Lately there's been an influx of re-releases and/or re-unions from many of my favorite artists. Faith No More and Soundgarden have been touring. Queens Of The Stone Age re-released their Rated R and played a couple of live shows. A Perfect Circle are currently touring the US and playing all their albums live. And this week Paradise Lost announced they'd be re-releasing their 1995 album Draconian Times and playing it live in several shows next spring.
Although I've been one of the first ones in line to get tickets to FNM's re-union gigs and gutted that I wasn't able to see either The Queens' or APC gigs, the news about Paradise Lost made me both sad and disappointed. Sounds illogical, doesn't it? It's not actually.
I literally fell in love with Paradise Lost's album One Second in 1997. I had already heard some their songs before that too of course but One Second was thee record for me. It sounded so cold, detached and stylish and had great songs. I wasn't able to listen to it alone in the dark because it gave me the chills. It was impressive.
The album was also a gutsy move from PL. They'd become big with their previous record Draconian Times but on One Second they altered their sound and became more melodic and polished. They even cut their hair which apparently is a huge no-no for any metal band, as I learned later. I didn't care. I just loved the music.
So, ever since One Second I've been their fan. Sure there have been times when I've been busy listening to other stuff but whenever there was a new album from PL, I always got it and liked it. I kept coming back. At one point I used to spend insane amounts of time in their forum online and got to know other fans. Some of them became good friends. I travelled abroad to see gigs, I bought the t-shirts, I interviewed the band and found them a bunch of really nice, down-to-earth and funny guys.
But then something happened. In 2007 PL released In Requiem. It didn't quite hit the nerve but had a couple of great songs in it, so I wasn't really worried yet. But the 2009 album Faith Divides Us, Death Unites Us got me seriously concerned. It wasn't the PL I had grown to love. The album sounded as fine and polished as usual, the songs were ok but there was something missing. It took me a while to realise that I just couldn't hear the soul anymore. There were cool bits and pieces here and there but they didn't come together. It was as if the band had tried too much, as if they were suddenly writing music to please their old fans instead of themselves. The album wasn't breathing. For me, it was like a zombie version of the PL I used to know. It was heartbreaking.
So when I heard the news about the Draconian Times re-release and shows, it was like a deathblow. It wasn't a gutsy or classy move. It wasn't about going forward and being creative. It made me realise that I was able to appreciate re-unions and re-releases if they mark either new beginnings or serve as closure for something that was disrupted too soon or suddenly. But in my mind for Paradise Lost, once such an innovative band, this is a huge step back.
Don't get me wrong, I've nothing against fans attending those upcoming DT shows and being excited about it. They just probably love PL for different reasons than I do. And if PL comes up with something cool next I'll promise to be a happy fan again - but it'd better be something really good. The bar's set high though but after all, it's there because they set it there themselves, back in 1997.
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