Tuesday 20 October 2009

My cost

If you are interested in my price here it is: a pen...
...
Yes, a pen. Aren't me supposed to think that, when my mother insulted me for losing her pen?! I can't stand it!

Is a mother supposed to act like that, hellz?!
It was that close for her to tell 'Get out of my house!' and she was yelling me all the time!! If I had any choice, I would leave at the second, but since I must finish school and I don't have a job... I'm staying. But I now will be different from the person I was... It's like the whole world trying to change me into a monster.

The coolest and the most funny drummer ever!

This is Ariën van Weesenbeek - the Epica's drummer.
He is very cute----->
and very cool. Best drummer ever! You ROCK
Ariën!




















Here is his biography from his personal website:

Yes… the mayhem is born… Only three years old and already bashing furniture with spoons and forks. Fortunately, he dicovered his dad’s drumset on time. It was obvious that this young man just HAD to play drums (not in the least place for other peoples safety!).

I took up drum classes at age seven to learn the basic drum skills. Meanwhile, a lot of synchro-tape-drumming was done at home. Inspired by a Cream&Eric Clapton record, I intensified my practise under guidance of my drum teacher.
At the same time, I joined a local marching band. Besides a lot of fun, this appeared to be very helpful for discipline, too.
When I was 15, I made some friends at school, and was introduced to rock and metal music (ANTHRAX, SLAYER). As a group we began making heavy music. Then, British grindcore/deathmetal formation NAPALM DEATH crossed my path, and I was blown away when listening their intense, fast, cyclone-like metal, gazing with open mounth at the record store. A new love was born.

My rather improvised band grew, was named PANDAEMONIUM, and developed into a six-man effort playing NAPALM DEATH, CANNIBAL CORPSE- and MORBID ANGEL-inspired metal. Double bass pedals were purchased, and so began a long period of intense training. School efforts went below zero; being a fulltime musician was my only ambition.

I also joined another band, hardcore/metalband DOWNSLIDE, and played quite some live-gigs and made my first studio recordings with my two bands.
DOWNSLIDE split up at the time I started studying at the Rotterdam Conservatory. I started to mix metal with rock, funk, jazz and latin to enrich my drumming and composing style. Together with some fellow students, I started a rockband called CONSPIRACY. It appeared to be a fun and helpful experience to play different music other than metal. I recorded one demo with them, and played some live-gigs, even once as
support-act of RACOON.

With PANDAEMONIUM’s third release, I auditioned for the drummer’s seat in Dutch deathmetal band GOD DETHRONED. After having played with the guys and being hired for the job, I played multiple festivals and tours across Europe and even US-festivals. At this time I recorded the album ‘Into the lungs of Hell’.
As a project for my education, I made a personal promo-cd: containing three self-written songs, one PANDAEMONIUM-song, and one CONSPIRACY-song. It contains my musical experiences till this recording, and are summarized in the 5 songs.

I was also asked to record a demo of the band EDGECRUSHER from Belgium. Isaac Delahaye, one of the guitarplayers, was also studying at the Conservatory, and asked me for the recordings. I recorded 6 songs for the demo called ‘Impressions of Mankind’.

PANDAEMONIUM came to an end after 7 years, as I got busier with GOD DETHRONED, and I finished my education at the Conservatory.
I left CONSPIRACY, and started working as a part-time drumteacher at Parnassos in Utrecht, Holland.
It was in the same time, that I was a guest-teacher at the Rotterdam Conservatory.
I had 5 students who I was ‘training’ each one to play one song of God Dethroned, and to perform the songs live together with fellow students who played the rest of the instruments, and even with a female grunter!! It was a great thing to do, and everybody gave their best!

I went on playing gigs with God Dethroned, and around summer 2003, I went into another new musical adventure: gothic metal with the band IMPERIA. Together with them I recorded their debut-album as a session-drummer, and also did two live gigs with them.
Again, a good thing to have done and I learned a lot from playing this kind of music.
God Dethroned took it a bit easier for half a year, due to line-up changes, and in this time, I was jamming with other musicians who he formed a band with called ‘DOWN TILL DAWN’, a heavy-, power-, thrashmetalband. After playing together for a year and a half, and later on with Isaac Delahaye in the band, we recorded their first promo-cd, to find out where the band musically stands. With this promo, DOWN TILL DAWN is trying to get gigs, reviews, and maybe... a record deal.

