Paradise Lost: "We are our own biggest critics"

If you take into consideration that Paradise Lost have been active for 35 years and they’ve reach their 17^th full length album with "Ascension", it’s release in quite an accomplishment in itself. But, it’s the fact that the album is so brilliant that makes it even more impressive, proving that the fire stills burns strong in the band’s camp.

With that in mind, having the chance to chat about the new album and the status of the band with Nick Holmes was a no-brainer. And Nick indeed proved to be in great spirits, having a lot of interesting things to share with us regarding the making of the new album, the inspiration behind the music and the teenage dreams that are always hard to beat. Plus, he answered some questions coming straight from the fans of the band, making our conversation even more interesting and intriguing.

I'm really glad to have a chance to talk with you. It's been a long time since I first fell in love with Paradise Lost, about 30 years ago and I only had the chance to talk with Greg so far. So it's really a pleasure and a privilege to have a chance to talk with you.

Oh, cheers, man. Appreciate that. Thank you.

It must have been a heavy schedule doing interviews regarding the new album all day long. So are you enjoying this promo period or is it like a burden for you to talk that much?

It's just something you do. I mean, we've always done it. It's just… you do the album and then you do the promotion and then you go on tour it. It's just part of the cause, you just get on with it. So yeah, it's fine. If people like the album, then it's certainly a lot more pleasurable than if they all fucking hate it. That's definitely a bonus… (laughs)

I think we're giving a spoiler early on, but I think you achieved something great with this new album. We'll talk about it later on, but congrats for it.

Cheers. Appreciate that. Thank you.

It’s not the same feeling as when you're a new band and you're releasing an album

So, reaching the 17th LP album as a band with a 35-year career, how different is the feeling as the years go by, having a new album out? How do you experience having a new album released with Paradise Lost these days?

I mean, it's not the same feeling as when you're a new band and you're releasing an album. I remember how we felt when we released our first album or the first two albums and how people responded to it. It was always difficult to tell how people would respond, because there was no internet. So, you only realize how well it did when you played live. That's the only time, when you walked on stage. That was the only time you realized that people liked it or didn't like it. Now you can get much more of a rounded indication of if people like it or not before it's actually released. Especially, if you're going to do three singles, so you get a gist for the vibe of the singles. So, I guess, if the vibe's good, then we're looking forward to everyone hearing the rest of it. But yeah, I mean, we've worked very hard on it. We did the best we could with it and hopefully people like it. You can't really wish for more than that, you know?

If you're expected to write an album every couple of years, and especially if you're touring, you need to step back from things and put things in perspective and have a bit of retrospect on things

On my side, I can tell that "Ascension" is so good that, after all these years, it's an accomplishment by itself to put out such a good record. So, I was wondering… what was your motivation and your inspiration for this album?

I think we had quite a bit of time to write it. I think it's good to have space… I mean, if you're expected to write an album every couple of years, and especially if you're touring, you need to step back from things and put things in perspective and have a bit of retrospect on things. So, the pandemic was two years and we wrote the Host, the side-project album, that Greg and myself wrote. We did that in between and then we re-recorded the "Icon" album. And then we came back to writing this album, the new album. So, we had a bit of time to distance ourselves and decide where we wanted to go with it really. I think you can have too much time… but at this stage in our career, after so many albums, it's good to have a little bit of space and just see where you're going to go.

Do you think that this album/touring/album/touring cycle has become a bit more hectic than it should and it has affected a bit the bands and the quality of the studio works somehow?

We draw a line in the sand with playing live when we're writing. We say "That's it. We're not going to play any gigs now for however long it takes to write the album". So we're lucky that we have the luxury of being able to do that. But we say "Okay, well, we want 10 months to write an album, so we're going to not do anything for 10 months apart from writing". We're lucky we can do that. I can't imagine writing on the road. I can't see it being productive. And I know bands will do that, but we've just never been able to do that. It's not our thing at all. We need some space and we need to be in a more static environment, I think, to write. But, I guess, we're lucky in that situation that we have the luxury to be able to do that.

I don't want to growl for the sake of growling, it's got to fit right with the music

Now, I'll be 100% honest here telling you that the three last albums that marked a new chapter in the Paradise Lost sound, wasn't really my cup of tea. Mainly, because I'm not the biggest fan of growls and stuff. But then again, while you don't change that much in the new, as it’s not a 180 turn from what you did, it seems much more balanced. You're clean, aggressive and brutal vocals on this album are all brilliant and have a great balance. Would you agree with me that this balance is a key factor and makes a difference in this new work?

