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Rating: "Locked inside this peaceful tomb, entwined on seas of endless bliss…"
Just like Death, the band of the late Chuck Schuldiner, managed to fully encapsulate an entire way of conceiving Metal music by simply naming an album that has now become legendary, so have Paradise Lost. How many bands can boast about creating an inspiring album that has played an almost evangelistic role, especially, but not exclusively, for those bands that were just starting out back then and are now at the top of their genre? Very few now. Recorded with the support of a small orchestra, GOTHIC is one of those essential albums to understand the subsequent evolution of genres that were clearly influenced by it, namely the Doom of the early 90s and Gothic (and by Gothic Metal I mean the "true" Gothic Metal; not those hundreds of bands that, riding the trends, flood the market with albums of dubious integrity and value).
As usual, centered on difficult themes such as the pain and suffering to which the human being is condemned, lyrically the album is heavily influenced by Milton's poem titled "Paradise Lost," a wonderful work that narrates the events of the biblical Genesis from the perspective of man who unjustly pays the price for the desire for self-knowledge and the mystery of Life and Death with eternal pain and perpetual suffering. Opening the album is the title track, a true manifesto of the entire album. Holmes's terrifying growling proclaims words of despair mixed with anger, the compositions are leaden, and Mackintosh's guitars have such a dark sound that they fit perfectly into the track as piercing screams of pain, creating something majestic, refined, and haunting. Another innovative element is the use of the female voice that accompanies Holmes with good results in most of the tracks.
The orchestra performs its task to perfection without ever overshadowing the band, and the result is tracks like "Rapture" or "Eternal," one of the fans' most beloved songs, a masterpiece of absolute level. Other highlights include "Silent" where Holmes sings with a voice that would make anyone pale, but above all "The Painless," perhaps the best track, a true black gem that represents the ideal synthesis of all the key elements of this grand and profound work, perhaps like never before concerning the Halifax group. The task of closing falls to "Desolate," an entirely orchestral instrumental that ends this gem in the darkest way possible because in the end all you will hear is the faint sound of a mourning bell…
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Gothic (04:43)
Denying our restlessness
Frustrations tension eludes
The past was clean
Where thoughts were mild
The present day horrors alive
Slowly passing timeless horrors
Lives within all fear
The mourning in my tears
Drown all the past
We lived beneath these years
Awaiting for the call
For all life to expire
Passive to this day
To infinity we'll fall
The light is dim before us
Shadows appear and fall
A barrage of savage ways
Only the darkness can filter through
Awaiting for the call
For all life to expire
Passive to this day
To infinity we'll fall
Lives within all fear
The mourning in my tears
Drown all the past
We lived beneath these years
02 Dead Emotion (04:33)
Struggle with emotion
Feel the pain burn deep
Within our nerves
The mourning of lost life
Commands our actions night and day
The foul realism is unleashed
Upon the earth we'll bleed
Banish all fond memories
As the lord beckons us to judgement
Degeneration is close at hand
The mortality coil is weaker
The pain is close to heart
Now leave the ruined world to your god
The kindness of deaths grasp
Relieves us from the pain
03 Shattered (03:58)
Stare at the dark foreboding walls
I turn and look away
The fear it haunts me
While I sleep
(Sleep)
Now as life is torn apart
The walls they lead the way
This tortured journey
Almost at the end...
(At the end)
Look at time upon the skies
I turn and look away
The truth it haunts me
Wake me from sleep
(Sleep)
04 Rapture (05:09)
In agony we are now
Twisted unblessed we must strive...
Repulsed by the false harmony
Blinded by truth that eyes can't hope to see
Foolish man must die
For the sins that he creates
Forgive lord - we must be weak
Remove the weight of sin
Release harmony
Resist the throes of his embrace
Ignorant laws thrust in our face
05 Eternal (03:46)
Why can't we hear
The time must come for us to leave here
Emotion has withered away
Out burnt out love has decayed
Obsessed to leave the earth
Tragedy has overrun since birth
Now our righteous fathers weep
As we greet eternal sleep
Are we born to pass away
Cry at all that remains
"Chosen words" fail to sustain
The wisdom of powers heard
In dismal thoughts seemingly absurd
Now as hope and glory dies
We'll scream at our demise
Are we lost forever more
Now our righteous fathers weep
As we greet eternal sleep
Are we born to pass away
08 Silent (04:36)
After all wars
We lie, as shelter falls
The world is but Hell
A place darkened out by time
Submit to the fall
Live in peace for years
Turn back the hands of time
Light shines before
As lives are torn
Morals slow decline
We'll live in cold fear
Until we lay dead
Silent our please
Search for the end
09 The Painless (03:58)
Locked inside this peaceful tomb
Entwined on seas of endless bliss
The painless...
Strength is released
The horror passes through our eyes
Diversion cast upon our souls
The meek shall inherit our tears
Stray from this tranquil place
Guarded by all fear
Submit now to this curse
In our plight for existence
Reach the sky not falling down
Sunlight shines in heaven
Stray from this tranquil place
Guarded by all fear
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Other reviews
By Vic Sorriso
For a Death Metal album, it’s a kind of record, I think!
The result? A mess! Maybe Paradise Lost will be more grateful to your mother’s ears when you play them at a deafening volume, but that doesn’t mean this album is memorable.
