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Interview
Deutsche VersionInterview mit Epica (27.11.2004)
HH: Hi Mark! We're from Heavyhardes.de, a Munich website. I read the band biography on your website and it seems to me that you are quite the mastermind.
Mark: Yeah, maybe I write the most but I bring it all to the rehearsing room and we develop the ideas there. We all do things together.
HH: I said this because when you put the band together, you had a casting or something. How did you find for example Simone, the others we're there from the start in Epica and you started up with another singer.
Mark: Yeah, it was not that easy to find the bandmembers together because at the beginning we had a lot of auditions and we have to see in one audition if a guy fits to the band or not. Most of the guys who came to the auditions could play very well, but there were only a few guys who were personally very cool and on tour you have to be together a lot with each other so it's important to get along very well. So that was the most difficult to get really the right person for the right spot. Simone was the last one we added to the band because there were a lot of female singers that came along somewhere good but they looked a bit ugly to be honest and others they were not so good but they looked fantastic. There was no one who had both things altogether and Simone was too young in the beginning, we knew her already but she was too young to enter the band but after we searched for months and months she grew as a singer and she became older and we said: "Let's take the risk and just do it!" That's how she entered.
HH: How does a guy to bit to fit in the band? How would you describe yourselves?
Mark: The guy needs to have humor, a sense of humor. Nothing is more important to have fun on the road. Not that we laugh the whole day at each other but every day there are some moments, where you can laugh your asses of here in the bus and that's I think very important. All the things that they have to have is when there's an argument that you can talk about it and not talk behind the back of somebody else about him and talk bad. When we have an argument we look each other in the face, talk about it and then it's over with the argument and we just go further. There were so many bands that were so talented and they have a litte argument that became bigger and bigger and bigger and then they stop, they split up. It's such a pity. So that was very important that we have not only have the best musicians but also the best possible characters.
HH: With your debut album The Phantom Agony you hit very big in the Netherlands and were invited to the 2 Meter Sessies; that's how we got to know you. This show is unknown in Germany, unlike many other Dutch shows. John De Mol brought all the shows over but not this one. What's this show like? What happens there?
Mark: It's a TV show by a guy called Jan Douwe Kroeske and nowadays he doesn't make the TV program anymore, he does it for radio but it's still a famous program in the Netherlands and bands like REM, Radiohead, Sepultura, they all came there so when we were asked for it, it was really an honour. But because he has no TV program anymore we were thinking shall we record it anyway and they still have all the cameras and so they said, yeah, we can record it and let's see how it looks like. It went all very good and the transmission decided when they saw the pictures to make a DVD out of it. It's more a thing for the Die-Hard-Fans to have something extra and people who want something new after The Phantom Agony they can better wait for the next record because that's something really new. The DVD is something for the people that can't get enough of Epica, haha!
HH: Did you prepare especially for the 2 Meter Sessies?
Mark: We were already on tour for a long time so we didn't have to prepare and the choir we used was already the choir from The Phantom Agony. Only the string section was new but they read just from paper and they have no difficulties in reading what they see from notes.
HH: Did you write the notes?
Mark: No, that was already done with The Phantom Agony by the guy who made the arrangements for the strings because we write the songs and the beginning of the arrangements and the guy writes what violin A has to play, what violin B has to play, what cello has to play because we just write the things but we don't know what instrument has to play what. So they already wrote it down and we just had to copy it and give it to these guys.
HH: You were asked to make a soundtrack for a film. When will this be?
Mark: Right after the Mexican tour. After the European tour we do a Mexican tour and right after that we start composing this score.
HH: How do you think will it be? Do you have experience in writing something like that?
Mark: Not at all! Hahaha! That must be also for them a little scary moment but I already wrote the trailer, I did already some try-outs for them and they said: "Oh well it's gonna work!" They trust now completely. This is my fist movie and I'm now really cheap, that their advantages. They have no big budget, they have the best dutch actors, how they pay them I don' now and for the rest they don't have much money so everybody who is involved besides the famous actors they all get nothing and when the film becomes a success everybody gets something from the profit.
HH: If there is one.
Mark: Yeah, but you have to start somewhere and when you don't start with this movie maybe you'll not get an offer again.
HH: Do you want to make a carreer out of that if it works?
Mark: Yeah I hope so. I want to make Epica for sure, at least one half of the year and the other half making film music score. But let's see how it goes, first I have to do this film well and then we can see how it can go on... if it can go on.
HH: I hope that you can live of it because it's a very big dream to live of the music you make.
Mark: That would be really great. I'm almost finnished with my studies but I really can't imagine that I gonna be a psychologist.
HH: On We Will Take You With Us there is a bonus track "Memory" from the musical Cats. Why did you choose this song?
Mark: Oh yes, Simone sang it already a couple of times in her singing lessons and she had to perfom it live one time with the pianoteacher and this sounded so beautyful that I asked her: "Can we do that also for the 2 Meter Sessies?" because this guy Jan Douve Krouske asked if we could do one song that we only would perform for the 2 Meter Sessies that he had something special and we decided to do this song. I'm happy we did it because it's from the acoustic songs the most beautiful one. I heard a lot of good critics and I'm happy we have chosen this song.
HH: Will you push the music of Epica in the direction of the classical musical like cats or something?
