paradise lost live

It was with some trepidation that I ordered my ticket to go and see Paradise Lost a couple of months ago, but more about why later. Then I found out that Katatonia were supporting, so I was much happier about that.

King Tuts Wah-Wah Hut is a small venue at the back of a pub on the edge of Glasgow’s financial district and shares a Georgian office block with solicitors, accountants, staffing agencies and advertising firms. It’s a good venue, intimate and close, although that can be challenging in it’s own right.

Engel, from Sweden, opened up just after the doors through to the hall were opened, and apparently with only a minimal soundcheck, which left them sounding fairly awful for the first song, but then the sound crew got on top of it, only for the backing track machine to go off in a huff. So we only got four songs from them. A tough day at the office for Engel then.

Katatonia, Swedish doom metal aficionados were up next, enthralling the crowd with their own unique sound, and a surprisingly lengthy set. This was comprised of old and new songs, including a superb rendition of Forsaker from the new album. There were a surprising number of people there just to see Katatonia, judging from the reaction from the crowd to July and Forsaker particularly, and then from the way the barrier cleared once their set was finished, those spaces being filled by the diehard Paradise Lost supporters. We will be looking forward to their alleged headline tour in March 2010.

And so to Paradise Lost. I’ve seen them a number of times over the last couple of years and their sound has always been a bit off, with the vocals being inaudible, and the guitars not really in balance. I was on the point of writing them off as a live band, preferring their studio output instead.

This time, thankfully, they seemed to have got it right. The guitars were nicely balanced and Nick’s vocal lines came through just fine. The fanbase were right into the performance, almost to the point of getting a moshpit going, but there just wasn’t room for that so it fizzled out pretty quickly.

We were treated to some rare jokes from the normally enigmatic Nick Holmes, and even Greg (lead guitar) smiled on at least three occasions. Nick even gave one of the crowd some abuse for filming one of the songs on his phone. ‘The sound on that video you’ve just taken will be absolute SHIT’, he opined. He was probably right too, because it was loud in a room that was only marginally larger than, say, a double garage. The classic banter was to ask for requests then wait until somebody shouted out the next song to be played anyway. He did that a couple of times, probably to fill in the gaps while Adrian Erlandsson (drums) adjusted the backing deck.

There were a few technical issues, again with the backing track deck, which on a couple of occasions didn’t seem to want to navigate to the correct track. I guess they’ll sort that out for the remainder of the tour.

The band were clearly enjoying themselves, with Aaron on rhythm guitar stomping his way through many of the songs, working up a right good sweat on the way, and it’s great to see people who are into what they are doing in such a whole hearted way.

Paradise Lost are not among the most exciting live bands around, they don’t have much of a stage presence, but on the other hand, they don’t do anything to distract from what they play. And what they play is very, very good. The Enemy got a good reception, as did the Last Time and Faith Divides Us. Overall a very positive reception from the Glasgow audience.

On balance though, I still think that the best way to listen to Paradise Lost is on your home system, where you don’t have the distractions of people thumping into your back, standing on your feet, shaking their hair in your face or throwing beer over your head. The joy of live gigs!

by Alan Thomson