Johan DeFarfalla

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Johan DeFarfalla is a Swedish bass player, born in 1971 in Stockholm. He is the former bassist for seminal Swedish progressive death metal band Opeth.

DeFarfalla originally joined Opeth in 1991 along with David Isberg on vocals, Mikael Åkerfeldt and Kim Pettersson on guitar, and Anders Nordin on drums. He replaced Nick Döring on bass for one show, and DeFarfalla quit immediately afterwards. Opeth moved on, recruiting Peter Lindgren to replace him for their next show, and then Stefan Guteklint after Lindgren moved to guitar. In 1994, Opeth was approached by Candlelight records, and Opeth fired Guteklint. DeFarfalla rejoined Opeth, initially as a session bassist, but he subsequently became an official member again and joined them on tour.

DeFarfalla appears on the albums Orchid (1994) and Morningrise (1996). After touring in support of Morningrise finished, DeFarfalla was fired from Opeth by Åkerfelt, citing that DeFarfalla was not a good fit (possibly due to the fact that DeFarfalla wanted the bass to have a more prominent role in the music of Opeth, an aspect which Åkerfeldt did not feel comfortable with).

The departure in sound on all subsequent recordings has often been attributed to the recruitement of bassist Martin Mendez and drummer Martin Lopez (Nordin quit Opeth to move to Brazil days after DeFarfalla was fired for unrelated reasons), although Mendez did not contribute or record any basslines for Opeth's next release (1997's My Arms, Your Hearse). If Opeth's sound can be described as having been influenced by jazz, it is most prevalent on the first two albums (that DeFarfalla and Nordin contributed to), the fourth album being an exception.