Paul Roland : Gaslight Tales 2003

                                                                                   
The Anthology (1980-1997) / 2 CD set   
Label : Last Call
Release date : July 2003

This eccentric son of Kent is one of the most unashamedly literate singer-songwriters that you'll ever be likely to hear and this collection is rather like a version of the Victorian Strand magazine, delivering short vignettes of crime, adventure and courtly romance.  RETFORD TIMES

With tracks with titles like Knights, Nosferatu and Sprong Heeled Jack, you get the feeling this is the type of album Mary Shelley would have made if she were around in the 1970s.  SWINDON EVENING ADVERTISER

Gothic rock as cartoon.  ALTERNATIVE PRESS
PAUL ROLAND has been variously described as the last English eccentric, a Twentieth Century troubadour and a Romantic in the tradition of Poe, Lovecraft and M.R. James. His songs teem with characters, both grotesque and humorous, juxtaposed and set in music suitably atmospheric and evocative.
Paul's preoccupation with fantasy and historical themes, often set in Victorian or Edwardian England has been described as "Gothic in the traditional sense ". This compilation explores those interests. Spanning the years 1980 to 1990 it encompasses some of his delightful songs and almost stories.



PAUL ROLAND BY HIMSEL

I was born more years ago than I care to remember backstage during a performance of 'Hamlet' in which my actress mother was cast as Ophelia.
It was my mother who instilled in me the importance of stage craft which basically amounted to being well rehearsed, speaking clearly and communicating to the audience. She also nurtured my love for quaint old movies featuring quintessentially English characters such as Margaret Rutherford, Alastair Sim and Will Hay, which is by way of an excuse for my later behaviour and for my skewed view of the world.

My father was less outgoing. He was a writer who used to entertain me with his Jules Verne-styled bedtime stories featuring explorers who set off into the wide blue yonder in a balloon in search of lost continents and strange creatures. Unfortunately, his descriptions of the apparatus were so involved that I would fall asleep before the travellers reached their wondrous destination and so I was left with a fascination for invention and the spirit of adventure, but little sense of geography.

I was an only child (with no brothers or sisters to annoy) and was sent away at an early age to be educated at Dr Benjamin Twists' Prep School For The Sons of Gentlemen where I spent the lessons staring out of the window and playing war games with an unhealthy attention to military tactics and gruesome detail that can only have come from memories of a previous life.

                                                                                    
I wasn't particularly academically inclined, although I could be relied upon to stage a melodramatic end-of-term play based on an old horror movie with myself cast as the mad doctor/monster and my friends as the hapless victims. And I was often in trouble for trying to incite my chums to go on strike under the pretext that convicted criminals were not incarcerated for as long as we were. I always considered myself to being held against my will in the educational system.

I amused myself on occasion by pretending to be dying of an incurable illness which gave me the perfect excuse for having fits during lessons that I didn't like or attacking the school bully, who was prevented from fighting back due to my affliction. Thankfully, none of the teachers had heard of Black Snake Swamp Fever, which I claimed to have caught off an uncle in Africa, so I could vary the symptoms at my whim.

I think Dr Twist and his staff were as happy to see me leave at the age of 16 as I was to go. Needless to say I was miraculously 'cured' of Black Snake Swamp Fever the day I left their establishment.

I would like to boast of having spent my childhood reading and dreaming of wondrous worlds, but to be honest I was too impatient to sit and read. Instead I would spend the school holidays racing around the grounds of our crumbling old house on my bike scaring the wits out of the servants and any tradesmen foolish enough to risk life and limb to enter Roland Towers. In the evenings I would put on shows for nanny and my tutors who applauded politely after each song or magic trick. I don't know if their appreciation was genuine or if it was because they feared what might happen if they didn't.

You see, my other childhood obsession was magicand I don't mean the kind where the conjuror pulls a rabbit out of a hat. I wanted to conjure up surprises that were neither fluffy nor friendly. Ever since my first out-of-body experience at the age of 5 or 6 I was obsessed with the occult and what lay beyond the physical world of our senses, a gift I inherited from my mother's side of the family, several of whom were psychic.

At night I would practice leaving my body and exploring the astral world. At other times I would attempt to make the lights go out in neighbour's houses or invoke elementals (creatures of the lower worlds) or create thought forms - an indulgence which came to an abrupt end when I came to my senses one night to find the room crawling with insects that I had created! Unfortunately, it was not as easy to walk away from magic as it had been to walk into it.

