PAGAN ALTAR - Never Quite Dead
Dying Victims Productions
The promo info for this starts off with "PAGAN ALTAR are the very definition of a CULT band". Ah yeah ya think so? I'd also say that PAGAN ALTAR have a unique legacy. This English band originally released a demo in 1982 at the height of the whole NWOBHM movement. Now because it really wasn't NWOBHM style (it sounded like Doom) it was over looked and became something for tape trader history.
Fast forward to 1998 when the band, whoever was in it at the time, decided to give the demo an official release on CD titled Volume One on their own label Oracle Records. It would be a few more years till the word got out about PAGAN ALTAR. In all honesty I'd say by the mid-2000s knowledge of the band made it into the Metal masses.
Now with that all said yeah personally I thought the band's first album is decent. But everything that's come out after it is hit or miss for me. Years ago while writing about their The Room of Shadows full length, which came out in 2017. I said that I could make a compilation of their best songs from the EP The Time Lord from 2004 to the present day. I eventually did and it's a great sounding PAGAN ALTAR compilation. Since the band's singer Terry Jones passed away in 2015 I thought it was an honor.
But here we have the new "keep it going" PAGAN ALTAR with Terry Jones' son Alan Jones on guitar and backing vocals. The singer now is Brendan Radigan who is no Terry Jones. Along with that nobody in the band is a member of the original PAGAN ALTAR. When I first heard this album I was not thrilled. But a few more listens made me appreciate it.
Opener "Saints and Sinners" is in the mode of a cool late 70's Hard Rock track. When the fourth track, "Madame M'Rachael's Grave" comes in then yeah this is the PAGAN ALTAR sound which is doomy and rocking. I mean there's a couple of cuts on here like "Liston Church" for example that reminds ya of the band's past folksy rock endeavors. "Well of Despair" is a great Doom Metal cut. The final cut "Kismet" is a nine plus minute epic past PAGAN ALTAR type number.
In the end yeah there's some decent cuts I really enjoy but the rest are OK. That's pretty much the same way I felt about their last album The Room of Shadows from 2017. I think the album title and the cover art is perfect for em these days. But to me this is PAGAN ALTAR 2.0 and hopefully I'm thinking that if they continue on they'll make something better.
LISTEN HERE:
https://dyingvictimsproductions.bandcamp.com/album/never-quite-dead
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