{"id":6166,"date":"2017-09-05T14:06:27","date_gmt":"2017-09-05T18:06:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/?p=6166"},"modified":"2017-10-06T13:41:56","modified_gmt":"2017-10-06T17:41:56","slug":"pagan-altar-room-of-shadows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/pagan-altar-room-of-shadows\/","title":{"rendered":"Pagan Altar <br>Room of Shadows"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/PAGAN-ALTAR-The-Room-of-Shadows.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-6167\" src=\"http:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/PAGAN-ALTAR-The-Room-of-Shadows.jpg\" alt=\"Pagan Altar, The Room of Shadows\" width=\"250\" height=\"250\" srcset=\"https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/PAGAN-ALTAR-The-Room-of-Shadows.jpg 250w, https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/PAGAN-ALTAR-The-Room-of-Shadows-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 250px) 100vw, 250px\" \/><\/a>The story of Pagan Altar is so heartbreaking even the Biblical Job would have questioned what they did to deserve all of the tragedies that befell the group, tragedies that finally silenced the band nearly 40 years after formation, but not before the swansong <i>The Room of Shadows<\/i> (Temple of Mystery Records).<\/p>\n<p>The band formed at the cusp of the burgeoning New Wave of British Heavy Metal in 1976 or 1978 (depending on the source) when seemingly every band wound up on a Neat Records compilation. Pagan Altar had a unique lineup\u2014a father-son collaboration of the elder Terry Jones on vocals and his son Alan on guitar\u2014and a cool sound owing more to classic rock such as UFO than fellow doom-trodden NWOBHM act Witchfinder General.<\/p>\n<p>Despite an electric live show steeped in druid mysticism amidst copious amounts of incense smoke and ritual, other bands recorded while Pagan Altar floundered. There was always something impeding their success: a record plant shutdown causing an early single to literally vanish, having to turn Metallica down when the then-young thrashers reverently offered the band a spot on an American tour because they couldn\u2019t risk losing their day jobs, etc.<\/p>\n<p>A demo they recorded in 1982 sat in mothballs until it was finally given a CD release in 1988 as <i>Volume 1<\/i>. (It would later be reissued a few more times with the new title <i>Judgement of the Dead<\/i>.) With the release, the band sprung back to life, and with a subsequent string of critically acclaimed albums in the mid-2000s, it seemed there would finally be justice for all.\u2028\u2028 However, in 2013 things took a dark turn as Terry Jones was diagnosed with cancer. Two years later he would succumb to the disease. His death would end Pagan Altar finally, only there was still a partially recorded album. Brokenhearted, Terry\u2019s son gathered the Pagan Alter vets to finish what they started\u2014and do so while he himself was dealing with cataracts that doctors have said will eventually blind him! \u2028\u2028If you play <i>The Room of Shadows<\/i> back-to-back with the ancient debut album, one thing that will strike you is that Terry\u2019s distinctive warble sounds virtually the same, untouched by years or the battles with disease. Much like Scott \u201cWino\u201d Weinrich, his is a voice synonymous with doom metal and it remains so on here.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s easy to take the lyrics on tracks such as \u201cRising of the Dead\u201d or \u201cAfter Forever\u201d and romanticize a man coming to terms with his mortality, but the fact is that much of the lyrics came before the diagnosis and the man\u2019s fixation with the topic of death is not exactly new. There\u2019s no need to create a story when the story is so compelling and bittersweet without embellishment.<\/p>\n<p><i>The Room of Shadows<\/i> never loses sight that what made Pagan Altar special was how it interpreted classic rock within a doomy landscape. \u201cDanse Macabre\u201d is a piece of prog-metal melodrama that intentionally employs Kansas\u2019 \u201cCarry on Wayward Son\u201d for the boogie breakdown; \u201cThe Ripper\u201d is not the Judas Priest classic, but a slow-burning, soulful gothic dirge; and the title track is metal as folk or folk as metal, whichever you personally prefer.<\/p>\n<p>When an album comes together under the circumstances that birthed <i>The Room of Shadows<\/i>, it is exceedingly difficult to be overly critical. Fortunately there\u2019s no need. This finale is grand, a perfect elegy befitting the band\u2019s storied past.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The story of Pagan Altar is so heartbreaking even the Biblical Job would have questioned what they did to deserve all of the tragedies that befell the group<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1940],"tags":[2075,1941,2076],"class_list":["post-6166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-something-wicked","tag-pagan-altar","tag-something-wicked","tag-temple-of-mystery-records"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - 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