The black heart of the British metal scene, Paradise Lost have been handing out auditory gloom for over 35 years. Together with fellow Northerners My Dying Bride and Anathema, the Yorkshiremen established the ‘death/doom’ subgenre, but quickly branched out, helping to coin ‘gothic metal’ with 1991’s Gothic, then carrying the subgenre to international acclaim before offering sorrowful takes on alt rock and synthpop.
With the exception of their drummer, they’ve kept the same line-up throughout. Frontman Nick Holmes has seen them through euphoric highs and tumultuous lows alike. As a result, he has plenty to share, touching on everything from stupid bets to the pitfalls of defying metal’s conventions.
MISERABLE WEATHER, MISERABLE MUSIC
“I don’t know why Yorkshire is such a breeding ground for miserable metal. It could have something to do with the dark, Satanic mills, or the weather. It’s the same with Sweden. Sweden’s bred some very dark bands – and the weather’s similar there a lot of the time!”
YORKSHIRE IS A BIG COUNTY WITH A SMALL METAL SCENE
“My Dying Bride lived in Bradford and they all moved to [Paradise Lost’s hometown] Halifax. When they moved in, we’d already moved out. Aaron [Stainthorpe], the singer, I can see his house from my mother’s bedroom window. It’s quite a small, tightknit place.”
SOMETIMES PASSIONS FALL BY THE WAYSIDE
“I used to be heavily into BMX racing, and Aaron [Aedy, Paradise Lost rhythm guitarist] was as well. We used to race at a track in a little village called Greetland in Halifax. He wouldn’t admit it, but I was better than him. I’ve got about 20 trophies to prove it. I last did it about 15 years ago, and nearly broke my fucking legs. I tried doing a 360 and it nearly snapped me in fucking half! I’m not doing that again – I’m too old.”
BEING AN OUTSIDER IS AWESOME
“I liked heavy metal because everyone hated it. It was always frowned upon. It felt rebellious: there might have been, like, two guys in the entire town that liked it. I liked that. It was like having your own little team, you know?”
A BET IS A BET
“We recorded [1995 album] Draconian Times at Ridge Farm in Surrey. There was an indoor swimming pool, but it was fucking freezing. Paul Harries, photographer, was on about getting a shot and Steve [Edmondson, bass] said he’d jump in the pool for 50 quid. Paul said, ‘Alright!’ Steve jumped in holding a bottle of champagne and he got straight out, absolutely freezing. Paul was fucking pissed because Steve cashed the cheque. What did you think he was gonna do? He’s from Yorkshire!”
CROWDS THROW WEIRD STUFF
“I like playing to big crowds – even if they’re throwing things. Donington [1996], when we played with Kiss and Ozzy, everybody got shit thrown at them. Someone threw a potted geranium. It landed just behind me and I couldn’t stop thinking, ‘Who the fuck brings a potted plant to a gig?!’ There were jugs full of piss and stuff like that, but you could see them coming from a mile off. You had to dodge them like in that Donkey Kong game! Ha ha!”
THERE IS NO ‘NEW METALLICA’
“Kerrang! once called us ‘The new Metallica.’ We were just laughing about that. The new Metallica is Metallica, because they went on to get even bigger than they were at that time I guess it was a hookline to make people go, ‘Oh, hang on. Who are these guys?’ Needless to say, we weren’t the new Metallica.”
MAKE IT IN AMERICA AND YOU’LL MAKE IT ANYWHERE
“We neglected America in the 90s. We had the opportunity to spend more time there and we shunned it, which I regret. We toured there in ’93 and we didn’t go again for decades. We had a very bad time on that tour. We were very young, and it was the first time we’d been away that long from home. We did seven or eight weeks, which is too long when you’re some little teenage boys from Halifax.”
DON’T BELIEVE EVERY ROCK’N’ROLL DRINKING STORY YOU HEAR…
“We could drink with the best of them, especially in the 90s, but we never really talked about it much [in interviews]. A lot of the stories I hear should be taken with a pinch of salt. Before the internet, people used to play stuff up all the time, because there were no cameras. Stories about throwing television sets out the window; I know a few people who have done that, but it’s such an expensive thing to do. If you did that now, you’d probably get put in prison!”
…BUT WE HAVE A COUPLE OF CRAZY ONES
“At one of the Dynamo festivals, I jumped off some furniture onto [veteran music PR] Andy Turner’s back. He hit the floor like a ton of bricks. My big, thick, gothic ring filleted through my finger as it hit the floor. It embedded itself right in my finger and the skin was all the way over it. I had to go and get it removed in the hospital, and I was fucking hammered as well. It was bleeding like mad. Two months later, the ring turned back up – Andy had had it fixed for me and sent it back to my house.”
METALHEADS REALLY DID CARE ABOUT HOW LONG YOUR HAIR WAS
“We got the green light to cut our hair when James Hetfield cut his off. People were properly upset about it. For three years, everyone’s first question was, ‘Why did you cut your hair?’”
METAL HAS BECOME MUCH LESS RESISTANT TO CHANGE
“By [1997’s] One Second, Greg [Mackintosh, lead guitar] had already started getting more interested in keyboard-orientated music. We thought there was a real darkness in keyboards that you weren’t getting with metal. You could do an album like that now and get away with it, but at that time, everything had to sound like it was meant to sound. You couldn’t wander too far out of your lane and, if you did, God help you!”
JUST BECAUSE SOMETHING IS CONTROVERSIAL, DOESN’T MEAN IT’S NOT EXCELLENT
“Songwriting-wise, Host [PL’s divisive 1999 synthpop album] is a great album. There are some great songs on there and it was always about that. It was never about playing them at rock festivals or anything like that.”
NU METAL RUINED EVERYTHING
“Nu metal reinvented metal, but in a shit way. I was like, ‘What the fuck is this?!’ Linkin Park are a great band with great songs, same with Korn, but there was a whole glut of fucking garbage that came with all that. The best of the crop are still around, and for good reason.”
YOU NEVER KNOW WHO WILL MAKE IT BIG
“When Korn were picking up steam, Greg said, if they get big, he’ll eat his hat. He’s still trying to get through it. Ha ha! I had something like that with Snow Patrol. We were at an afterparty in a London hotel and I’d had a few drinks. I asked one of them, ‘What’s the name of your band?’ He said, ‘Snow Patrol.’ I remember saying, ‘Fucking Jesus! You won’t get anywhere with that fucking name!’ Then they went on to be one of the biggest bands in the world and one of them’s dating Courteney Cox.”
THE SLIGHTEST THING CAN COST YOU A JOB
“Jeff [Singer, drums] first auditioned for the band in ’94. It was one of those times where one little thing could make you change your mind on someone, and he had a pink drum kit. He said it was ‘cherry rose’, which just made it worse. We thought, ‘No.’”
EVEN THE UNLIKELIEST SONG CAN BECOME A HIT
“Greg was dead against covering [Bronski Beat’s] Smalltown Boy, but I’ve always loved that song. It’s surprising [that it’s become PL’s most-streamed song]. It’s great at festivals. You see death metal guys nodding their heads and wishing they weren’t. It’s quite funny.”
BEING IN A BAND GIVES YOU A GREAT SOCIAL CIRCLE
“We’ve done PL for so long that it’s hard-coded into my existence. I can’t imagine not doing it. When you do something for this long, what else can you do? It keeps your social networks going. A lot of my friends my age don’t have a great deal of friends around them, but we’ve got loads of mates in other bands and in the crew. It’s not to be taken for granted.”
Ascension is out now via Nuclear Blast. Paradise Lost's UK tour starts in Manchester on October 9. For the full list of dates, visit their official website.
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