Mark: The new record is in a way more quiet and more musical stuff but on the other hand the fast songs are even more faster and harder and louder. The contrast became bigger. We have even a Black Metal piece in it.
HH: So there were influences in both extremes.
Mark: Yeah, there are a lot of influences and maybe that's why you hear a lot of influences in Epica because I listen from Black and Death Metal to the most soft film music. I have just one criterium: the music has to be good. And all music I love was good. Only R'n'B and Rap music I dislike.
HH: I think you hardly find a Metal fan that likes R'n'B and Rap music.
Mark: Yeah, it's very rare.
HH: How did this success of The Phantom Agony, being invited to the 2 Meter Sessies, playing two tours, influence your live, how did it change your life?
Mark: Personally I knew what could happen because I already played in After Forever for about seven years and the band was already quite big when I left so I knew what I could expect. For the other guys it was totally new so I think for them it was a bigger change. It was a bigger change when I had to leave After Forever and had nothing to do anymore during the day. I love to be on tour, go to different countries, different cities, that's the way I like to live. So for me it's just having my normal life back.
HH: With only one album released you don't have so many songs. How long did you play on the tour so far?
Mark: We started with shows of one hour and 15 minutes but unfortunately our singer has a cold now so we have to shorten it, now it's between 55 minutes and one hour. It's pity because we really like to play as long as possible and we also played some new songs already. But shit happens.
HH: Your songs are very melodic, lots of arrangements, strings and stuff like that, do you also put that all on the stage or do you put that stuff away and concentrate just on guitars, bass, drums...
Mark: No, no! We use samples because the choir parts play such a big role in our music they have to be there. If we leave them away there is something missing. In the future we hope that we can play live with a real choir and a real orchestra but that's so expensive we have to use samples before. Maybe in future, you'll never know.
HH: Don't you feel a little bit constricted by that?
Mark: Yeah, in some way yes. Because sometimes you want to do something else in the middle of a song but you are forced to keep in the right place and we have to play the song as it is and we can't change if we know something else but we are thinking about getting more freedom in there by making the samples in that way that we have more freedom. It must be possible but we are not exactly sure how to reach it.
HH: Perhaps one gives signs with little flags and someone pushes the right button. Or you give this job to the drummer which starts the samples at the right time.
Mark: At the beginning our drummer did start the samples but sometimes it didn't work out and he started the wrong one, haha! So we said: "You don't do the samples anymore!"
HH: How was the tour so far? How many people came to your show every evening?
Mark: In Switzerland there were about 200 people, in Austia there was one show also with 200 people and one show there were about 70 and in Germany it's always between 40 and 100 and we knew already that Germany would be most tough because there are so many tours going on here and we're not that big here yet and so we have to build up something here. In concerts in Netherlands we are always sure, also in Belgium, France and Spain there are always a lot of people but in Germany we have to build it up.
HH: Yes and here in Munich you have very bad luck because Therion is playing on the same day here too together with Trail Of Tears and another band so it's a tough competition. So there could be less people than you expect.
Mark: But when there are 20 people at least already then we are already happy because 20 people can go home with a happy feeling and for us the mission is complete.
HH: If you like film scores what is your favourite movie?
Mark: Gladiator!
HH: I would have thought such an epic film. Do you like the Lord Of The Rings?
Mark: Yes of course but that is obvious, such a good film music and it's well played and everything is good at that movie. But the Gladiator is from my favourite composer, Hans Zimmer. He also made The Rock, Hannibal and he had some involvements in Pirates Of The Caribbean. And movies like that I like a lot.
HH: Yes and you know always it's Hans Zimmer because he alway steals a little bit from himself.
Mark: Yeah that's true, sometimes you think, man come up with something new!
HH: Is there a film where you like the film and hate the score and where you think: "I would really write a good score for that film!"
Mark: I can't say one because when I don't like the score then I also don't like the film. I can't imagine... (thinks) ... a lot of dutch movies, sometimes the score sound too cheap, like a Casio keyboard... the film music is not good enough. I know there's not much money. But there are a few good film score composers and they do a lot of work but when they don't do a certain movie and they have somebody else then it sounds sometimes so crappy.
HH: How do you go about writing music. I read about Hans Zimmer that he has a farm of computers that all are busy computing his arragements. Do you also have a computer or something?
Mark: Yeah, I have a homestudio but most of the things I have to do myself so he has maybe some programs that help him but I have to record everything myself with my producer equipment.
HH: What programs do you use?
Mark: Sonar 3, that's something like Pro-Tools.
HH: As you answered half of my questions in stride I have no questions left. But one thing I'd like to know. How do Simones parents view this hanging around with people with long hair and singing and having no "real" job? ;-)
Mark: They have two daughters and they always come home with boyfriends with long hair so they are used to it. At the beginning when she said I'm not going to finish the school, I'm going to join this band and we go on tour they were not that happy. But now they see that the band really is getting a name and now they are proud of her. I'm happy that we reached already this level and they can be proud of her and they can really see that it was worth of her leaving school. I hope that we can go on like this and make a living out of music. We will do everything that we can to make music and I'm shure that we keep on going like this and give ourselves 100% and that it will happen.
HH: I hope so too. So I thank you very much for the nice interview and have fun.
Mark: I thank you too and I hope there will show up some people! :-)