PlanetMosh Keeping it Metal
I spoke to Epica guitarist Mark Jansen ahead of the release of Epica’s new album, The Quantum Enigma. I also took the opportunity to ask him about his other band, Mayan.
Your new album, The Quantum Enigma is due to be released at the start of May. First of all can you tell us where the title came from?
The Quantum Engima means in quantum physics, when you observe little particles, by oberving you influence things. So as we are made out of little particles ourselves, we can ask ourselves the question, what does the world look like if we are not observing it? If we have a direct influence on what we see, what would it be like if we did not observe in any way. You can really philosophise about this question for a long time, and also what is reality and what is an illusion. All the lyrics, especially the title track of course, but all the lyrics are in a way involved in this topic.
I suppose it also applies to concerts – how would a band perform without the audience observing and influencing them?
Yes. That also would not be the same, because we need the audience to perform – it’s an exchange of energy, and the more energy we get from the crowd, the more they get in return. So every gig is different, every reaction is different, every show is different. But definitely the crowd can make a show much better.
What was the song writing process for the album – did you all work toegether or were there one or two main song writers?
Ususally we write with a pretty small group of people and everyone on our own, but this time we tried to do things differently than we’d ever done before. This time we still wrote the songs on our own, but at a much earlier stage we sat together and started working on each others songs, and together with the new producer, Joost van den Broek, we sat together and started working on the themes and trying stuff. We had a much longer preparatiom time before we started recording the songs. Especially on the last album, Requiem for the indifferent, we didn’t take so much time between writing the music and recording it. Now there was a whole new stage in between where we reconsidered every part, we tried to make the little details better, we tried to make the drums, bass and guitar better. Literally every detail had to be good before we started recording.
As you mentioned, for this album you have changed producers and used Joost van den Broek. Why the change?
Well firstly, we could have carried on with Sascha Paeth as producer for many more years – he’s a really great producer, but we had a feeling that if we did go on with him as producer there was a chance we’d start repeating ourselves. We know Sascha very well and he knows us well and after such a long period there is always a risk that you start taking things for granted and you cannot motivate each other 100%. That was the main reason we looked for someone else, because we really wanted to be taken out of our comfort zones, and have someone try some new stuff with us, some stuff we wouldn’t expect to do, and that guy was Joost van den Broek. He was the kind of engine that kept the whole process going, and he was also the one that motivated us to work harder than ever before, and that was exactly what we needed. So yes, Sascha was a great producer and there was really no need to change for all the things he’s done for Epica but it felt right to make the change. Sascha was still involved on the album anyway because he was working with us on the vocal lines.
Joost has been a busy man recently – your album, Xandria’s album and Stream of Passion’s album are all about to be released and he produced all of them.
Yes, yes. It’s pretty funny because I always joke that I have no idea how he does it, because he was working so hard on our album and he was constantly there with us recording it. I have no idea how he managed to do all these other projects around the same time as well.
Listening to the new album, there’s a lovely balance between the hard guitar sound, the orchestral element and the vocals – a nice combination of raw and heavy but also polished and rich.
Thank you. That was also something we changed. In the past, Sascha did the mix, and this time we used Jacob Hansen. The reason for that was we had some things in mind for the sound and we thought Jacob could do better with the things we had in mind. All the things you said, that was exactly what we tried to achieve, so as you said there’s a good balance and the guitars sound more harsh when they need to, it fits better with the songs this way than the old way. I’m very happy with the end result.
You have an album launch show in Tilburg on 30th April. Will you be playing the whole of the new album there ?
Yes, I started rehearsing around a month ago, and this week we started doing some band rehearsals. We want to be very well prepared for this show, because we don’t have any shows before then so the 013 is the first show we’ll do in about six months so it better be good. We will play all the songs from the album and we will also play some oldies. Each album will be present in the show, but the main focus obviously will be on the new album. We will play all the songs, and I want to add that it’s a big advantage that we rehearsed the songs before we started recording. We know already with the new songs that they work really well live, and with “Requiem for the indifferent”, when we recorded it we had no idea how they would work if we played them live, and we found out later that some songs worked well on stage and some songs did not. Now with the new album we know every song will fit in a live setting, so I’m really looking forward to play this one live. Two weeks is too long to wait now.
You’ve once again got fans tavelling to the show from around the world. Are you ever surprised by how far some fans will travel for your album launch shows, or the Retrospect show you did ?
Yes it always surprises me. We are not a band like Metallica or the Rolling Stones, so when people travel a long way to see our band, it makes me happy and proud. It makes me also think sometimes about all the things we’ve achieved over the years. It also gives you a big feeling of responsiblity which is part of the reason why we take each show so seriously, because there are so many people who make a lot of effort to come and see you. When I see sometimes bands that will drink a lot and don’t take their shows seriously, I cannot imagine something like that because of that reason – for many people it’s a lot of money to buy a ticket or lots of travel, so you have to give them the best possible, otherwise you’re not worthy to play in a band I think.
You’ve got Insomnium supporting you at that show. I was hoping you would have Mayan as support.
We discussed that but some people said it’s better not to do that because if you play with Mayan then some of the energy is gone, and some of the magic is released already, you’ve shown yourself on stage. With a different support act then it builds up towards the climax. When they said that I can understand, even though I personally would have loved to play with Mayan as well, so I’m a bit in the middle of it.
You’re due to play some festivals this summer including Pinkpop on the same day as The Rolling Stones.
I could never have imagined we would be playing the same day as the Rolling Stones. I think there won’t be many more chances to do that because I don’t think they will keep going for ten more years, you never know because twenty years ago people thought they would stop soon and they’re still around, so you never know. I think it’s very unique. My parents listened back in the day to The Rolling Stones, I grew up with music of that era and now I share the day with such a band, it’s a unique feeling.
Are there plans for tour dates later in the year?
Yes we’re still working on them, We’re working on a European tour, a North American tour, and a South American tour. First we will do summer festivals, then these three tours, then the year is already over, so it’s going to be a full year but after all this inactivity because of the pregnancy of Simone, and working on the album, now we really cannot wait to hit the stage again.
It’s even busier for you because you also have shows with Mayan. You’re playing Power Prog and Metal (PPM) fest this weekend as well as Dokk’em open air in June. Are there likely to be any more Mayan shows this year?
We will also do two club shows. We also have one other festival scheduled. We won’t do that much with Mayan but we will take the chances we get, and in the free time when Epica is not playing, we will try to do some Mayan gigs. There’s no pressure at all with Mayan, what opportunities come we can take, but we don’t have to make a living from it, so that’s the positive thing from it, we can just have fun and also with the music, it would not be a disaster if an album was not received well. Thankfully our new album, Antagonise, got received very well but even if that were not the case, it doesn’t change anything. We can do everything without any pressure whatsoever, and I think that’s the strength of the band.
Thank you for your time.
