“Paul Roland writes nice melodies and has a very particular personality, but he is too intellectual for me!” (Frank Zappa, 1988)
“Roland’s songs are like short stories set to music.” (Greg Lake)
Since the appearance of his first album ‘The Werewolf of London’ in 1980 (a John Peel favourite and a regular featured album at the legendary Bat Cave) Roland has written and recorded 20 albums including ‘A Cabinet of Curiosities’ which ‘Rolling Stone’ named “one of the best albums you’ve probably never heard”, the H.P. Lovecraft-inspired ‘Reanimator’ and ‘Bates Motel’ with songs written for surviving members of the Velvet Underground.
For four decades Roland has been spinning twisted tales of Victorian villains, eccentric Edwardian inventors and the supernatural against a backdrop of gothic-psych-baroque pop, earning him the title “the male Kate Bush” (a comparison attributed to former label mate Robyn Hitchcock) and, more recently, “the Godfather of Steampunk”. His highly literate lyrics, often macabre themes and strong melodic gift has attracted an increasingly large and loyal cult following while his proudly independent ethos has ensured he has remained a cherished niche artist.
Paul’s first album for Dark Companion, ‘White Zombie’ (2016), was acclaimed ‘a masterpiece’ by RAI, Italy’s national TV and radio broadcaster and named ‘Album of the Month’ in ‘Blow Up’ magazine. His next group album ‘Bitter and Twisted’ (2017) was nominated for ‘Album of the Year’ in a French rock magazine and ‘Album of the Month’ in several German rock magazines, while his most recent offering, the acoustic psych-baroque collection of supernatural-themed songs ‘Wyrd Tales of an Antiquary’ (Sept 2023) prompted major features in Spanish and Russian rock magazines and was playlisted on RAI3, Italy’s national radio.
Roland headlined the indoor stage on the final night of the METAL MAGIC FESTIVAL in Denmark on July 9th last year with his NEW Italian band confirming that his audience is as diverse as his genre bending music. His previous performance was hailed by the organisers as “one of the five best gigs in the 11 year history of the festival”.
Roland’s gaslight world is one of quaint but dark English folklore, sinister Victoriana and bittersweet stories…a steampunk prophet not without honour in his own land, either. (Uncut UK)
Roland approaches his songs like hand-stitched labours of love to be glimpsed through an arcane wonder-tinted microscope… 8/10 (Classic Rock and Prog Rock magazine 2016)
Roland is a maestro of melancholy and madness… ornate gothic/baroque songwriting and quintessentially English pop-psych dementia…princely stuff. (Ptolemaic Terrascope UK)
Psych-pop genius…Paul Roland has remained a cherished figure on the gothic rock and psychpop periphery for 30 years. (Record Collector)
Paul Roland could well claim to be the world’s most famous singer-songwriter, author and paranormal researcher…Roland endures as a purveyor of a unique type of English art-rock who should be celebrated. 8/10 (Vive Le Rock)
Gothic-psych-baroque-rocker waxing demented in a way only an Englishman can…impeccable. (Goldmine, USA)
With his polite, thoroughly Anglified take on garage, pop and psych Paul Roland has long since been elevated to the status of a revered national institution. **** (Shindig)
Paul Roland has a unique gift for song writing unlike anyone else and the imagination on display is formidable…we clearly are in the presence of a master story-teller…there is plenty here to suggest that Roland is one of the UK’s best secrets. (Louder Than War)
American critic Jim DeRogatis (‘Rolling Stone’, ‘Chicago Sun Times’) credited Roland for “masterful Syd Barrett-style pop tunes orchestrated in the manner of SF Sorrow by The Pretty Things, and placed Danse Macabre (1987) at number TWO in his Two Dozen Great Psychedelic Rock Records from the First Revival. “Roland has made many fine albums, all of them have moments of greatness.”