Listen to the Episode HERE!

 

 

Turn up the sound system, because it’s getting loud: the guest of my metal special is Chris Harms, the singer and frontman of the band Lord Of The Lost. The dark rock band from Hamburg took part in last year’s ESC with their song “Blood and Glitter” and never ceases to fascinate with its versatility. Chris is a really down-to-earth and easy-going guy, with whom I will talk about the fascination of vinyl, the new LOTL cover album Weapons of Mass Seduction, WhatsApp voice messages, and much more.

 

*intro music playing^*

Max: … and with this an especially “rocky” hello and a heartily welcome to MAX - the podcast. Before I am giving away who my guest is, even though you surely have already seen it on the cover ‒ here’s a little musical excerpt. *Blood and Glitter snippet playing* Even if certainly not each of my listeners is a fan of the Eurovision Song Contest, you surely have heard this song before. This was of course “Blood and Glitter,” by Lord Of The Lost, and I’m about to interview the band’s frontman, Chris Harms. Chris is not only the singer, producer, and founder of the band Lord Of The Lost, he is also a real multi-instrumentalist, has already worked with many big names, and created quite a few catchy tunes that got stuck in my head. Before I start beating around the bush now, we listen to this exceedingly sympathetic and easy-going interview. Have fun with the interview and of course with Chris Harms!

 

Chris: Moin! (Northern German for “hello”)

MAX: Moin! Good Morning! Very nice, with very good equipment, you’re using a microphone.

Chris: Yes, of course.

MAX: That’s how I like it.

Chris: Otherwise it would be horrible, but – I know that podcast partners can be difficult concerning the sound.

MAX: Sometimes, yes. Actually, yes. I once had someone, who only had an I-pad or an I-phone in front of him and spoke into it. You could not really listen to it in the end.

Chris: Yes, sure. Of course, you can’t expect everyone to have the know-how or the equipment, but it is of course difficult then.

MAX: It’s difficult then; that’s true. I’m all the happier that it works with you. Very nice. Yes, welcome to my MAX-the podcast format and thank you for taking the time at this early hour.

Chris: That’s no problem at all. I have been awake for two and a half hours already, so this is totally fine with me.

MAX:  For me it is the case that I always try to cover all genres a bit, from movies, TV, to music – I always say that I also make new discoveries - you’ve probably already answered that question before, but I hope you’ll answer it anyway. There are people who don’t know you as a musician or your band…

Chris: Yeah.

MAX: How did it all start musically for you? A little summary.

Chris: I think, that the foundation was laid very early on. I was two years old, or shortly before my third birthday, around Christmas, I was sitting on my mother’s lap at a classical concert in a small setting, a string quartet, and we were sitting right in the front row in front of the cellist and I found this "toy," the cello, which was a toy for me, incredibly fascinating, and from then on I made it clear to my mother that I would like to have this toy. And because there were always guitars around at home, my parents could both play a few rudimentary chords, and my older sister also played the violin, I would always take these instruments and put them between my legs, just like a cello, and play with this "toy", so to speak, and I annoyed my mother until I was finally allowed to really start playing the cello when I was five. In other words, my first encounter with music was classical music, then came my parents’ vinyl singles collection. They were born in 1940 and 1943, which means that musically they were basically there from the early 60s on, with The Beatles and Stones and so on, and then at some point I was given my first record. It was Joyride by Roxette, 1991, from a classmate, and that’s how I really got into non-classical music via pop music. And all the harder music, metal and darker stuff, electronic music, that didn’t really come until I was 18, 19, 20. At that time I had already started writing songs and had already taught myself to play the guitar rudimentarily, which is quite easy to derive from the cello, it’s just two more strings and a different tuning, but if you master one instrument, you learn the other quite quickly. And so I then added piano, bass, and drums self-taught; I started singing at some point and suddenly had my first band at 18. And a few years later I was on stage at the ESC. *laughs*