It was 1974 and the time of the 'Exorcist'. I happened to watch a documentary on demonic possession one afternoon and being the imaginative kid that I was I became convinced that I was possessed by the devil - which made life at school even more lively than it had been before. Fortunately my father happened to know a real magician (as he had been on a spiritual search of his own) and he convinced me that such things are not possible.

Thereafter I left the occult alone until I was old enough to know how to handle my abilities and then I allied myself firmly on the side of the angels. (If you want to know more, the rest of this story can be found in 'Investigating The Unexplained' published by Piatkus)
And then I discovered something which offered a healthy distraction - music.
Marc Bolan loomed large in my world all through my teens not only because of his extraordinary voice, but also because his early music evoked a fanciful world with magical overtones.

I didn't have time for anybody else until I started making my own records then I opened up to other influences and found my own style.
At the age of 14 I bought my first guitar and started writing songs as soon as I had learnt my first three chords. At 19 I recorded my first single and a few months later my first album.
And now, after an absence of several years, I'm tempted to return to music - if only to get it right this time!

Paul


Paul Roland Bibliography  untill 2003

'Kabbalah ­ A Piatkus Guide' (paperback) Publisher: Piatkus 1999 UK
'Kabbalah Cards' (pack and book) Publisher: AGM Muller Switzerland 2003
'Revelations ­ Wisdom of the Ages (hardback) Publisher: Carlton, 1995 UK
'Prophecies and Predictions' (hardback) Publisher: Island/S.Webb & Son 1997 UK
'Complete Guide To Dreams' (hardback) Publisher: Hamlyn, 1999 UK
Angels ­ A Piatkus Guide' (paperback) Publsiher: Piatkus 1999 UK
*'New Age Living' (hardback) Publisher: Hamlyn 2000 UK
'Investigating The Unexplained' (hardback & paperback) Publisher: Piatkus UK 2000
'How To Meditate' (hardback and paperback) Publisher: Hamlyn 2000 UK
'Meditation' (paperback) Publisher: HarperCollins/Gem 2002 UK
'Meditation Solutions' (hardback) Publisher: Hamlyn 2002 UK
'How Psychic Are You?' (p/back) Publisher: Hamlyn 2003 UK
'Jazz Singers' (hardback) Publisher: Hamlyn 1999 UK
'Teach Yourself Rock & Pop' (paperback) Publisher: Hodder Headline 1999 UK
'Chrysalis Guide To Rock & Pop On CD ' (paperback) Publ: B.T.Batsord 2001 UK

Paul has also contributed a chapter on the history of French music to 'Paris - Traditions' and a chapter on Irish Drama and Literature to 'Dublin ­ Traditions' both published in hardback by Hamlyn.

CD 1


1. Blades of Battenburg     3:01

2. Lon Chaney             3:03    
3. Werewolves of London     3:26    
4. Dr Strange             2:56    
5. Madelaine             3:01    
6.The Puppet Master         3:39    
7. Captain Blood         4:08    
8. Cairo             3:38    
9. Death or Glory         3:30    
10.Burnt Orchids         3:06    
11.Ghost Ships             4:24    
12.Berlin             2:31    
13.Gabrielle             2:58    
14.Witchfinder General         3:41    
15.The Great Edwardian Air-raid 3:15    
16.In the Opium Den         5:37    
17.Buccaneers             2:07    
18.Wyndham Hill         4:05    
19.Walter the Occultist     3:31    
20.Cousin Emilia         3:09    
21.Demon In A Glass Case     3:04    


CD 2


1. Nosferatu             6:05    
2. The Crimes of Dr Cream     3:03    
3. Alice's House         3:31    
4. Pharoah             4:41    
5. The Ratcatcher's Daughter     4:58    
6. Candy Says             3:44    
7. The Sea Captain         5:15    
8. Poets and the Painters     4:06    
9. Come to the Sabbat         6:30    
10.Morgan Le Fey         3:12    
11.Beyond the Realm of Sleep     4:10    
12.Waltzing the Square Ring Again 3:03    
13.A Thousand and One Nights     6:01    
14.Ophelia             2:53    
15.Aleistair Crowley         3:07    
16.Gargoyles             3:59    

Bonus Track

17.The Cars That Ate New York     4:50

Πρώτη ανάρτηση και απο εμένα για το 2013 . Τι άλλο απο Paul Roland ; Καλή Χρονιά παιδιά .

CD 1  Mp3 : Size : 176 MB
CD 2  MP3 : Size : 179 MB

CD 1 Flac :  Size : 464 MB

CD 2 Flac :  Size : 473 MB