I think it just adds to the variety of it. I mean, I don't want to growl for the sake of growling, it's got to fit right with the music. If it feels aggressive, if a song's a galloping aggressiveness guitar, then the voice has got to go with that and the aggression of it. At the same time, I don't want to growl over clean bits that would sound better with a clean voice. So, it's just about whatever fits, what's the right environment for the song and about what complements the music and vice versa. Being death for the sake of death… we don't need to do that. So, I'm not gonna start just growling because I have to feel I have to growl. I just do it where it feels right.

But again, we've had space. We've had a lot of time to really revise the songs and come back to them and change parts and tweak them and keep coming back and blah, blah, blah. So we've had that luxury. So we've been able to figure out. There's lots of parts on the songs where I've done clean lines and growls, but it sounded better to do clean or growl or vice versa. So we've had the luxury to be able to tweak it, to make it the best that we can.

Sometimes you've got to grow into songs and get to know what's going on there. And that makes it more interesting ultimately as well. If something's too instant, you're going to go off it pretty quickly

So, when Greg presents you an idea, how do you follow the inspiration to know if it's better to put a growl or a clean voice in the first place? What drives you?

Usually, he doesn't say much… Because, usually he has something in mind. He'll have a growl voice or a clean, but usually he doesn't say, because he knows if he has a growl in mind and I sing a clean line, we can use a clean line somewhere else. So it could be like a happy accident. And then he'll say "Well, I had growls in mind" and I’ll go "Okay, well, I'll work on a growl now". But then the clean line will maybe work in another part. The more the more ideas there is, the better it is, because the more to work with. So, I've done growls over other things and he said "It doesn't work for me that at all" and I’d go "well, I thought it sounded great". But then when you first hear things, sometimes even if you don't like it at first, then you can you can grow into things. So I never dismiss anything I hear. If I hear anything and think "Oh, this is strange", then I’ll come back to the see if it makes sense after a few listens. Sometimes you've got to grow into songs and get to know what's going on there. And that makes it more interesting ultimately as well. If something's too instant, you're going to go off it pretty quickly. So, it's good to have things that you have to get into as well. I like that aspect.

But, the fact we don't sit in the same room and write is better for the songs, because we would probably agree on more things if we were sat together and then we would both agree that we'd be wasting our time for the last six hours... (laughs) So, we have the file share, how we work with file share and how we write songs is definitely better for the songs, I think, you know.

I get it, but maybe in the future you could try an old school method and get back in the studio and write songs right away…

Yeah, I mean, there's no right or wrong way to write anything. Happy accidents are very rare, you can have happy accidents, but you usually don't… they're very rare. But, there's no right or wrong way of doing anything. It's just the end result... Like I said, there's no rules to it. It's just going to do whatever works.

I guess life is about luck on the whole… But, "Ascension" is just trying to do the best you can...

So, let's go to the title of the album. Why did you call the album "Ascension"? Is it connected with the themes and the lyrics of the album some way? And really, what are the main topics of the lyrics?

The title, I was knocking at… I mean, I write down album titles and song titles. Every time I think of something, I write it on my phone. And I've got about 500 titles and 500 song titles. And most of them won't get used. If they're extreme, they'll get used for Bloodbath songs… (laughs). I'm always thinking of words that kind of go together and they are the incredibly dark sentences or incredibly dark pompous phrases. I like all that kind of stuff.

But, the tile, I've had that word in my list for a long time... The fact that you go through your life and you just do the best that you can and you ultimately want to rise up and do the best you can in every situation. I guess now that I'm of an age where I'm in the last part of my life, you could also look it at the aspects of religion… so you want to go up and you want to go to heaven. If you want to believe that, that's fine. It's not for me. For me, it's more about just doing the best that you can, despite all the negative things that happen to you, and the positive things, and all that shape you into the person you are. But there's a lot of very bad people have a lot of good luck and there's a lot of good people have very bad luck. And what determines that, I don't know. I guess life is about luck on the whole, you know? (laughs). But, I guess, "Ascension" is just trying to do the best you can...

We’ve always been after that sort of album cover for a long time actually. But, for some reason nothing clicked

Also, the artwork is amazing and fits the album perfectly, with the whole atmosphere of the album. And it doesn't seem like a typical Paradise Lost album cover. So how did you end up with it?