MAX: I can relate to this concerning vinyls, I always heard that from my father back then, but at first he only had them sitting in a box, and then I went for my training in Kiel (town in northern Germany), and there was always a group of, I don’t know, 3-4 people, who said: “We’re going to play records in the evening, probably because people didn’t want to listen to Spotify then, it was all a bit “cooler” this way. And so I said to my father: “Unpack the records!” And since then I’ve bought myself ‒ I don’t know ‒ around 500 records. Unfortunately, I cannot turn around my laptop…

Chris: I love vinyls, I am not that much – many love them because of the vinyl-sound, that’s not so much “my thing,” I don’t necessarily need this “vinyl-sound”. There I prefer the “clean product,” the way you can meanwhile stream it without loss or get it from a CD. But I like the feeling of putting on a record, consciously going there and putting on a record, listen to it, at half of the time I turn to the B-side and continue listening. There’s not just a playlist of the two or three most popular songs from each band playing – I enjoy that very much. 

MAX: That’s exactly how I always explain it to people, if they ask me “Why do you listen to records, you can skip songs on Spotify!” That’s not how it was planned by the artist.

Chris: Also the experience – I have to say, if I have a record there in front of me, this 32x32cm or 30x30cm thing, I don’t even know the exact size, the artwork, and if you also have a big booklet coming with it – yeah, it’s such a shame … I only know it from the artist’s perspective: you create an artwork for an album and then it gets released as a 12x12cm CD booklet. You can’t really see everything in it, that’s why I have become a huge fan of – I don’t know if you know that, the so-called “earbook,” which is also 30x30 cm, so almost as big as a vinyl format. It’s a book which has between 24 and 96 pages. In the front there are 1, 2, 3 or 4 CDs in it, which means, it is a CD format, with a book, almost as big as a record. That’s why for some years we have also released all our albums as this so-called “earbook,” as the CD is the “go-to”-medium now, in case you don’t exclusively stream music anyway, along with this book. Some people, who only stream music normally, buy it because of this 96 pages artwork and stream the music on Spotify, but still get the experience to be able to consume the whole thing in nice and beautiful style. It’s an amazing format.

MAX: Yes, absolutely. I can understand that very well. The artwork also plays a very big role for me, that you can flick through it and somehow immerse yourself a little more. I then sit down, listen to the album, have it in my hand ‒ yes, I understand that very well.

Chris: It’s also about the credits – I’m a credits “junkie,” too, you find a name in the songwriting credits, you think: “I’ve read that name before somewhere!” Maybe 15 years before with a totally different artist, he has co-written this song – and that one, too. He has edited something here, what is he doing overall? You go looking for that person, find out that he also makes music for movies. You get from one thing to another, concerning these things. I’m also a bit of a Wikipedia-Junkie, I have to admit. It’s super interesting for me.

MAX: I can see many parallels right now, I can understand this very well. May I ask – has it become more difficult on the music market to get vinyl records pressed, to reach people haptically Do you have the feeling that it becomes more and more difficult?

Chris: Yes and no. It’s true that vinyl records are experiencing an extreme revival at the moment, it’s not just a perceived hype, but it really is the case. You noticed that right when the pandemic started and the war in Ukraine and the resulting shortage of materials, that this was one of the parts of the industry that was affected most quickly. There were times when vinyl production lead times were up to 9, 10, 11, 12 months, and that’s why some artists were releasing singles for a year on Spotify until the vinyl was available, and that’s largely down to demand. And it continues to rise. CDs are on the decline, but what is on the rise with CDs are products such as the earbook, for example, everything that has artwork of some kind. But yes, sound carriers have become more difficult, but it’s not really the case that we’re not earning money through Spotify and the like. I have to say that it’s partly complaining about first world problems. Of course, there’s also some shit going on with streaming, especially this new idea from Spotify not to pay anything to artists who have less than 10,000 listeners, which I don’t understand at all, which is of course a real no-go, but basically it’s like this, with one million streams, about 3,900 euros are left over, which are usually split 50-50 between label and artist. And if you know that and look at the figures on Spotify, then you can work out for yourself that it’s not necessarily a bread-and-butter art and that even moderately successful bands can at least earn something. But it’s more difficult with the market, people do want haptic products, but the trend is really towards something big that you can put on display, in a showcase, that you can touch, and not just the CD with the little booklet.

