Paradise Lost - Symphony For The Lost (Album Review)
Monday, 23 November 2015
Written by Alec Chillingworth
Paradise Lost are one of the best rock bands the UK has ever produced. There. Said it. Their studio output has been smashing bigger bands into the ground for a quarter of a century and even their crap records have had their moments.
So, having the heinous Halifaxians play at the ancient Roman theatre of Philippopolis in Plovdiv, Bulgaria must be a bit decent, right? The State Opera Plovdiv orchestra and Rodna Pesen choir seem to think so, because they accompany Paradise Lost for the first 40-or-so minutes of ‘Symphony For The Lost’. And it mostly works.
Don’t think Metallica’s ‘S&M’. Think Cradle of Filth’s ‘Damnation And A Day’. Over The Madness’ doomy, death-drenched plod is heightened tenfold by the choir while the pomp of Tragic Idol borders on farcical, the orchestra accompanying a soundtrack so victorious it could overcome any army Peter Jackson may throw at it.
It’s all a bit overblown, but Paradise Lost’s music has always yearned to revel in this level of grandeur. On ‘Symphony For The Lost’, the band are now doing live what Septicflesh have been perfecting on record in recent years. Victim Of The Past, unreleased at this point but later included on ‘The Plague Within’, is confirmation, its anaemic guitar lines and blasts of growling harking back to a style many fans thought forgotten.
And then we have the man, the maverick, the abso-fucking-lute king of the seven-string: Greg Mackintosh. His solos arriving backed by an orchestra is the most ludicrous thing since chocolate Philadelphia. The juxtaposition of jagged precision and bombastic brass on Your Own Reality is like God stepping down from Heaven and smacking you about the face.
But the concert’s not without its faults. Nick Holmes is a certified gent and his death growls sound like piss being jettisoned through a smoothie-blender (this is a good thing) but Christ, his cleans are a bit dodgy at times. He strains to hit the notes on Tragic Idol – a song that relies on a powerhouse chorus – and, as a result, he occasionally sounds out of place next to the band, orchestra and choir.
But that’s a minor niggle. The crowd also really needs to go to a pop-punk gig and learn to clap in time with the music, but ‘Symphony For the Lost’ is, for the most part, a triumph. Some fans may be irked by the second half’s non-orchestral, somewhat standard setlist - the industrial stomp of Isolate is a definite highlight, which says something about the predictability of the latter segment - but it’s Paradise Lost, and we’ll flip a table every time we hear the intro to Say Just Words.
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