Well, that's the thing. We've always liked the kind of grand master, the very old style painting. We've always liked the Renaissance type paintings. We've always loved that vibe. And we've always been after that sort of album cover for a long time actually. But, for some reason nothing clicked. I mean, Greg found the artwork and straight away he sent it to me and I went "Oh yeah, I like that as well!". So we instantly just clicked straight away, which is brilliant, because artwork is so subjective. You can have about a thousand emails where nobody likes one thing and somebody likes something. It can be a crazy trying to decide on artwork. It is really subjective, more subjective than music, I think. But, it was very easy this time because we just straight away liked it. Like "Yes, we've got our cover". So, that was good. We just like that old style…

We stopped doing that in the in the 2000s, because when you're trying to write a single on an album it just detracts from the album

Yeah, it really fits. Going to the music of the album, how come "Savage Days" was not chosen to be one of the main singles of the album? Maybe you didn't want people to have a wrong idea for the musical direction of the album? Because, I can't find any other reason…

The only reason is because we make a point of not writing singles or anything. We just write the album and we don't even want to think about that aspect. And then when it comes to the release, everyone who's involved in the album decides which songs they think should be the single. And then the songs that are singles are the ones that everyone decided basically… We just say "Okay, fine"… The only reason is because we asked everyone what he thinks and that song just didn't come up. As simple as that.

But, at the same time, for us it's about writing albums, it's not about writing singles. We stopped doing that in the in the 2000s, because when you're trying to write a single on an album it just detracts from the album. And then you end up with an album with one good song on it. And we just don't want to go there. We leave that to other bands.

I just wanted to highlight how good the song this is.

That's quite an old song actually. I think "Lay A Wreath Upon The World" and "Savage Days", these are two of the earliest songs we wrote, actually. "Savage Days" has changed a lot, but still the early demos are kind of similar. But "Lay A Wreath" is maybe the oldest song on the album, actually. But the style we were writing then on those songs has changed slightly over the years. So, again, having the time to change and make things a bit more varied, I think that the album benefits from that. Having the time, the style’s slightly different on different songs.

"I didn't know Nick could sing like this…". It’s like… I can’t!

There's no reference in the press release or anywhere else, but we're quite sure that we can hear Alan from Primordial making a guest appearance on "Salvation". Can you confirm that?

You can! I can confirm it, yeah. I mean, the part he sings on, I had that kind of voice in mind and I can't sing like that. So, I thought Alan would do a good job of that, because that's in his zone… So I asked him to do it and he was "Yeah!". But a lot of people still think it's me, because they were saying "I didn't know Nick could sing like this…". It’s like "I can’t!"(many laughs) "Well, I didn't know you could do this. You should do this more often"… (laughs)

So, yeah, it was Alan. That part, he really lifted it. Because, in my mind, how I sang it, it needed more height, more old school kind of metal singing. I know, he did a great job, I’m really happy with it. I don't think he's got a copy yet, actually. I need to send him a copy. I don't think he's heard it yet… (laughs)

Interesting. He did a great job…

He's got an album on the way to him anyway, I think anytime now. But yeah, I didn't send it to him. I sent him the part he had to sing on, but that was the only part he heard… (laughs)

Apart from these songs that have already been mentioned, there is a kind of old school, 90s feeling in songs like "Diluvium" and "Sirens", yet they sound fresh. How do you explain this? Was it a conscious decision to breathe fresh air to old recipes maybe, in your songs?

Well, "Diluvium" is very similar to something we would have done on "Shades Of God". It's just very old school metal sounding and particularly it could have been on "Shades of God", on that album, that song. I think it lends itself very much to that style of the old, very old Paradise Lost stuff. But, I guess, if you take that and have a modern production sound, then it's going to make it sound fresh. Obviously, the new album sounds way better than the "Shades Of God" album did. I guess it's just down to modern production and everything sounds brighter and therefore hopefully sounds more up to date.

As you said, you make albums and I always love that because I'm an album person myself. And I always pay much attention to the closing track of an album, because I think it sets the tone as much as the opening track does. And I think "A Life Unknown" is on the other side of the spectrum in comparison to "Serpent On The Cross", the last one being very melodic and the opening track being maybe the darkest, heaviest track on the album. Did you want to have these different sides bookending the album?