MAX: Yes, that’s also interesting to hear, because it’s always said so often: “Yes, I can’t earn anything with Spotify; I don’t upload anything there and it’s no longer worth it” ‒ and, as you said, perhaps a bit complaining about first world problems, but it’s also good to hear that.

Chris: Yes.

MAX: We also have the town of Diepholz (a town in northern Germany) here in the – kind of a neighboring town - we also have the town of Diepholz nearby, where in the Pallas factories records are pressed. So that’s one of the places where ‒ I don’t know, I think AC/DC used to have their records pressed there, I don’t know for sure, but in any case they had to expand ‒ build bigger.

Chris: All of these companies had to expand, and there’s actually several labels which have bought vinyl cutting machines, especially during the pandemic, which are incredibly expensive. You really have to think about it carefully as you also need people who can operate these machines. How many vinyls do you need to press and sell to get the money back? But it is really – some really did that. Meanwhile the production times are ‒ of course I cannot talk about all press- or vinyl cutting factories – the last thing I heard, when it was about something for us, the label said: “It’s OK. In the meantime, three months or so lead time is enough.” But it still is – you still need to wait. A CD is pressed faster. It really is the case that if you want to work in the music industry and you have the money or the possibility of obtaining a loan by chance, that you go to get a vinyl cutting machine. People, that’s where the future lies. You can really dare to do that. You don’t need to buy a CD burning machine right now.

MAX: I’m curious to see where this all will lead. We’ll see.

Chris: We also need to talk briefly about sustainability in the case of CDs which are now available. The CD itself is of course made of plastic, but the sleeves can now be made completely from cardboard, also from recyclable cardboard. There are no longer these digi-packs, which have a transparent plastic tray inside where the CD is placed, but so-called digi-sleeves, and the CDs are then simply put in paper pockets which are a bit thinner, these digi-sleeves. I don’t even know, I don’t even know how to pronounce it correctly ‒ but in principle you can do it all sustainably, especially if you don’t use glossy printing. You can use recycled paper, and with vinyl ‒ I’m looking to the right here on the shelf. We actually make all our vinyl from recycled vinyl now, unless we need some super special color, or liquid vinyl with  ‒ I don’t know ‒ liquids in it or whatever. But you can recycle that and vinyl is nothing other than PVC, a certain PVC for the records, and the recycled material is available in black, but also in colors, where other vinyls and Lego bricks and whatnot are recycled, and the funny thing is ‒ each one is unique, because you take it out and you don’t know what color it is, because depending on what vinyl color has just been recycled, you get very strangely marbled, different colored vinyls, and that’s actually quite nice. They sound ‒ they’re a bit limited in terms of sound. They’re about 90% of the quality in terms of frequency response, because recycled vinyl is just slightly harder, and that’s just a bit more problematic for the cutting machine.  But if that’s okay for you and you’re not super audiophile high end, I can only say: you should also think about that, especially if you produce ‒ I don’t know ‒ a hundred thousand records a year.

MAX: Yeah. Yeah. I totally agree with you on that. An interesting topic. I didn’t know before that you can create new records from old records and Lego bricks.

Chris: I’m talking about Lego bricks in a figurative sense, because if we’re being precise, Lego is actually made of a different kind of plastic, but that’s roughly how you can imagine it.

MAX: Okay, okay.

Chris: That’s how you can imagine it. Everything that’s made of a similar material is then melted together and new records are created from it. I actually find that very beautiful.

MAX: Yes, absolutely!

