1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your musical project?
Yes, of course. I am a 27 year old Dutch guy and musician.
At the moment I live in a small town close to Rotterdam in the Netherlands.
Among many things I think, music has always been my passion.
I already wanted to play the drums when I was 3 or 4 years old but, unfortunately, my parents did not want to buy me a drum kit or send me to drumming lessons.
When I was 8 or 9 years old I started playing the piano. That’s basically where my musical journey started.
I think I was 13 or 14 years old when I got my first Metal album which I remember was ‘Life Is Peachy’ by Korn. It was one of the neighbor’s kids that introduced me to it.
And that’s also where my love for Heavy Rock music started.
At age of 14 I took up the acoustic guitar and shortly after the electric guitar after hearing Iron Maiden. I quickly got into bands in high school and music school where I also had my first guitar lessons. Basically, all of these bands I played in at the time were pretty shitty to be honest. I did have a few live shows on stage with these bands however. Meanwhile, I also started songwriting and taught myself how to write drums/percussion.
The last real band I played in was in 2011, in a band called ‘De Grensverleggers’. It was a punk rock band with four members with mainly political, anti-establishment texts in Dutch.
After ‘De Grensverleggers’ broke up I went abroad to do my studies in Germany and Mexico which was a very busy, interesting, but also hectic period in my life that, unfortunately, did not leave me much time or room to be able to really do something with music again.
In 2014, after returning to the Netherlands and completing my studies in International Business, I started auditioning again as a guitar player but, unfortunately, nobody wanted to hire me for several reasons. The same year I also started playing the bass and practicing vocals/grunts. After a while I got so disappointed and frustrated with all the band auditions leading to nowhere that I decided to continue as a solo artist and write, produce and record my own music and that’s where Walter Fornication started in October 2015.
The project I started was originally called DP (DarkPsymaster) Productions which was another nickname I used to have before but then again I had people asking what the initials DP were for. The name Walter Fornication came from a former colleague and musician I was working with in Berlin, Germany. He used to call me Walter Fornication and The Heartbreakers. Which is of course a funny reference to Californication from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers but I think the name kind of stuck with me.
When I first started this project I only wanted to try setting up my own home studio and produce and record some songs for myself. However, I quickly realized it was easier to build a decent recording studio and record songs in a decent quality then I had imagined and that’s when I quickly decided I wanted to release my own demo album in December 2016. And this year’s ‘On A Journey Through Time And Space’ of course.
2.So far you have released a demo and a full length, how would you describe the musical sound that is presented on the recordings?
I think both recordings are quite different to be honest.
A Revolution’s Dawn, the first, ‘demo’ album I released in 2016 is a more thrashy, riff-based kind of album I think.
This album is also very much based on certain riffs and licks I wrote years before but never got to do anything with in other bands.
A Revolution’s Dawn has a more sludgy and Thrash Metal kind of sound I think.
I heard somebody comparing it to the American Death Metal Band Nile as well.
On A Journey Through Time And Space is quite a different kind of album. For this album I used different kinds of amp plugins to create a more ambient, warm, melodic kind of guitar sound. I also added synthesizers to the mix as well of course. At the time I was writing ‘On A Journey Through Time And Space’, I was also listening a lot to Ambient and Synthwave kind of music. The album ‘Somewhere In Time’ from Iron Maiden was also a big influence in making this album.
On A Journey Through Time And Space is also more like a concept album.
It is basically a journey through historical events presented in a non-chronological fashion based on both fictional and non-fictional events with a big cyberpunk and dystopian flavor included.
3.What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects you explore with your music?
A lot.
Sometimes I get my inspiration from fictional topics or subjects. For example, novels such as Dorian Gray (Oscar Wilde), Children Of The Night (Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare) or video games (J.C. Denton, Assassin) but most of the time I like to write about non-fiction, life and society itself.
I also like to write about personal stuff, issues I have been going through in my life that are very recognizable to many people I think.
And I like to write about the way I think or feel about certain events that are happening in our society, world nowadays.
Nevertheless, I do not wish to be ‘a moral knight’, telling people how and what they should believe.
I am a very liberal person, if only just in that sense.
