Over 32 years, doom/goth metal pioneers
Paradise Lost
have consistently caused confusion among fans due to an insatiable penchant for reinvention, experimentation, and musical growth. They have regularly engaged pop styles (including danceable synth pop) antithetical to metal's unholy rule book. The band offered an uncharacteristic olive branch to punters with 2015's
The Plague Within
and 2017's
Medusa
. Those albums marked a symbolic return to heavier roots, but
's sophisticated songwriting and production still colored outside the lines.
Obsidian
shifts gears again. While retaining many aspects of their visceral doom approach, it reflects the group's obsession with gothic rock and post-punk. Co-produced by the band and
Jaime Gomez Arellano
,
offers a swirling mass of dark, moody atmospheres, crunchy, blasting, distorted guitars, muddy drums, dramatic structures, gorgeous labyrinthian melodies, and plodding tempos.
Sisters of Mercy
and
Fields of the Nephilim
are the patron saints of inspiration here, though
never allow them to subsume their own sound.
The fingerpicked acoustic guitars and halting, crystalline vocals that introduce opener "Darker Thoughts" should have listeners checking the sleeve to make sure this is
. Further disorienting are violins that waft in from the margins before getting multi-tracked as they introduce blazing guitars and thudding kick drums. The slow, processional tempo creates an ever-intensifying whirl of sound as frontman
Nick Holmes
reveals astonishing control over Jekyll (clean) and Hyde (dirty) vocals while songwriter/lead guitarist
Greg Mackintosh
rips through a solo. The refracted doom vamps in "Fall from Grace" offer a whirlpool of heaviness as
Mackintosh
plays counterpoint single-string leads in call-and-response.
Holmes
growls from the depths before a ringing melodic refrain channels an even more desolate character's inspiration,
Depeche Mode
vocalist
Dave Gahan
. Though "Ghosts" commences with
Waltteri Vaeyrynen
's rumbling kick drum,
Steve Edmondson
's absolutely filthy low-tuned bass line guides the track. One could be forgiven (at least initially) for thinking this is a
outtake. That said, the monstrously dramatic interplay between that bass line and the band's riffing offers an overdriven, orgiastic goth groove. "Forsaken" is a near-textbook case for gothic metal.
's first guitar break sets up a massively satisfying chug while
channels
Carl McCoy
Ian Curtis
in his delivery and a sampled classical chorus hovers in the backdrop. "Serenity" is anything but, a massive blur of slamming drums, open, ringing guitars, and droning bass; its elegiac intensity recalls
's "Paradise Regained." "Hope Dies Young" is set to a post-punk trudge before turning left toward the band's own anthemic, muscular early-'90s sound. The startling "Ravenghast" offers some of
's heaviest-ever riffing, as
shreds his vocal cords trying to match the intensity.
Three decades on from their debut album,
sound as inspired and restless as ever. After all of the stylistic evolution,
seamlessly and dynamically entwines doom, gothic metal, and post-punk in brilliant songwriting and arrangements that showcase the band still standing, in pure angry, desolate form. ~ Thom Jurek