Again, "Life Unknown", that was again a very early song, one of the earliest we wrote. And it's had a few variations, but it is fundamentally the same as it was when we wrote that song, There's a couple of songs… On the actual album itself, there was kind of this difficult to decide which songs we should leave off. But for us, the album's just side A, side B and the end song on the album, then the extra tracks. But we have no extra tracks when we write them, we just see what fits in the running order. And those two songs at the end, they were the ones that we thought they don't fit too well with the rest of the thing.

But, we certainly don't think about B-sides. As soon as you think B-sides, it will affect you psychologically. It's not a good thing to think something's a B-side because already it's shit! (laughs)

That doesn’t happen with Paradise Lost…

No, it doesn’t... But, I'm just saying that the psychology behind it is you just write 10, 12 songs, whatever…

Anyway… the last half of that song changed really recently. And I think it's the best part of the song. And it's one of the best parts of the album, actually. I love that, how the chord changes right at the end of it. I really like that part. And that was very late on. That was right at the end of the writing process, when we did that. So, it was like the earliest song with the last bit slotted in. But again, we got the space to come back and we were lucky to have that…

Now I'll do something I've never done before. I have a special section in the interview, because that questions come from the members of the forum of our site. It's been running for the last 20 years and the thread of discussion about Paradise Lost is one of the most passionate. There are some guys there that love you seem they could talk all day about you. So, in order to reward them, I told them to send me a few questions that they’d like me to make to you…

Great!

Of course, they haven't heard the album yet, but I have a few questions from them.

Alright!

First of all, Fotis asks, since you are touring with Messa, if you have the chance to check their latest album "Spin"? What's your opinion on it". Also, if you have a current favorite gothic rock band?

I haven't checked them out as much as I intend to do. We met them recently, I think it was Paris. We met them recently at one of the King Diamond shows they came on. They're really nice people. Oh, it was Milan! They’re great guys. I play them and instantly I thought they're great, but I haven't gone back to it as much as I wanted to. We're going to play with them every night, so I'll probably know the set back to front by the time we finished touring with them! (laughs). I'll know the songs incredibly well by then! But they're a great band, and they're nice people as well, which is the most important…

We are our own biggest critics

All right! Nikos says that there are albums like "Medusa" that are more cohesive and focused on one style, while "Obsidian" covers a lot of ground. "Ascension" seems to be in the latter category. Could this be because you want to satisfy as many of your fans as possible, or it just showcases how broad your music palette is and how versatile you are as songwriters?

When it comes to songwriting, we always say this… we have to please ourselves first and foremost. We are our own biggest critics. If we feel like we're repeating ourselves, we know it, we're aware of it very early on... I mean, you know, we are our own biggest critics. And if it gets past our quality control, then there's a chance that other people will like it. We always have that mentality with it. If we like it, then there's a good chance other people will. If we think something's shit then other people will, without a doubt. We set the bar quite high for our own conscious, we have to have it our way. I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night if I thought something was wrong or shit. So the bar is kind of high in our own camp in that regard.

When Greg got back into Vallenfyre and got back into death metal, I joined Bloodbath and it got us back into the music we used to love when we were teenagers again… We remembered what we liked about metal in the old days and we're still in that zone

Manolis asks: Greg recently commented that with "The Plague Within" you started a new musical era for the band. How do you think your sound has evolved from "The Plague Within" to "Ascension"? Especially what makes "Ascension" different from the previous albums and "The Plague Within" per se?

I don't know! I guess each album is a chapter anyway. Whether it's a positive or negative, it's still a new chapter regardless. I guess we found our footing a bit with the song style. I mean, when Greg got back into Vallenfyre and got back into death metal, I joined Bloodbath and it kind of got us back into the music we used to love when we were teenagers again. And that definitely was a shot in the arm for us on an inspiration level. We remembered what we liked about metal in the old days and we're still in that zone. We still enjoy the old bands, still enjoying the old death metal bands, it's still there. Also, at this stage now, there's massive amount of nostalgia for those days, because teenage years and teenage dreams are hard to beat. So, I guess the inspiration came back and we got more into the heavy stuff again. And we found the reason we started the band in the fitsst place. And we're still there with the new album. We haven't lost that feeling at all. It's still there, and hopefully people will hear that.

Yeah, they’ll do. Now, Loukianos asks if the revival of the goth culture through TV series like "Wednesday" on Netflix has somehow benefited the whole current goth scene and bands like you, in a way.

I couldn't say for Wednesday, I’ve never watched it. I thought that was some kind of teenager thing... Is that like some sort of like a teenage sort of thing?