Chris: I don’t know – maybe some of our Lord Of The Lost records are partly made of – I dunno ‒ old Celine Dion records or something ‒ that’s kind of funny.

MAX: Absolutely! Yes, yes. Very good. I’ve just mentioned it here with the neighboring city and in general, my podcast is ‒ I record it in Bremen (city in northern Germany), which is of course also interesting for my listeners who come from Bremen and the surrounding area ‒ do you have a connection to Bremen somehow?

Chris: A current one ‒ I have a small one at least, so not emotionally, but one of our closest crew members, Lennard, who does almost all of our TV of the Lost episodes, which is kind of our tour TV, our “making-ofs” etc., where we’re already almost at episode 600, which is completely crazy... he’s from Bremen and we actually shot a music video at the HFK Bremen (University of Arts in Bremen) where he studies, for the song “Leave Your Hate in the Comments,” which was quite nice. But other than that I don’t really have a direct connection to Bremen. I think I was there as a child at some point and you do the typical tourist tour. You can look at the “Town Musicians of Bremen” (statue of four animals featuring in a German fairy tale) which are standing somewhere in the square ‒ and that’s it. But that’s not the thing. Bremen is so close, or Lübeck, or other cities ‒ but as a Hamburg resident you never really go there. When we go somewhere as Hamburgers, we go to the Baltic Sea or the North Sea because we want to see the sea, but we don’t usually go to a neighboring city, no.

MAX: No, no. But there is also this “old enmity” between Bremen and Hamburg, but…

Chris: Oh really?

MAX: Yes.

Chris: What is that based on?

MAX: I think, it was something about soccer somehow…

Chris: Soccer and local patriotism, that’s a topic on its own, right?
MAX: Yeah, yeah. Horrible.

Chris: Mm-hmm.

MAX: Yeah. Honestly said, I am…

Chris: But actually there is this centuries-old friendship, that was even sealed by the Hanseatic League. They are both Hanseatic cities; we have an economic agreement. Friends, that’s not possible!

MAX: That’s how it is! And the saying also goes: “Hamburg is the lock and Bremen has the key to it” – as we have our Bremen key. (Bremen has a key in its city coat of arms)

Chris: Yes, but if the soccer fans attack each other, that’s of course “more important”.

MAX: Yeah. Yeah. What else can you say there.

Chris: That’s what I experience in St. Pauli. I live in St. Pauli, and I can hear the noises from the Millerntor-Stadium, if I open the window, when matches are played there. St. Pauli is not big, it’s only like a square kilometer, it’s like a small village within …like Vatican City… within Hamburg, only a bit different.

MAX: Yeah.

Chris: And what’s always going on there, every second game in the second Bundesliga (German Soccer League) is a home match, and there are also certain teams amongst which the hostility is big, of course these are often politically motivated stories, because some teams also have a lot of right-wing hooligans ‐ which I also find so absurd, it’s so crazy how football and politics merge in an absurd way. They’re just athletes, it’s a team sport, it’s about fun, and about money of course, but ...every two weeks, what’s going on, there are hundreds and hundreds of police officers, also from other cities, Bremen amongst others, you can see that on the number plates. The police cars come there and they have up to 2000 to 3000 police officers on duty to make sure that the district isn’t torn apart afterwards. By sports fans! That’s really crazy. 

MAX: Yeah, that’s really absurd. But I have to admit, I’m not that such a big soccer fan, so I can at least stay away from it. I don’t notice too much of it here in the old town, from our… well, in the Weser-Stadium you also get situations in which you think: “No, I won’t go out anymore tonight; it’s too wild for me.”

Chris: Yeah, that’s when you know exactly: “Tonight I won’t go out to the streets.”

MAX: Right, right.

Chris: I actually always check then, who has won, who has lost, are they friendly teams or not, has there been a tie, that’s always kind of the barometer, so you know roughly what the mood is like in St. Pauli.

