On the eve of the historic Paradise Lost Draconian Times tour we could past up the opportunity to catch up with Nick Holmes to hear about the past, present and what the future holds for likely lads from Halifax.

There are a couple of songs on the album that we have never played live, we’ve played most of the songs at one time or another so we’re just getting used to the ones we’ve never played and of course Adrian is pretty much learning everything from scratch as he has never had to tackle them before. He’s been working his bollocks off but it’s all coming together well.

It is a classic Paradise Lost album, weather it is your favourite or not is a different matter but it was a classic. Even if you didn’t own it, it came out at a time that you would have probably have heard it, and everyone else is doing it so we thought we’d jump on the bandwagon (laugh). I could say it was an original idea but it clearly isn’t (laugh) but seriously it is a real stand out album for many people and for that reason I think a lot of people are really excited to see it played in its entirety.

We’ll just do the album and then we will go off, have a beer and then come back on and do a best of set. We’re planning on doing some songs we’ve not played for a long time live, the issue for me is that we’ve been going so long I can’t remember what we have and haven’t played live to be honest. We certainly looking to do a good cross section of songs when we do come back on. We haven’t got to that part of rehearsals as yet we’re still focused on Draconian Times. As we all now live all over England we rarely get together to rehearse anyway to we do it in our own space, so when we do get together we sort of rattle through it (quickly).

Given that you guys have such a huge back catalogue to choose from how do you go about selecting a “best of” set, as to be honest that could mean you guys could play for a couple of hours without the Draconian Times set?

Well there is only so long I can sing for, so unless you are going to employ drum solos, bass solos and so on, there is only so long before I fall on the floor. We always put out what fans want to hear and the majority of the time fans ask for the stuff we play anyway because there is always someone who wants the real obscure stuff but in the majority of cases people want to hear “Just Say Words” for example as people love that song and its popular live. We judge by how a song goes down live we’ve done songs on stage before purely because fans have asked us to and they have gone down like a lead balloon. You will never please everyone, but we’ll hopefully please most of them,

Why Draconian Times also, I mean you guys have a host (excuse pun) of classic albums, from Gothic to Shades Of God to Icon. What made you settle on picking this particular release?

It was more on a commercial level as “Draconian Times” is the biggest album the band has done. It is the most memorable to most people than anything else we have done, all across Europe it was a hugely successful and in some cases people know the name “Draconian Times” before the name Paradise Lost. Again I wouldn’t say it is my favourite album that we’ve done it may not be in the top five if I’m honest but having been rehearsing it now for a couple of weeks I can see why people like it. It is really upbeat, a really rocky album, and really good songs to play live. The profile of the band was really high around that time; we played the Dynamo Festival and a really good buzz around the band.

Was there any thought to try and bring back Lee Morris for the tour, I mean to complete the whole Draconian Times “family” once again?

In a word, no. Nothing derogatory to Lee but he left the band a long time ago and I for one have not seen him since, so to bring him back in for one album would feel a bit weird if I’m honest. Adrian is comfortable behind the drums for us so it would just feel wrong to change things for the sake of it.

The “Draconian Times” tour consists of 7 dates across Greece, Holland, Germany, France and the UK. Beyond these dates are there any plans to extend this tour to more countries and more dates?

As far as I know we’re doing these dates and that is it. We’re not planning on taking it any further than that if I’m honest. We want to start on the new album after this so that will be our focus for the foreseeable future. It is a week of stepping into the past and then full throttle into the future. You can never say never, but I’d be surprised if we do anything like this again.

On the topic of new material can we expect any new songs to be included within the set for the up coming shows?

We hope to record this year but we’re in a little dilemma as to the direction to go in, we’re not sure what to do if I’m honest. We’re pondering where to go and once we decide were we’re going….I mean we’ve written one song we’re happy with but it’s kind of reminiscent of the last album so we’re not sure if we’ll use it or not. Once we’ve sorted the direction out we’ll be able to knock the songs out I’m sure. We’re very much like “if you sound like the last album you really haven’t bettered it” if you know what I mean. It is always nice to try and do a different album each time.

So given you guys have been together for over 20 years and now live all over the country how do you get fresh ideas and actually find time to get together to write new material?

We do it all through file sharing. There are times when it would of course be worth while sitting in a room with someone but if you are trying to create something you can be much more creative on your own. Then you can listen back to things at different times of the day. I can spend hours and hours working on something I think is brilliant and then play it back an hour later and it can sound totally shit! You can vanish up yourself quite easily so if I write something I like make sure I can live with it for a week and then I can say it is a good idea. The file sharing works for us as it is dead fast and we’ve never been the sort of band to sit in a room for hours. Even when we wrote songs as teenagers Greg used to come down with riffs on a C90 cassette and I used to bellow over it, we were never in a situation where we ever did it together.

So how do you then approach writing new material, as it must be hugely difficult not to fall into that Paradise Lost rut and not sound like the last record, or a particular song or style?

The thing is with us, no matter what we do a song will always sound like Paradise Lost. Even on the “Host” album it still sounds like us. We bring a lot of different influences into the music and it still sounds like the band, without wandering to far off the Paradise Lost path. We forget how many albums we’ve got to be truthful as we stopped counting them, every album is a new challenge and there is always a certain amount of reinvention aswell. At the end of the as long as we are into the music the chances are the fans will be also as our fans are very like minded.

The progression of the bands music over the years has been vast, when you consider the sound on “Lost Paradise”, then “Gothic” then to “Host” to your last release “Faith Divides Us – Death Unites Us”. So how have your influences changed over the years and how much does this play on your music?

I still like listening to Possessed when I’m in the right mood, I still like to listen to the first wave of Death Metal bands. Bathory is still the best example of Black Metal to me. We like new bands, but we like new bands that remind us of old bands. We’re not stuck in the past by any stretch of the imagination but we’re not brainwashed into liking something because everyone else says it the greatest thing (ever). Regardless if an album sells one copy or a million copies it doesn’t mean it’s good, we’re simply not swayed by public opinion. For young people today it is hard to make up their own mind, when I was a kid I could discover Venom on my own no one told me to like them. It was exciting for me as no one else liked them.

I’m keen not to use the phrase elder statesman of British Gothic, Synth, Death Doom or whatever it is the press want to try and label you but when it comes time to write new material is there ever any trepidation or worry about what people will think?

Christ! I heard the first part of elder then and thought you were going to call me Elton John (laughs) my influences are broad but that’s stretching things a little. Of course you think about upsetting fans but as I said before if you don’t feel the music is right from the heart then you will never please anyone. It’s always good to get a third party opinion but people will see through things if your heart isn’t in it. We’ve always had a good instinct towards our music and it has kept us alive this long. Perhaps I worry more about what people think than perhaps Greg, Greg doesn’t read anything whereas I read everything. I want to know what everyone thinks about everything we do, which isn’t always a good thing but you need to know what reaction to your music is; good or bad. Please yourself and then others will either get it or not.

Yes! I mean the internet has changed everything, being a musician now is totally different from when we started this band. There are hundreds of opinions of a hundred different topics, I mean for kids out there now it must just be mind boggling all that is on offer to them, it does my head in just thinking about it. I mean there were only like seven bands around when I was a teenager but now there is almost too much choice.