Interview with Charlotte and Martijn, vocalist and keyboardist for Dutch symphonic metallers Delain

Rock City, Nottingham, 22nd March 2010

Currently touring for your new album APRIL RAIN, your first full project since 2006’s more collaborative LUCIDITY, but what were musical backgrounds before coming into this?

Charlotte - Several bands, and orchestras really, a lot of different metal bands…
Martijn - For me, I started the flute when I was seven (laughs), piano for 8 years I think, I started Within Temptation when I was 16/17 something like that, but I left in 2001, and started to do stuff for Delain. I got a little bit ill for a while which I didn’t expect, but got through it, and here we are.

Was it hard for you to go back in touring after suffering 5 years out being un-well?

Martijn - Well music is not something that stops, you can still write and be creative when you are ill, and I had a lot of stuff at that time, and I thought, ‘why not do something nice with it’, I met up with charlotte, and off we went.

It’s been quite a gap since your initial collaborative project 2006’s LUCIDITY…

Charlotte - When we released LUCIDITY, there wasn’t really a concrete plan that we had for where the music was going to go. The first development for us was bringing in a live band and having that to work with. After we had that the idea of writing the second album and having it more band orientated and written with that became the main idea, and it went on more as we wrote and gigged. The more we got to see how the songs worked live, the more ideas we came up with to develop them into what they are now.
Martijn - It just evolved on its own really, after working with so many different people on LUCIDITY, it was nice to get back into writing with just ourselves and having it like that.

Were there any conflicts during the writing process, considering your quite different musical backgrounds and idols?

Charlotte - Sometimes we do, but other times, it’s like there is an overlap, the music you like doesn’t always become the same music you like to make.
Martijn - If you have the same kind of background there would be conflict anyway, the creative process of making music breeds that kind of thing anyway; a bit like a puzzle that builds and runs, it gives you a wider perspective. Of course you can take elements of the music you love, maybe even place it in the same vein, but it can be surprising the results you get from a bit of difference.
Charlotte - If you look at the rest of the band, we all have different backgrounds, it’s quite an eclectic mix. Our drummer is all about 80’s pop, and our former bass player (Rob) was very 70s and into folk, and you can hear that in some songs on the record. You just have to make sure that in the end everyone agrees with what’s going on the record.
Martijn - Yeah it’s not quite a democratic process (smiles), you don’t want anything too wide or you lose focus, and myself and Charlotte, we are the core that keeps it that way. It’s still metal, but also it’s kind of pop, but with that heavy coat that we give it, it’s the way we write, we sometimes get compared to the other bands within this genre, but we always try to do something a bit new, which is always difficult.

Did it cause any problem having to replace you bassist whilst touring?

Charlotte - Luckily it wasn’t that bad a time when Rob decided to leave. It’s always sad losing someone close to the band. We had a lot of good times, and he is a great musician, but we are doing well, and Otto is settling in.
Martijn - Yeah, yesterday was his first gig actually, it was a busy venue, and he was great, beyond my expectation actually (grins). It was a challenge to find him, especially when you are like, ‘oh fuck someone is leaving the band’, it was like a phase. When you are a band that keeps growing and evolving, it’s natural that perhaps you might lose some people as you progress; when your band becomes your life sometimes you have to make difficult choices about which direction to go. When I started Within Temptation three guys left in the first year, including me… It’s not nice sometimes but maybe it has to be done to allow you to move forward.

The popularity of the symphonic genre has grown a lot over the last 5 or so years, and a lot of people say that perhaps the genre is getting over-populated and tired. Do you feel under pressure as kind of a new band coming into all this?

Martijn - Absolutely not, a lot of people forget where we come from, but I’ve been writing in this style for 14 years, I’m not like a copycat or something. We just write music we like, and we don’t give a fuck if ten people or a million people like it. Obviously it’s much better when a million people like it (smiles), but yeah, we make the music we make, and maybe it’s not entirely original, but it works for us, but everyone has their own unique take…
Charlotte - Yeah, Epica for example have much more operatic vocals and symphonies with orchestras, a much more folk style.
Martijn - And we write much more to a pop structure, but we have been asked if perhaps we would work with an orchestra on the next record, but it’s been done many times.
Charlotte - But people do like that, and we like that, so why shouldn’t we, maybe…