MAX: Yeah, if you can go out or not. Let me come back from soccer to music. Joachim Witt ‐ I had an interview with him the other day. You recently recorded “Elektrosexuell” with him; I’m playing that on repeat at the moment. It’s a nice song. I’ve also seen ‒ Nino de Angelo, Blümchen, that is Jasmin Wagner, Alex Wesselsky from Eisbrecher; there are a lot of big names there. If you could now pick out someone, worldwide ‒ or even just Germany-wide, however you like ‒ who would you like to work with?

Chris: “Work with” in the sense of … with Nino de Angelo, Joachim and Blümchen I have produced their albums. Do you mean “work with” in the sense of making a duet, or producing an album?

MAX: Both. Both – something, which is perhaps a little close to your heart.

Chris: Concerning duet partners… there’s various levels, if it comes to “really singing together”: Lady Gaga, still in the first place.

MAX: I have read that somewhere before, yes.

Chris: I’m still a huge Lady Gaga fan. I would really love to do a song with Morten Harket from A-ha. Steven Tyler from Aerosmith, an awesome singer. Songwriting:  I would absolutely love to – that’s one of my life goals – write a song with Per Gessle from Roxette. Producing: awh, that’s so… that’s so difficult – I think I’ll keep that ‒ I actually prefer not to say that, because it always comes across as if I said: “I’d like to produce a record for this artist” ‒ it comes across as: “What you do without me isn’t good enough.” And that’s not how it’s meant at all. And there are actually too many, because I often hear productions and think: “I’d like to do that differently” and by “differently” I don't mean “better”. For me, there is no such thing as “better” or “worse” in music, there’s just different tastes. And as a producer you are sometimes simply paid for your taste, you just have to say that, and I would like to try to do things differently with many artists. I think that would be interesting. Finally, I perhaps have one big wish, which is also a “lifetime bucket list thing” for me. I’m a cellist, and Apocalyptica as a cello band, a cello metal band… I used to play with them in my room as a teenager, they don’t really have a singer, they always do a lot of guest vocals. That would actually be something for me, whether there might be “Apocalyptica featuring Chris Harms” at some point, that is something that is still on my bucket list, just like the ESC, for example, that was also one of my lifelong dreams, to take part in the ESC once, that was one of my lifelong dreams, and I was able to realize it – and I would do it again any time.

MAX: I was just about to ask, but I think, you already told that in several interviews, that you would do it again any time.

Chris: Yes, I would. Many people don’t believe me, but we would do it again, not just me, but all of us as a band, we are 100% in agreement on this. If we had a crystal ball, that told us that we would come in last again – we would still do it again, because it was such an amazing experience. Of course it is a contest and there are many reasons and assumptions and discussions, why Germany in particular ends up last so often and blah… If we ourselves talk about all of this, it always sounds like excuses, that’s why we don’t even start with that. I can only say: In the end we didn’t give a da*n about the ranking. What did we lose? Nothing at all. And what did we win? So much, if not everything, so – we would do it again, any time. And not just because it’s a cool promotion. For everyone out there, who thinks: “I want to participate there once!” Don’t participate, if you only want to get free – what does “free” mean in this concern anyway, you have months of work to do, we gave more than 900 interviews last year – don’t participate, to just get the promotion somehow, you need to celebrate it, you need to really, really love it, don’t just say, “Okay, that’s a cool promotion for me!”

MAX:   I'm going to move on from music to another main topic of my podcast, and that’s movies. Can you ‒ I know this is a really nasty question ‒ can you say you have a favorite movie, or maybe two, three, favorite movies?

Chris: It’s very, very difficult for me anyway in general to say: “This is my favorite food, my favorite movie, my favorite song” ‒ because every day – it’s a very difficult topic for me, because my brain doesn’t work that way, because every day is somehow different, but of course I’ve noticed over the last few years that it’s precisely these things that you watch again and again for sentimental reasons, that I get stuck with certain things again and again, and on the one hand that’s the very flat action entertainment. I’m from the Stallone-Schwarzenegger-Van Damme generation…

MAX: I understand that well.

