INTERVIEW: PARADISE LOST IN CONVERSATION WITH GREG MACKINTOSH
It has been a decade since Paradise Lost toured Australia. Greg Mackintosh guitarist, songwriter and producer for the band, talked to No Barriers to discuss the band’s long-awaited visit, their setlist for the tour, their latest album ‘Ascension’ and working with Till Lindemann.
“We are doing a real whistle stop tour,” exclaimed Greg Mackintosh. “Well, that’s what it feels like! We will be playing in India, Japan, China, down to Australia and then back to Thailand. Then we end up in Holland. Why? I don’t know. Modern touring logistics? It’s fast!”
“We are just hoping that people remember us in Australia,” Greg Mackintosh quipped. “We have not been around in Australia playing for a while. We have just released ‘Ascension’, which is our first album in five years. We just hope people come out to see us and remember our music. We have a well honed setlist as we have been playing live so much over the last year. We are going to cover as much ground as we can for fans. There will be three songs from ‘Ascension’ and then something from all our eras – we have quite a lot of ground to cover”.
Paradise Lost comprises of vocalist Nick Holmes, drummer Jeff Singer, bassist Steve Edmondson, guitarists Greg Mackintosh and Aaron Aedy. The band formed in Halifax, England in 1988 and last year they released their seventeenth album, ‘Ascension’. The album has a metallic heaviness, melodic bite, dark atmosphere wrapped in melancholy. The centre of Paradise Lost’s songwriting is their philosophical position. Do you just accept life as doomed? Or do you choose to think about life in a more optimistic way and consider your role as a human being and what you can do to fight back against the darkness?
“You have to look at life with a bit more optimism,” stated Greg Mackintosh. “We were a lucky generation. We can travel to the other side of the world. We can see and do things other people have not been able to do. We can communicate, have technology…but we also have the belief in rising to a better place, even though the world looks dark at the moment”.
Music and songwriting is important for Greg Mackintosh.
“It took a long time for this new album to come together…inspiration was hard to find. I had a dry period. But when it broke, the thinking and writing came on fast. Writing for me is a very conscious thing. When I write, I try and bring the vocals and guitars together with the song themes. It’s the core of it all for Paradise Lost. I want that cinematic and sensory feel to our music. The themes that come through are big: the idea of striving against unseen forces, building kingdoms and for what? Everything leads to death. But I love writing music that mixes it all up: bombastic, moody and upbeat. I just want to create something cool”.
Speaking of cool, Greg Mackintosh has just made a new version of Till Lindemann’s new song ‘Es Brennt’.
“We were really lucky that Rammstein played support for Paradise Lost back in the early years,” mused Greg Mackintosh. “They weren’t even Rammstein then. They were just an East German punk band, Tempelprayers, but there was something special in that band”.
“The approach came out of the blue,” explained Greg Mackintosh. “Till’s assistant rang and asked if I would remix his new song in the style of our songs from ‘Ascension’. But I stripped it out and replaced everything except Till’s vocals. I love his voice – his timbre – crisp and chesty. When he sings, it’s like he is singing just for you. So, I compressed it to make it clearer and closer for the listener. It’s called a ‘new version’ because I changed it so much with crackling fire, guitars, drums and bass – it was no ‘remix’, it was ‘doomfire’, a new version”.
Greg Mackintosh has a real gift for production, beautiful and ornate guitar lines and melodies, and intricate emotive songwriting. Australian fans can catch Paradise Lost in October with their gothic metal support band Victoria K.
Paradise Lost will be performing at these venues:
Sunday, 18 October 2026: The Triffid, Brisbane, QLD
Monday, 19 October 2026: Factory Theatre, Sydney, NSW
Tuesday, 20 October 2026: Max Watt's, Melbourne, VIC