I also got a phonecall from the guitarplayer-singer of the band PACE GRACE, a
rockband with sixties-blues live-covers, and was asked to play live gigs whenever I was available, and so I did quite a lot of gigs with this band.
It was around the time of the DOWN TILL DAWN promo-finish, that GOD DETHRONED was back on track; it was time to record a new album. Henri and I started working on new songs at Henri’s house and in the rehearsal room, and when the songs were nearly finished, Henke Zinger and.... Isaac Delahaye(!) joined the band. GOD DETHRONED recorded ‘The Lair of the White Worm’. The band got very good reviews, and went on the road again: festivals, a tour with GRAVE and a headliner tour.

So.... pffffff... and what’s happening now?? Well, it’s been busy with gigs the last couple of months of GOD DETHRONED, PACE GRACE and DOWN TILL DAWN. I was also asked to participate in a project called ‘DELAIN’ of Martijn Westerholt (ex- Within Temptation), and I recorded the drums for 11 songs at Spacelab Studios in Germany.

And.. I’m still teaching drums on a part-time basis....
And there are more gigs coming up...

***

And here is a funny video of beach drumming:

Epica

Thursday 15 October 2009

I'm so indignant!

Grrrr!!! Our police s*ck (the Bulgarian)!
Today on the TV news told about two policemen that coerced a sixteen years old student and they raped her for two months and even took pictures and made videos with a camera!!! (It's getting unbearable to live here!)

I can't stand it, the misery in Bulgaria! It's so pity - we've got beautiful places and a great history... and we totally ruin it!!! It looks like we are losers, right? And yes, we are.

EPICA

Yeah, that's my favorite band. They are great!

Ever since EPICA emerged on the scene, the band has been caught in a whirlwind of studio recordings, interviews, screaming fans, world wide live performances and the rock 'n roll lifestyle. The loss of both a record company and a drummer in 2006 seemed to have stopped the band on their rise to the top. But all is not what it seems. EPICA is back with a mighty new album called 'The Divine Conspiracy', an exiting new chapter in the history of the band.

The Dutch female fronted symphonic metal band EPICA was founded in 2002. Mark Jansen had left After Forever to pursue his own dreams and found that guitar player Ad Sluijter, bass player Yves Huts and keyboard and piano player Coen Janssen shared his vision. Drummer Jeroen Simons and singer Simone Simons completed the band. The band name is derived from an album of Kamelot of whom several band members are big fans and musically EPICA stands out by not only taking influences from the world of rock and (symphonic) metal, but also from film music as composed by the likes of Danny Elfman and Hans Zimmer.

Within a few months EPICA had the material to record the stunning debut album 'The Phantom Agony'. The album was released worldwide in 2003 and was followed by a lengthy tour. EPICA's efforts were rewarded in 2004 with an Essent Award (an important Dutch award for talented young bands). While touring continued throughout the year, EPICA recorded and released their second full length album 'Consign To Oblivion' in 2005. The album made it to #12 in the Dutch charts and remained in the Top 100 for 7 weeks. This release also features a guest appearance by Kamelot frontman Roy Khan. With the creative juices flowing, that same year the album 'The Score: An Epic Journey' also saw the light of day. The album consists of the music EPICA wrote for the Dutch movie 'Joyride'. This album is marked by the absence of guitars, drums or even vocals and contains mainly instrumental symphonic songs. After four years of hard work, the band took the time to reflect on the impressive career that took the world by storm. So in 2006 the photo-sound book 'The Road To Paradiso' saw the light of day. It's a detailed description of the band’s history in words and images and contains lots of pictures taken by the band members, professional photographers and even hundreds of fans that contributed their best pictures and words. This book comes together with a unique bonus-cd that features unreleased songs, live material and demo recordings.

The year that started on a high ended in a low when drummer Jeroen Simons decided to quit the band. But it's not in the band's nature to be taken aback. After hundreds of shows in dozens of countries all over the world (including the US, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Brazil, most European countries, Israel, Tunisia…) this band had become a well oiled metal machine that is unstoppable. In 2007 EPICA signed a new record deal with Nuclear Blast and the year will see the release of EPICA’s third full length album 'The Divine Conspiracy'. “More” is the best word to define this album. More choirs, guitars, grunts, speed and songs. 'The Divine Conspiracy' will be more guitar oriented. This time four guitar tracks were recorded instead of the usual two. Thanks to the skills of talented God Dethroned drummer Ariën van Weesenbeek EPICA was able to make faster and more complex songs. As with all of their releases, the music on this album was brought to a higher level by the dream team at the Gate Studio: Sascha Paeth, Amanda Somerville and Miro Rodenberg. This new opus is more than 75 minutes long and is EPICA's first concept album. It deals with the theory that, as a test, God created all kinds of different religions and released those upon humanity to see if they would be able to find the true nature of them. The question is whether mankind can realize that all religions are basically the same. But there’s more to it. The album also concludes the 'Embrace That Smothers' concept that could already be found on 'The Phantom Agony', but started on the After Forever-album 'Prison Of Desire'. It seems only fitting that the conclusion of the concept features a guest appearance by After Forever grunter Sander Gommans. The circle has closed, the journey continues…