Chris: I always go back to Terminator, Rocky, Rambo & Co. On the other hand I’m also totally into Star Wars and Lord of the Rings, these work both for me, Star Trek, too, so…

When I look at the movies that always get me the most emotionally, it’s probably Forrest Gump. I think that’s one of the greatest movies I’ve ever seen, and also the movies that made such a lasting impression on me, back when I was 19, I think, or 18, there was Fight Club in the theaters. I saw a sneak preview where you didn’t know what was coming.

MAX: Oh my!

Chris: That’s certainly a movie that’s somewhere in the top ten, so these are the first things that come to mind, but it’s quite complex. It can actually also be a very flat, romantic entertainment like Notting Hill, which is one of the sweetest and most beautiful films for me, and I sit on the couch and cry over and over again during Notting Hill, because I find it so sweet. So, I’m super versatile there too, I couldn’t just go in one direction... it doesn’t work.

MAX: Can you at least say ‒ because you said you grew up with action films, with Van Damme, Stallone & Co ‒ who is the biggest action hero for you? Which character or also which actor?

Chris: I actually have 2, you know... both Schwarzenegger and Stallone are self-made men, they’re both difficult characters and there are biographical things in both of them that I find problematic, but that’s the case with almost everyone. Although ‒ I find them both extremely inspiring. This “never stop” and this “keep going, keep going”... and I’m currently reading Schwarzenegger’s book Be Useful, which is also such an incredibly beautiful credo, I also have "Do it now!" written on the inside of my front door, because you always put off so many things that you could actually do straight away. Here ‒ I don’t know, you wrote me an email and I replied straight away instead of thinking: “I’ll do it on Friday.”

MAX: I liked that a lot.

Chris: It took me five seconds to reply, “Okay, when?” I would really name Schwarzenegger, as I said, not unrestrictedly, because I don’t agree with everything he says and does and has said either, but when it comes to having a motivator, and someone who is really an action hero for me, even in real life, I have to say it’s Schwarzenegger, for sure.

MAX: Did you watch the series Tulsa King with Stallone?

Chris: Nope, I haven’t watched it yet. But it’s on my list.

MAX: I can really highly recommend this, too, it’s awesome, absolutely awesome.

Chris: I have this long list, and with me it goes like this: I always watch something new, and then I watch something that I already know.

MAX: I like that. My list keeps getting longer and longer every year, I always try to tick off a bit of it, but…

Chris: You need to watch on two TV sets in double speed.

MAX: It could work this way. I think, that’s why Netflix has installed this option, that you can watch something faster.

Chris: Yes, but it’s really horrible; it drives me crazy. It’s like some very handy, but also very exhausting features in Whatsapp, Telegram etc., I can capture the message quicker then, but I feel terribly stressed afterwards. If someone talks to me so quickly, it does something to me. It puts me under pressure.

MAX: Yeah.

Chris: It’s like it’s really incredibly urgent now and “you have to ...” that’s like “For risks and side effects, read the package insert and ask your doctor or pharmacist” (in German commercials this is sped up to save time) ‒ so, that’s hard for me.

MAX: Or you need a friend like the one I have, who speaks so incredibly slowly in his voice messages, that you can really listen to them at double speed and you feel like he is talking to you at normal speed.

Chris: What’s also nice – it doesn’t work in Whatsapp, but with Telegram you can also listen to messages at half speed, that sounds as if someone was s u p e r  s t o n e d *says that in “slow motion” to demonstrate the sound* That’s totally funny.

MAX: Yeah. I believe that. Very nice. But I have to come back now, you said earlier that you were “confronted” with records though your parents ‒ or at least for the first time... you said some of this music was from the 60s?

Chris: That went from then on, yes. As I said, my parents were born in 1940 and 1943; they started to listen to music at 19, 20, 21 – so, it was really the beginning of the Beatles era, in the early 60s. And that was the big time of the vinyl singles. From the 70s on there were significantly more albums sold than singles.

