British band Paradise Lost has a knack for producing dark and moody, yet very accessible metal. And that's exactly what they do on Believe in Nothing, serving up a bunch of tracks that could appeal to a wide range of music fans. Tight and melodic, "Mouth" is an excellent example of how to write a chart-topping rock song. In fact, almost exactly the same thing could be said about "Fader" and "Illumination." "Look at Me Now" is also a noteworthy tune, but probably a little too easy on the ear and thus lacking staying power. The suitably sullen "Never Again," on the other hand, gets better with each spin. In the end, Believe in Nothing doesn't quite scale the same heights as a couple of the band's previous releases, such as Shades of God and One Second…
Doom legends Paradise Lost continue to churn out albums of high quality and The Plague Within delivers the goods. They meld their signature Doom Metal with their more angry, Death Metal stylings. They open the album with the very melodic "No Hope In Sight" and follow it up with a much more aggressive cut "Terminal". The album definitely gets more and more old school as it goes along integrating guttural vocals to the aggression. Other highlights include "Punishment Through Time", the blistering "Flesh From Bone" and "Cry Out". Another solid album from the prolific Paradise Lost.
In the scope of Paradise Lost's career, their eponymous release from 2005 represented the act of Hell freezing over, for it witnessed these founders of the British doom movement finally deigning to revive the sonic blueprint that made them famous in the first place, nearly a decade after seemingly abandoning it forever. Still, the general consensus was that its songs didn't quite match the band's good intentions, and so it fell to its 2007 successor, the aptly named In Requiem, to make amends and come just a few steps closer to resurrecting Paradise Lost's post-death/doom, goth-inflected middle period (marked by the classic Shades of God, Icon and Draconian Times albums)…
Following 2007's In Requiem, the renowned Yorkshire gothic metal outfit return with their 12th studio album, Faith Divides Us Death Unites Us; its title stemming from vocalist Nick Holmes's views on the futility of war in the name of religion. Opting to work this time with Jens Bogren (Opeth, Katatonia) instead of long-term producer Rhys Fulber, Paradise Lost have picked up the heavier parts of the last album and run with them, resulting in a set of downtuned, seven-stringed, crushingly weighty, yet melodic and atmospheric tracks that hark back to their doom metal roots.
Paradise Lost's career trajectory comes virtually full circle on 2009's Faith Divides Us - Death Unites Us, an album that sees the British metal veterans resuming virtually the exact same accessible goth doom style that characterized their most commercially and critically successful albums, in essence making it sound like the would-be successor to 1995's Draconian Times. Of course, in the real world, that successor was 1997's One Second, which initiated the group's often still remarkable but widely underrated voyage into a decade's worth of electro-goth rock experiments before the start of its metallic "rehabilitation" via a tentative eponymous set in 2005 and its far more focused follow-up, In Requiem, a couple of years later…
Obsidian… dark, reflective and black: it’s a pretty decent description of the music that Paradise Lost have been making over the last 32 years, even though this most resilient of British metal bands have stoically refused to be pinned down to one easily defined formula. Powered by a lust for creativity and a stout devotion to haunting heaviness, Paradise Lost have defied the odds by coming back stronger than ever over the past decade.
From the deceptive elegance and dual atmospheres of opener "Darker Thoughts" through to the crushing, baroque doom of war-torn closer "Ravenghast", Obsidian reveals a band in masterful control of a broad array of vital ideas.
Originally released in 1999, Host earned Paradise Lost their reputation as West Yorkshire's musical chameleon, as it saw the band moving further away from their previous death metal roots to a melancholic and catchier electropop sound.
Singer Nick Holmes comments: "With the Host album we wanted to take the One Second concept further and make a very dark album with even more subtlety. It was a bold leap from all our previous albums, a leap too far some would say, but for me, the new remastered version really shows it's still one of the bands strongest albums in terms of song writing, atmosphere and sheer misery."
Re-worked and re-recorded version of the 1993 classic fourth album "Icon".
Paradise Lost has returned with a new full-length album, and "Icon 30" is here among us to ensure that 2023 is nicely wrapped. The album serves as a second look at "Icon," originally released in 1993 and now celebrating its 30th anniversary - an impressive milestone for the band.
Reaching the 30-year mark is never an easy feat, and it always comes with its hardships, and most importantly, overcoming them while still delivering the best we have. This applies to both bands, albums, and, of course, people. "Icon 30" is the new take on a classic album - a restoration of a piece of art that may have been nostalgic for the band to revisit their own history.
Live recording of the show on November 3rd 2013 at the Camden Roundhouse, London UK, as part of their 25th anniversary 'Tragic Illusion' tour.
Four years after the release of their critically acclaimed “Braindead,” LOST SOCIETY return with a brand new album “No Absolution,” out on 21 February 2020. Inspired by thrash predecessors ANTHRAX and MEGADETH while combining the groove metal tendencies of PANTERA, LOST SOCIETY was founded by vocalist/guitarist Samy Elbanna in 2010