More at: http://epica.nl/

Time

Tomorrow, finally I sure will have some time.
I guess I'll be back from school at 4:00 p.m. And when I'm back I'll have lunch. I'm not going to do my homework (yeah! ;]). I'll just stay home. And... that means I'll have 2+ hours free! Which means that I will write a Halloween story and I'll think about my costume and the decorations!
That's all great, but still, I must make myself a plan (everything happens!).
Here it is:
  • 4:00 p.m. - Home
  • 4:10 p.m.-4:30 p.m. - Lunch
  • 4:30 p.m.-5:30 p.m. - Writing a story
  • 5:30 p.m.-6:30 p.m. - Making decorations
  • 6:30 p.m.-7:00 p.m. - Drawing
I think the plan is good.

Feeling better

Finally. I feel better now, though I'm different and lonely. The day feels good. And now I noticed - not much leaves are yellow. There are many green that falled... too young. It's because the weather is frezzing cold (brrr!) and the trees are now confused. It's cold like in winter and everyone wear their winter coats already! Would be good to have some snow for Halloween! :P
Today it's like I have wings! I feel free to do anything and enjoy. And I'm not sad anymore. Did I said wings? Oh, I have 2 pets - parakeets (little parrots) and now they so carefully smooth their feathers! They are so funny! :D

Wednesday 14 October 2009

Legends & Myths

Do you still remember those old, dusty legends and myths?
It looks like we, the 'new' people forgot them. Can you remember your favorite one? Mine is Beowulf. You should watch the movie too. It's a great success and will tell you the legend better than I will.

There are even more legends and myths. They are all great!
But still I prefer to make my own fairytales. It's easy! Just let your mind imagine anything and write it right away or you will lose your thoughts. :] Happens to me all the time.

Look now, I'll give you an example:
This morning I woke up and got up. Then I looked through my window and I saw the dark clouds. I the first thing I imagined was a golden forest in autumn with dark, cloudy sky and a fog. And my thoughts went to a path in the forest, that was covered with brown leaves and I was hearing a melody from deep inside me. And if I had more time I would write a story of something that happened in this forest. I just had to woke up from this fairytale... unfortunately.

I already forgot the melody... but it was truly no one else could hear no more. It is a lost melody. :[

Making a fairytale is a great exercise for your mind. It's even better to have 1 or more people with you and you can do this: everyone adds a sentence and you alternate. And at the end you'll have:
  1. A fairytale;
  2. Good moods;
  3. Better friendship;
  4. A nice memory.
So try it right away! ;] Hope you enjoy! And write a comment if you liked it.

I want to go back home, where I belong!


This day was black as Hell...
I feel so not myself now. It's like I lost myself (again, damn it!). The strange thing is that lately much 'blackness' came to me. Hmm... bad thing. And yeah, Halloween is coming and I've got no an hour free in a day just to write one spooky story!

And I've got so many things I want to do and I can't because I'm too busy. I need some rest. Hard life! But I must find some time for me too. And if it is a 'must', then I can do that!

I'm lonely too, though. I'm not really sociable...

Moaning wind

The wind is moaning this early morning. I wished I could understand what he wants to say... So I will listen and learn.

You think I'm crazy, don't you? I don't mind really. Because I think that everything here, on the Earth has it's own message for us. And we are all forever connected - from our first crying to our last sigh, when the coruscation in our eyes will go away. "The energy is not losing, it just transforms." - says one great physics rule. After death our energy goes somewhere, it isn't lost - it's just released. But who knowes where it goes?

Let's go back to the wind.
It's so wild this morning, so noisy. Maybe it's just because it's autumn. I leave you here to think about it.

Tuesday 13 October 2009

Where is my autumn mood???


I still wonder why I can't enter the new season. Hmm... And even though I waited a whole year to be Halloween again! I don't really know what's happening to me. When I changed school... maybe I somehow changed too.

I remember how I desired that change. I was chasing it and chasing it... and now what?! Depression! Because I want to go back. I forgot who I am really... I'm not well. Maybe I need a rest for my mind... but I don't have the time, I don't even know HOW. I feel like I lost my soul somewhere. But where?...

All I want now is just to have more time to enjoy the autumn's beauty but I've got much homework!! I don't have enough time to watch the autumn leaves fall on the ground, I don't have any time to hear the quiet rain... I'm always busy. I think I should have some rest, otherwise this will kill me and I'll just waste my life.