MAX: Yeah. If you think about it now ‒ apart from Roxette, of course ‒ which album do you think my listeners would have to listened to? 

Chris: Like, which…?

MAX: Imagine you have this box with records there in front of you – which one would you take out and say: “You HAVE to listen to this one!”

Chris: In the small box there’s only singles, but you’re probably talking about an album now, right?

MAX: It can be a song, too, where you say, “You have to have listen to this song at least once in your life,” as it maybe means a lot to you or because it is just so good.

Chris: I think, I would still choose an album then, and that is Pink Floyd –The Wall.

MAX: Mm-hmm.

Chris: It’s a really long album, it keeps all of you out there busy for quite a while. Yeah. Pink Floyd -The Wall. This is great art for me.

MAX: Yeah. That also fits in with the slow voice message, that you sound a bit stoned, I think that’s also a typical album that you associate with that a bit.

Chris: Maybe for a bit, but if I choose a single, it would probably be a song that moved me very much: Emerson, Lake and Palmer, “C’est la vie”.

MAX: Emerson, Lake and Palmer, “C’est la vie”.

Chris: Mm-hmm.

MAX: I’m going to put that in the show notes.

Chris: A beautiful song …from the 70s, I think. 

MAX: It goes into the show notes.

Chris: Very good.

MAX: That’s the lifeblood of a podcast, tips that you might not hear every day.

Chris: Exactly, things, that you maybe wouldn’t expect, as I also don’t listen to it every day.

MAX: Yeah.

Chris: And I certainly haven’t put on a record from this box for 10 years, but there really are such gems in there such as the song “Popcorn,” for example, this *sings the popular tune*, which was now released as a remix by … Drunken Frog or whatever he is called.

MAX: yeah.

Chris: And the original is really from the 60s, one of the first electric songs, or 70s? 60s or 70s, really really early synthesizers, when actually electric music didn’t even exist yet. Groundbreaking. I also have the first album by Kraftwerk (German band founded in 1970) standing here next to me as a vinyl.

MAX: Very good.

Chris: Awesome.

MAX: I would love to browse through all the beautiful things you have there.

Chris: If you are ever in Hamburg, we have here in St. Pauli, as Lord Of The Lost our own apartment, the “Lost Place,” that’s where I am sitting right now, which is kind of our “part time shared apartment”. Each of us has a key and comes and goes as he pleases; we work here, write songs, we do livestreams, as I do right now, or we invite interview partners to come here. It is kind of “our headquarters,” and there are certainly about 200 of my records standing around.

MAX: I won’t let that be taken away from me, I’ll definitely get in touch, when I am in Hamburg.

Chris: With pleasure.

MAX: Very cool. I am now actually already at my final question.

Chris: Mm-hmm.

MAX: Or rather, I still have one; this is the one that has to come before the final question. Weapons of Mass Seduction – a cover album. I have read, that you need to have a reputation, a discography of your own, to be able to do cover versions, so that you’re not just a simple cover band.

Chris: Mm-hmm.

MAX: I have read in a different interview, that there were many songs, very many songs.

Chris: Yeah.

MAX: How long did it take to make the final decision – that was not mentioned in either of the interviews, how long you sat there and said: “This one goes to the album.” 

Chris: To start with: well, we’ve always released covers as B-sides or something, but not as part of an actual album – not as a main song of an album. They were always just a bonus, because we didn’t want to be a band that was only famous for cover songs.

MAX: Exactly.

