On Friday night, Ste, Liam and I travelled off across to Yorkshire to see Doom Metal legends of yore, Pagan Altar play one of their two shows this year (The other being down in London).
Arriving at the Fenton quite early, we sunk a few pints of their (rather excellent) Guinness in the beer garden listening to Pagan Altar's soundcheck, before making our way back upstairs to watch the support band, The Lamp of Thoth.
This was the first time I'd heard Lamp of Thoth, although I'd been hearing good things about them for a while, especially from Liam in the car on the way down; he was telling me the whole story about where the name "The Lamp of Thoth" comes from, and I was more than impressed.
Proper old style, rocky doom, with eccentric evil vocals from vocalist The Overtly Melancholic Lord Strange and awesome leads from guitarist Randy Reaper.
NWOBHM-styled stuff, with an overall doomy feel. An awesome cover of Cirith Ungol's Frost and Fire to close the set as well; I picked up a copy of their Cauldron of Withcery 10 inch EP as well.
This is a band who I'm going to keep an eye out to go and see them again, they were fucking awesome.
If what I had been told, this was Pagan Altar's first gig for twenty five years or something, and we were lucky enough to be amongst the 25 people who paid to see it (like I say, I only counted 18. Trve Kvlt).
I can honestly say I wasn't too sure what to expect of the most cultishly followed of all doom bands after such a lengthy lay off; but any fears were alleviated when we were sat in the beer garden listening to them soundcheck The Wake of Amadeus.
The lineup includes original members Terry and Alan Jones on vocals and guitars respectively and have been helped out on this tour by Rich "Militia" Walker on guitars.
Terry's nasal vocals were on top form (even if he did miss his cue to come in on one track, but for god's sake it's been 25 years) and it was amazing.
A big, shit-eating grin isn't something that's often associated with Doom Metal, but I had one on my face for the entire set. "Black Mass", "Sentinels of Hate", "Black Mass", "Pagan Altar" no "Time Lord" but they did play for over 100 minutes.
A Mythical and Magical night indeed, true thanks go to the Miskatonic Foundation.
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