Je viens de recevoir le Host interactive press-kit. Je vous mets des photos du digipack et du CD, ainsi que les cinq photos du groupe qui y ont été gravées (tout le monde les connaît, ces photos, mais bon...), et la présentation du groupe. Le reste du média ne m'est pas accessible, car mon PC est trop récent et ma version de Windows n'est pas compatible. Je verrai ce que je peux faire pour récupérer les données, malgré tout.
Host interactive press-kit, 1999, EMI Electrola réf. CDP 000 011.
Contenu :
- Vidéo ;
- Biographie (en anglais et en allemand) ;
- Paroles ;
- Interview filmée ;
- Photos.
[Vous devez être inscrit et connecté pour voir cette image]PARADISE LOST
Nick Holmes – vocals
Greg Mackintosh – guitar, keyboards
Aaron Aedy – guitar
Lee Morris – drums
Steve Edmondson – bass
„Somebody asked me to describe our music“, says Paradise Lost singer Nick Holmes, „and I said dark rock. They said they’d never heard of dark rock. I said, well, you have now“.
Paradise Lost’s ever-evolving sound is not easily defined, but dark rock certainly reflects the mood, depth and emotive power of the band’s new album „Host“, their for EMI Electrola.
Paradise Lost are no ordinary rock band. They have sold more than a million albums worldwide without any hype. They were still a cult act in their homeland when they headlined Holland’sDynamo festival and attracted a record-breaking crowd of 135.000. Their influences run the gamut from The Smiths to Black Sabbath to New Order.
Paradise Lost have never followed rock’s trends. As guitarist Greg Mackintosh affirms, „We’ve always been outsiders“.
It has been this way ever since the band’s formation in 1988 in West Yorkshire town of Halifax. „Most of the bands we played with at the start were hardcore punk bands“, Gregg recalls. „Extreme Noise Terror and bands like that. Everyone was playing fast and we were playing as slow as possible“.
„When you first start out you just make a noise“, Nick explains. „It wasexciting when we first started playing heavy music, but it stopped beeing exciting when everybody started doing it. We just wanted to do something that nobody else was doing. And once we’ve done something, we try not to do it again“.
To this end, „Host“, Paradise Lost’s seventh album, is their most adventurous work to date, fully embracing the electronica present on the preceding „One Second“, itself a top ten album in many major European markets.
„Half of „One Second“ was playing safe“, Greg admits, „and half was exciting and new to us. This time we did exactly what we wanted“. „We try to be original“, Nick stresses. „Obviously you’ve got to keep up with how music is progressing, and we’ve got influences like anybody else, but the kind of stuff that’s had a bearing on this album is mostly from the `80s, from Duran Duran to New Order. Our music doesn’t necessarily sound like those bands, it’s in a modern context, but the `80s were a great period for music, and we were too young and narrowminded to appreciate it before“.
Despite these pop influences, the new Paradise Lost songs are anything but throwaway, and the pervading mood on „Host“ is melancholic.
As Nick explains, there is a very real sadness at the heart of these songs. „Music, to me, is about feeling and atmosphere. We’re not intrested in uptempo rock songs. They might be good in listen to live when you’re pissed, but the stuff we’re doing now is the kind of stuff you’d listen to at home. Anyone can write crowd-pleasing rock songs“.
„There’s a lot of thought behind this music“, says Greg. „There’s enough energy to make people dance to in a club, but also you can put it on headphones and listen to all the sounds going on“.
„Lyrically, angst is my main source of inspiration“, Nick reveals. „Angst as opposed to anger. Years ago I was shouting, why is life so horrible? Now I’ve accepted it and these songs reflect upon it. As you grow older you become aware of your mortality. When you’re young you think you’re invincible. Now I only think I’m invincible when I’m drunk“.
„I only sing about the darker things in life. „So Much Is Lost“ is one of a handful of songs about loss, however it may manifest itself,whether someone dies or you lose a lover“.
„I’ve had plenty of inspiration in the past year, from bringing upmy first child to the death of my father. It wasn’t long after my little girl was born that my father passed away. People come and people go“.
„The way I see it, if you’re feeling happy, it’s a normal, mundane experience. It’s hardly worth talking about“.
To Nick Holmes‘ mind, the best lyricist of recent years is Morrissey. Paradise Lost first revealed their admiration for Morrissey and his former band The Smiths when they covered „How Soon Is Now“, The Smiths‘ classic 1984 single.
„Morrissey’s lyrics are so tongue in cheek, I love them“, Holmes says. „I stay well away from irony when I write, but I really relate to the humour in a song like „Girlfriend In A Coma“. When she dies at the end, it’s great. She could have got better, but not in a Morrissey song! It’s funny, but I hated The Smiths when they were massive in the `80s“.
Like The Smiths, Paradise Lost have been dubbed the kings of misery, but as Greg reasons, „We couldn’t possibly be as misserable as we sound on record. We’d have killed ourselves! Basically, there’s not really any middle ground with us. We’re either pissing ourselves or just kind of glum. It’s more natural for us to not smile“.
However, they do raise a smile when assessing the new album. „We love it!“, Nick stresses. „It’s what we would buy as music fans. That’s why we do it“.
„The only thing that matters is whether the songs are good or not“, states Greg. „We were very aware of the kind of record that we didn’t want to make. The first thing we said to the producer Steve Lyon (The Creatures, The Cure) was avoid all the cliches, and that goes for everything: guitar sounds, drum sounds.
„I brought Steve in because I’d heard an album he’d produced by Recoil, which is not a very well-known album, it’s not even very commercial music, but it’s full of really good sounds. We put all the keyboards through the same effects as the guitars. There’s not a lot of bands who use keyboards in that dark way, distorting them and doing weird things“.
The first taste of Paradise Lost’s new music comes with the single „So Much Is Lost“. The accompanying video, directed by Marcus Nispel (Bush, Fugees, No Doubt) and filmed at Universal Studios in California, features only Nick and a dancer who has previously appeared with The Artist Formerly Known As Prince.
Ultimately, for all ist cutting-edge production values, this single and ist parent album testify to the power of good songwriting, something that Paradise Lost have always believed in.
„Music shoud be emotive“, Nick says. „I’ve heard this album a thousand times, maybe more, and I still love hearing it. Thats the whole point of being in a band, to me“.
„It’s so weird when people ask what’s my favourite thing we’ve done“, Greg smiles. „That’s such a bizzare question. Why would you continue if your favourite album was your second album? You’ve got to believe that your current music is the best you’ve done“.
March 1999
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So much is lost (Lost in Space mix) ;
Nick HOLMES : chant ;
Label : EMI Electrola GmbH.
Cassette audio : 7243 4 99947 4 4 (7 24349 99474 4) ;
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