MY LATEST HOBBY

By Johanne James

A SUDDEN RETURN TO THE LAND OF THE RISING SUN

MARTYR at True Thrash Fest 2020, Osaka, Japan-PART 2

RECAP: 16th February I got a message from Miki, our promotor, label manager and also organizer of the True Thrash festival in Osaka, Japan. The guy is in panic mode, Sacred Reich and Vio-Lence cancelled their trip to play at True Thrash festival 22 and 23 February 2020, if Martyr can hop on a plane to fill in the gap. And so we did...... On our first day we travelled and did some sightseeing, eating and boozing. On the second they we hang out at the first day of the festival to check out the other bands and meet a lot of fans. On the third day, after hardly having any sleep since we arrived it is finally time to hit the stage.

PARADISE LOST

Still Young At Heart

On 21st March, I had a face-to-face video interview scheduled with Nick Holmes, singer of Paradise Lost, to talk about the upcoming studio release `Obsidian’ and to present him the famous HeadBangers LifeStyle Black Box. But because of the worldwide outbreak of the Corona virus [COVID-19] and the imposed restrictions, the English doom death metal band had to cancel their promotion trip to Germany at the last minute and needless to say this was a wise decision considering the current, deteriorating situation. A couple of days later the interview was rescheduled and I was able to talk with Nick on the phone about the ins and outs of the new album, future plans, getting older and of course the current situation in the world. But first I want to know how life is at the moment for Nick, who is active in the music business for 32 years now.