My Dying Bride
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
||
|---|---|---|
 |
||
| Background information | ||
| Origin | Halifax, West Yorkshire, UK  |
|
| Genre(s) | Doom metal Death metal Goth Metal[1] |
|
| Years active | 1990—present | |
| Label(s) | Peaceville Records | |
| Website | www.mydyingbride.org | |
| Members | ||
| Aaron Stainthorpe Hamish Glencross Andrew Craighan Sarah Stanton Dan Mullins Lena Abé |
||
| Former members | ||
| Martin Powell Yasmin Ahmed Calvin Robertshaw Bill Law Rick Miah Shaun Taylor-Steels Adrian Jackson |
||
My Dying Bride is a British doom/death metal band formed in 1990.
Contents |
[edit] Biography
My Dying Bride were formed in June 1990 after lead guitarist Andrew Craighan left his former band Abiosis to join Aaron Stainthorpe (vocals), Calvin Robertshaw (guitar) and Rick Miah (drums). Adrian Jackson would join later on bass. After six months of rehearsing, the band recorded and released their demo, Towards the Sinister. Its title was taken from a line in the song "Symphonaire Infernus Et Spera Empyrium".
During the early 1990s My Dying Bride were part of what was known as the death/doom Great Three with Paradise Lost and Anathema - all three bands hailing from the north of England.
Their music is characterised by romantic, sensual lyrics and an obsessive attention to atmospheric detail. Early demos were death metal in a traditional sense, though much slower than most. However, their debut album As the Flower Withers saw the addition of violins and keyboards. Turn Loose the Swans built on that foundation, utilising clean as well as death grunts and, unusually, lead violin on several tracks. Trinity is a compilation of the three early EPs and a 7". The Angel and the Dark River saw the abandonment of death grunts altogether and added a more gothic feel to the songs. Like Gods of the Sun continued in that direction.
The highly experimental 34.788%...Complete was widely regarded as an extreme detour from the bands other works, and split fans down the middle. The vast majority of long-time fans that had listened to the band since Towards The Sinister have dismissed the album as not being made by the band at all, but by a group of impostors. Especially cited as a reason for this is the song 'Heroin Chic' - one fan has stated, to almost universal agreement, that the reason he so enjoyed the band was the lack of repetition in their material. For this reason, Heroin Chic, with its frequent repetitions of lyrics of the "nah nah nah yeah yeah yeah" variety, as fans like this describe it, has been written off as a spit in the face of fans. It is interesting to note that reactions to following albums are often sharply divided along the lines of reaction to 34.788%...Complete. Those accepting of it deride The Light at the End of the World as being a complacent exercise of treading water, while those who refuse to acknowledge 34.788%...Complete as canonical consider The Light at the End of the World to contain some of their best material since Turn Loose the Swans. My Dying Bride entered something of a hiatus after this, releasing two retrospective albums Meisterwerk 1 and Meisterwerk 2. These albums lay halfway between best of albums and rarity compilations and had no clear target audience. Completists of the band, while appreciating the early demos and rare tracks, bemoaned the many album tracks included, while those new to the band acquired a peculiar, career-spanning introduction which lacked coherence.
It was not until 2001's The Dreadful Hours that My Dying Bride managed to win round the bulk of their former fans. More innovative than The Light at the End of the World, yet retaining all the key elements of the My Dying Bride sound, The Dreadful Hours was slightly darker, although a long way off the intense darkness of the first two demos. 2004's follow-up Songs of Darkness, Words of Light showed a band continuing to expand and refine their sound and purpose. A substantial increase in live performances - once an unheard of rarity - has lead to much greater recognition by a new generation of fans.
In 2004, the band's label, Peaceville, re-released their entire back-catalogue in digipak format, with rare bonus tracks (demos, remixes, live performances etc.) added to each release. The band's next release came in May 2005, when they released the fancifully-titled Anti-Diluvian Chronicles, a fully-fledged best of box set featuring three discs and thirty tracks.
My Dying Bride toured the UK in November 2005, playing shows at London Astoria (18) and Bradford Rio (19). The band spent the winter of 2005/2006 writing material for new studio album A Line of Deathless Kings. The album was released on October 9, 2006. It was preceded by the EP Deeper Down on September 18. Shortly before the release of A Line of Deathless Kings, Shaun Taylor-Steels announced his permanent departure from the band due to persistent problems with his ankle.
In early 2007, Jackson announced his departure as he moved to the US and session-drummer Bennett decided to part from the band as well, citing a lack of time due to other commitments. Replacements were found in Lena Abé on bass and Dan Mullins of Thine, Bal-Sagoth and Sermon Of Hypocrisy on drums[2].
[edit] Members
[edit] Current members
- Aaron Stainthorpe - Vocals (1990-)
- Hamish Glencross - Guitar (1999-)
- Andrew Craighan - Guitar (1990-)
- Sarah Stanton - Keyboards (2002-)
- Lena Abé - Bass (2007-)
- Dan Mullins - Drums (2007-)
[edit] Former members
- Martin Powell - Keyboards, Violins (1992-1998)
- Calvin Robertshaw - Guitar (1990-1999)
- Bill Law - Drums (1998-1999)
- Rick Miah - Drums (1990-1997)
- Shaun Taylor-Steels - Drums (1998-2006)
- Adrian Jackson - Bass (1991-2007)
[edit] Session members
- Yasmin Ahmed - Keyboards (1999-2002)
- John Bennett - Drums (2005-2007)
[edit] Discography
[edit] Demos, singles and EPs
- (1990) Towards the Sinister (demo)
- (1991) God Is Alone (7")
- (1991) Symphonaire Infernus et Spera Empyrium (EP)
- (1992) The Thrash of Naked Limbs (EP)
- (1993) Unreleased Bitterness (7")
- (1994) I Am the Bloody Earth (EP)
- (1994) The Sexuality of Bereavement (7")
- (2006) Deeper Down (EP)
[edit] Albums
 As the Flower Withers |
 Turn Loose the Swans |
 The Angel and the Dark River |
 Like Gods of the Sun |
[edit] Compilations
 The Stories |
|||
 The Voice of the Wretched |
[edit] Video releases
[edit] References
- ^ The Encyclopedia of Heavy Metal (Daniel Bukszpan 2003, Page 168, Paragraph 1)
- ^ http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/blabbermouth.net/news.aspx?mode=Article&newsitemID=67524