Yeah, yeah. It's like Adam’s Family for teenagers...

Oh, is that what it is? All right. Yeah, I don't know about that. I mean, I'm more into stuff like Game of Thrones and more kind of adult. I do love dark stuff, dark fantasy stuff. I am quite a fan of that. But it's got to be very dark. I'm not interested in that kind of teenage stuff. I don't know so much about the teen stuff. I definitely find Game of Thrones was incredibly inspiring.

Manolis, again, asks that there is a rumor that you're only going to perform three new songs on your upcoming tour when you usually play five or six. If it's true, why so? And also if you're planning to perform any of your deep cut tracks on your upcoming tour?

We'll probably do three. I think we're planning three songs. We usually do four. I don't think we've done more than four that I can remember. So we're doing three on this. Then we probably start playing some other songs later on, maybe on the second-half of the tour. But, we're playing a lot of songs we haven't played for a long time as well. There's like six or seven songs which we're bringing, but we haven't played for quite some years. Unless you're showcasing the full album, which we're not, it's just a case of you playing the songs that people know and have heard. I guess we could play pretty much anything off the album at some point, but just not for the first part of the tour.

If you get thousands of people all giving a setlist, usually it’s the same as the setlist we do already

Only yesterday you it was announced that you'll play on 70,000 Tons Of Metal, the cruise and the second show will be a fan voted set. So what are you expecting from your fans to vote there? Are you dreading any song in particular?

Well, it's weird. It's weird because we have done fan voted sets before and if you get thousands of people all giving a set list, then you take every single song and you put them in order of how often they'd be mentioned, usually the setlist is the same as the setlist we do already.

They want to hear "Say Just Words". It's a good song. People enjoy hearing it. You're not going to not play it...

I expected that…

Yeah! Because people were saying "Ih, you should do this, you should do that". And literally, on setlist.fm, from the stats on there, you can see which ones we've played most. And it's quite a good indication for you to think "Okay, well, maybe we shouldn't play this as much". But then people want to hear it… They want to hear "Say Just Words". It's a good song. People enjoy hearing it. You're not going to not play it. So you've got to play these kind of songs that people know. You could play obscure songs that maybe three or four people want to hear. But if you're playing to X amount of people, you've got to make everyone hopefully happy... (laughs)

Cover songs are pretty good if you've dried out, or if you haven't got enough time to write any more original material

I know what you mean. Now, Fotis asks why you've stopped doing cover songs. The last one must have been "Never Take Me Alive" back in 2012…

Probably the main reason is we feel like we've done enough… I mean, cover songs are pretty good if you've dried out, or if you haven't got enough time to write any more original material. It's like "Okay, we can do a cover. We can bash out a cover pretty quickly". But we haven't been in that situation where we've had to do that. Again, sometimes there are time constraints where you think "Oh, we haven't got a lot of time, well, let's just do a cover, blah, blah"… That's a lot of the reason why a lot of bands do cover versions. We just haven't really been in that zone. Also, we've done a lot of covers, there's no overpowering urge to do any more anytime soon, but who knows?

Unfortunately our time is running out. I'm very happy I had the chance to talk with you. Our love, here in Greece, for Paradise Lost is everlasting. I think you know that…

Yeah, I do.

First time in Greece was great… when we all had the big hair and all that

So, just before we close and, I want you to share with me the most precious memory or story that you have from your visits here in Athens, Greece…

Probably the first time we ever came there! Because, we couldn't believe the crowd, how responsive they were. The crowd was crazy! We didn't even know what to expect. Obviously, before the internet, you don't know what you're going to get until you arrive. And that was like "Fucking wow!". It was incredible. And also in those days, you could have a little bit of a vacation. So we did all the tourist shit and we were hanging out a few days and we were looked after. We all got hammered all the time. It was great. It was really good… (laughs) Now you fly in and you fly out. And before you know, you're back on a plane to somewhere else. But, back in the day, it was a mini vacation/gig, and like I said, it was very memorable. Yeah, it was great the first time… when we all had the big hair and all that… (laughs)

I wasn't there the first time. I was very young to be there, but I wish I could be. So, thank you very much for your time. It was lovely. Congratulations for the new, which album is fantastic….

Thank you mate! I appreciate it!

Hope to see you soon in Greece again and maybe have a blast like that first time.

Yeah, hopefully man. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. All the best.