Chris: There are bands and acts whose only successful singles were covers. We didn’t want that. So we waited – and then released this cover album, which basically has 11 songs – and then there’s an endless list of bonus tracks. The selection actually didn’t take that long. Each of us suggested songs, no matter the genre, it was only about: “Which song would you like to cover?” Or: “Which song would you like to have written yourself?” In other words, songs that are close to your heart. Then we had this list with 40-50 songs. I listened to all of them and I tried to find out which songs really touched me emotionally, on whatever level, because I think that’s the only way to sing them authentically. I gave the example that the drummer, even if he only moderately likes the song, can still hit the snare drum hard. But if I don’t feel something 100% ‒ the voice is a far more emotional instrument, and it gives a much deeper insight into a human’s soul, than the hit on a snare drum could give into the soul of the drummer. That’s why this was the most important filter. And it didn’t take long. I listened to the songs, of some of them only the first half, some of them only to the first chorus, I noticed, yeah, it’s a cool song, but nope, I just don’t feel it.

MAX: Mm-hmm.

Chris: I had them all in a Spotify-playlist and deleted them one after the other, listened to some again, deleted them, left it for a week, then I sat down again, deleted a few more, I think, I did that for 2 or 3 weeks in a row, so – in total it was maybe 2-3 hours. Always allowing a little time to pass in between, before coming back to it. It really didn’t take long, and then at some point there were these 11 songs left. It was only important for me, that something remains from each band member’s wishes, so that it’s not just my personal choice, but that they can also say “Cool, I chose this song” and feel represented, if you want to put it that way – and I managed that.

MAX: Yeah. Very good. Very nice. Now for the final question:

Chris: Yeah.

MAX: What may we expect from you as a band or from you this year? What is about to come; can you give away something?

Chris: Yes – it’s always a bit difficult, the really exciting things can only be given away, when they are allowed to be given away officially anyway. This year we have – which is exciting for the fans – some re-releases coming up, as our fourth album kind of celebrates its 10^th anniversary. Just today – it has started just today, it’s out for an hour now – I have started to produce a podcast.

MAX: Aah!

Chris: Along with a friend of mine, with Swiss from the band “Swiss und die Andern” (Swiss and the Others), and there we talk about anything and everything that comes to mind, sex, drugs, rock’n’roll, politics and everything. And also if we are on tour, we will connect and release a new podcast every two weeks. We will look how it works out for a year. We don’t have a name for the podcast yet, that’s among others one of the topics of the first episode.

MAX: Yeah.

Chris: We want to get people involved in this. And next to the fact that we will mainly go to the studio this year, we play only about 50 shows this year. We do our first US tour since 10 years though. We will also go to Canada for the first time, but unlike last year it will not be 100 shows this year, but only about 50. We produce our next “real” album, not a cover album, but with our own songs, which will be released in the summer of the next year or a little later than that. We are taking our time for that. All other things have to stay secret, unfortunately – but there’s so incredibly many cool things going on that I’d love to give away to you, but then I’d get annoyed later on, as everybody knows them already.

MAX: That’s actually the perfect call to my listeners to simply follow you on all social media channels and follow what’s coming soon.

Chris: That’s how it is, exactly. And if you don’t like us and don’t like me – then even more so, as you all know, social media thrives on hate comments, which drives the algorithm excellently.

MAX: Perfect! I take these as the best final words, very nice, thank you very much!

Chris: Thank you for the interesting questions, and – see you at some point in Hamburg!

MAX: I’ll definitely get in touch, I’m very excited. Very nice. Have a lovely day and lots of fun with everything that’s pending today and tomorrow – and good luck in the podcast naming process.

Chris: Thank you.

MAX: What should I say ‒ mine is called MAX-the podcast. Not necessarily creative. But at least you can remember it.

Chris: And give my regards to Michaela Schaffrath (German actress)

MAX: I will! See you!

Chris: Thank you!

MAX: Ciao!

*outro music plays*

 

MAX: And unfortunately that was it again ‒ but here’s a good tip on the side ‒ listen to some albums by Lord Of The Lost until the next episode of MAX-der Podcast ‒ they are absolutely great. Well then, see you next time! I look forward to hearing you again, yours, Max. Ciao!

 

 

Translation: Margit Güttersberger

Proofreading: Katharina Hagen