fi black metal origins, but I say there's enough tr00 kvlt acts out there to satisfy your Darkthrone bone if that's your bag. I'd rather stick with something a little more interesting.

Now, knowing full well the shortcomings of the Palladium's sound quality, I was expecting Nachtmystium's black fuzz riffs to get lost in a sea of cavernous echoes, but-much to my surprise and delight-they sounded pretty darn good. Someone must have finally taken a look at the venue's soundboard and realized they'd had the "suck" knob turned all the way up for the last three years.

Emphasizing the experimental elements of their sound, Nachtmystium's set list went only as far back as Eulogy IV. "Assassins" was a serviceable opener, but it was "Ghosts of Grace" that really caught people's attention with its hypnotic, pendulous riffs during the song's final minutes. Bathed in red lights, the band cut an intense profile on stage while blasting through half an hour of trippy, fuzzed-up black metal that included chart-topping hits like the raucous "A Seed for Suffering." I was also pleased to see them joined on stage by Jon Necromancer, bassist for the tragically underrated and now defunct Chicago death-thrash unit Usurper. Closing the set with "My Vengeance" from Eulogy IV (which I bought from guitarist Jeff Wilson himself after the set), Nachtmystium left the stage with more than a few new fans nestled under their black demon wings.

High on Fire was up to bat next, spewing their caustic cloud of stoner-doom metal. I hadn't heard them before, but being a fan of guitarist/vocalist Matt Pike's previous outfit, Sleep, I was at least willing to stick around for a few songs. As I write this article, I am still deciding if sticking around was a good idea. High on Fire were heavy, oppressively heavy. But, they weren't heavy in a brutal, blast-beat way. This was a different kind of heavy altogether. I suppose being a fan of doom metal, I should have been prepared, but the painfully loud wall of bass and guitar was too much even for these battle-scarred ears. Each note felt like it was scraping out the inside of my skull with a sharp and rusty ice cream scoop. Matt Pike is also a very grotesque-looking dude. With scrawny arms and chest and a liberal beer gut, he reminded me of the Pale Man from Pan's Labyrinth. This, combined with the sonic lobotomy I was enduring, meant I would spend the remainder of the set outside.

With my fortitude re-established, it was time to return to the Palladium's Pit of Brutality for Sweden's progressive death metal legend Opeth. It's hard to believe it's been 13 years since Opeth released Orchid. Their brand of ebb-and-flow, acoustic-then-brutal death metal has more than its fair share of detractors (legions, in fact), but here they were, touring for their ninth album in front of a truly ravenous crowd. The endless hate posted on message boards by Internet trolls has had little to no effect.

At this point I have to confess that I only really listen to Opeth's Still Life and the all-acoustic Damnation albums, but that didn't stop me one bit from taking in the music. Normally the venue's poor sound quality keeps you from picking up on material you aren't entirely familiar with, but that night was an incredible exception. Opeth sounded amazing. Every riff and solo reached my ears with relative clarity. Even the bass was audible! The bass, for metal's sake!

It's also worth noting the improvement in front man and mastermind Mikael Akerfeldt's stage presence. Whereas he used to be notoriously shy, he now struts around the stage in an almost cavalier fashion, casually joking (at the expense of metal time, some loud drunk people behind me complained) with the audience.

The set focused primarily on newer and, some might argue, softer material with much of the hour-and-a-half set filled with songs from their latest release, Watershed. If you find it difficult to imagine one album dominating such a long set, keep in mind that most of Opeth's songs approach the 10-minute mark. Unfortunately, this focus meant less aggressive material, and the majority of the set was steeped in acoustic or progressive territory, with the death metal sections few and far between. While I don't think that Opeth is losing its touch by any stretch of the imagination, I do see them leaving my sphere of musical interest in the future. Still, I enjoyed the rest of their set with relative enthusiasm, nodding along complacently but never really going berserk.

Truth be told, if I were an omnipotent pagan deity, I would have taken High on Fire off the bill and switched Opeth and Nachtmystium, but as it stands, I'm just another mud-bound mortal, and I'll have to deal with it. Overall, I dub this evening, at the very least, interesting.