Interview with:Adrian Hates
Just recently it became clear that the new DIARY OF DREAMS album would be released sooner than anybody expected (according to Adrian’s announcement it will be the 13th March 2009) and of course anybody’s curious about more information, but this interview is rather a look into the past than a glimpse of the future. With friendly approval of the UAGoth Community we can provide this interview for you, in which Adrian Hates, front man and mastermind of the cult formation DIARY OF DREAMS, talks about his impressions of the Eastern-European shows, special fan gifts and the importance of music in his life.
Adrian Hates (DoD): Firstly, the tour was definitely a little longer. It was much fun for me and especially the shows in Russia were a big pleasure for us and of course the opportunity to play in so many different countries. That’s great! The album itself, of course is always the plug for a new tour. It was under critical discussion in every aspect regarding content, graphics, artwork... However I think that emotional feedback we wished for in the first place comes from the fact, that people put some thoughts into what they’ve read and saw and they discussed it. Sometimes, these were controversial discussions, but they discussed it and that’s the point. And I really liked the feedback I received and I think what I got back, what I read and heard you can only get by doing an extreme album.
Q: Which concert in the Ukraine, Russia or at our Belo Russian neighbours did you like most? Maybe also regarding audience and organization?
DoD: I really think that every concert on its own was extraordinary, because we’ve never done a tour of such scale before. To play so many concerts in more Eastern regions is really extraordinary and we had no high expectations. We just said we would see what happens, what comes and are happy about everyone who’s attending one of the concerts and they were well-attended, surprisingly well and I can really say that every concert was a positive experience for us with positive memories and we’ll definitely do that again next year.
Q: I know that every artist receives gifts from his/her fans. Are there any presents you really feel connected to?
DoD: I received lots of presents, that’s right! I still have many Christmas gifts in the tour bus right now. But there are indeed some presents I really feel connected to, which I have in my flat and hung them up there, or some that I use every day. Many years ago someone portrayed the cover of ‘One of 18 Angels’ on wood for me; that’s standing in my living-room ever since. Or a lady from Santiago de Chile gave me a wooden box in which she’d prepared some things and wrote a very long story with an elaborate writing on papyrus. There are many things, where you say “Wow, someone really put much work, much thought into this”, or fans who are sending me certain teas - which I could use again right now - certain tea sorts good for the throat and singers.
Q: This year you’ve put online the Russian version of the official DIARY OF DREAMS website. Was it already planned or rather a spontaneous idea of yours?
DoD: It wasn’t planned, really. I was offered that many times, but always rejected it because it’s much work. Not only the re-design into polyglotism, but to do all the updates in four languages. You’re so inflexible, you can’t just put news online, or say put that news online for me. It always takes a while to get the texts back from the translators. That’s kind of exhausting. But when we did that tour and saw… Well, you can’t tell it by looking at your sales like back in the day. There you had sold about 1,000 discs a month and you knew you were popular, now you don’t know that anymore and you’re coming back from Russia and you’re thinking: “Wow, there’s lots of people there hearing your music.” And then we thought we could promote that a little more and administer to the people there a little more and most of all it is very special language-wise. Spanish is very special and an insane bunch of people can read Russian plus English and German. I think with these languages we’re covering a broad spectrum of people. Maybe we should add Chinese as well (laughs).
Q: Let’s talk about the new album. Did you already start with the production?
DoD: Actually, it’s almost done. When I get back home, I have six days left and then it’s done.
Q: I learned you did some acoustic shows for your German fans. Are you planning on doing an acoustic record or another Live DVD?
DoD: There are many things you can do and which are nice, but in the end you always have to ask about the costs and if there’s a chance that you’re at least get that money back in. I don’t have to earn money with everything I do, but it has to at least bear itself, you know. And a DVD production is really expensive. I don’t know, we’ll see. The acoustic shows both were really extraordinary experiences. We had two acoustic guitars, a piano and three singers. Perhaps it’ll happen again one day.
Q: You’ve already worked as a DJ. If the organizer would ask you to do a DJ set at the after show party to one of your concerts... would you say yes or no?
DoD: In most cases I say no, sometimes I say yes. Depends on... If I was hanging around here all day, had a concert and am tired, I might just wanna sit around here and not doing a DJ set for 2-3 hours, because then I’m really done for and can’t do anything the next day. But it’s basically possible that I’ll do it, for release parties and I’m definitely going to do it for the next album. But the evening would be of a slightly different nature, because I won’t play what the audience wants, but what I want.
Q: …and which kind of music would that be?
DoD: That’d range from serene atmospheric pieces to more poppy tunes, Metal, hard guitar stuff, also hard electronics, but rather something like LFO, that’s what I like to play. Let’s say I’m doing a wild mix.
Q: You said once in an interview that you love to take pictures of nature and what about animals or people?
DoD: I’m not that people guy. I really like portraits. There are lots of beautiful portraits, pictures of impressions with people, but nature’s much more exciting for me.
Q: Maybe a more philosophical question... If you’d have the chance to go to a parallel world or reality, where you’d have everything you need. Where there’s lots of nature and you’d have enough time for your art and you could take all your friends and relatives with you. Would you do it or would there be no point in creating music for you if only your friends and relatives would be able to listen to it?
DoD: Making music as such for me has nothing to do with whether anyone’s listening to it or not: I would also make music if no one would listen to it, if I would only do it for me, I’d still make music. That’s an inner not an exterior need. See, to get things out of my head-system, I need to write them down, need to digest them and that happens in the form of music and that’s why it doesn’t matter in which universe with whom I would be, I would always make music. It doesn’t work without. I’ve been surrounded by music since I was a child. You can say that’s the core of my life.
Q: Well, I think that’s it. Last but not least I wanna say you’re very popular here in the Ukraine. When will you visit us again?
DoD: I think in early summer 2009. It’ll be very soon. The album is going to be released in March 2009.
This Interview was held on 26th December 2008 in Berlin before the show at the neuWerk festival by Daria Szegeda from the UAGoth Community (http://uagoth.net/). Translation by Sebastian Huhn, Editorial by Daniela Vorndran.
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