Style: Electronic pop/rock, atmospheric rock
Primary Emotions/Themes: Personal struggles, moving on from the past, loss of meaning
Thoughts: This album released nine years after Lost Paradise... nine years. Outside of Ulver I can't think of a more drastic change in style than Paradise Lost had in the 90's. After creating the doom/death genre with their debut album, each subsequent album became less heavy and more gothic until we got to Host.
The shocking change aside, Host is a great album. Sounding more like Depeche Mode than anything they had done in the past, the album demonstrates that the band is capable of writing in a myriad of styles and still creating a fantastic album. The focus here is less on guitar riffs and more on electronics and a string quartet along with Nicks clean vocals.
The shift away from guitar music is one that works well for the band here. The guitar is still present but it has so much processing on it that it feels more like a synth than a guitar. To the long term fans of the band this album was kind of on the horizon after Draconian Times and One Second. It seems that this was a one and done though, as after this the band started making their way back to their roots.
I recently found out another project that Nick and Greg called Host that continues this goth rock style. Very interested to check that out. In the mean time I have the original album which remains one of my favorites from the band regardless of how far they strayed from metal. Quality is quality regardless of the genre.
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