I just hope I will inspire people with my lyrics and let them think more critically about certain things.
The song: ‘This War Will Not End’ for example, which appears on the A Revolution’s Dawn album is basically an anti-war song based on The War On Terror and The Invasion of Iraq in 2003, which I very much opposed at that time.
4.On the album you record everything by yourself, how would you compare it to working with full bands?
I think the best part of being a solo artist is the fact that you have got unlimited creativity and freedom. You can try and experiment with everything you want and you don’t need to take into account the wishes of your bandmembers. I think I have done a lot of experimenting as well on both albums.
That is basically the best part.
The worst part is. You kind of have to do everything and find out everything on your own when it comes to songwriting, production, recording etc.
And you do not have direct input from others about your music.
Nevertheless, I think compared to working with full bands, I was able to get more things done and in a smaller amount of time, but it really took me a lot more effort and energy to write, record and produce all the music I wanted.
Then again, I did have some great people who really helped me with Walter Fornication, who did the mixing/mastering and album art for me and maybe I would have had the same issues as well in working with full bands by trying to keep everybody satisfied and occupied with the sound and the release.
5. What were some of the other bands that you were a part of in the past? ;)
The bands I played in before where each very different, one was basically a Nightwish cover band in high school were we did have and played a few own songs. The other was a rock cover band in music school and the real last one a punk rock band with lyrics in Dutch. All these bands, unfortunately, eventually broke up before we really came to a point where we were able to tour and play live on stage or record an album.
6.Currently you are s unsigned are you looking for a label or have received any interest?
Yes. While I had just released ‘A Revolution’s Dawn’, a Polish independent music label already send me a message that they wanted to sign me.
But I don’t think I was ready at that time and I am ready to be signed yet.
7.On a worldwide level how has the feedback been to your music by fans of experimental and death metal?
Mostly positive, although I honestly haven’t received that much feedback yet and I don’t know if all of them feedbackers were really Experimental or Death Metal fans.
Most feedback I received came from my SoundCloud account other Social Media and friends who briefed me about my music. Most negative feedback I received was about the vocals and the quality of some earlier mixes, which I can sometimes understand, haha.
I also got a funny remark from a Tokio Hotel fan who was mad at me for making a parody Death Metal version of Tokio Hotel’s Schrei. So I just told her, if you don’t like Death Metal then just don’t listen to it.
8.On the recordings you play a variety of many different musical instruments, how long have you been working as a musician?
I started playing music with piano lessons at the age of 9 I think.
After that I also picked up the acoustic guitar, electric guitar and bass.
So more or less 18 years I think.
I think it was at age 14 or 15 when I also began with songwriting and playing in bands.
9.Where do you see yourself heading into as a musician in the future?
I’m already about to start a new project very soon in which I will collaborate with Eric Mol, the guitar player and former lead singer of ‘Violent Queen’ and keyboard player Johan Seinen.
I will be writing the lyrics for their new album which will probably be about some crazy science fiction story/project involving Artificial Intelligence rockets or satellites exploring the universe.
Maybe I will also compose some music for them and do some vocals on the new album, but I’m not sure about that yet.
At the moment I am also learning/taking courses to become a fully certified software testing engineer. I hope and think I will probably finish these studies in March next year. Afterwards, I hope I will be able to move to the big city again and start a band or write a few songs with a band again and hopefully, also be able to play a few Walter Fornication songs live in the future.
I also think I have got enough ideas and inspiration left for two more Walter Fornication albums in the future, but I’m not sure when I will be making a new album again.
10.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?
I think my main influences are in the Old School Death Metal, Melodic Death Metal, Groove Metal and Thrash Metal area.
Think about bands like Death, Iron Maiden, Kreator, Machine Head, Megadeth, Morbid Angel and Obituary.
Nevertheless, I really try to find and create my own style with Walter Fornication and not just try to imitate a particular artist or genre.
Basically, I like to listen to most Metal genres. I am not that much of a fan though, of the overly happy Power Metal things and the really extreme genres like Brutal Death Metal or Grindcore etc. Which might sound strange because I know many people in the scene who do like to it but for me it just becomes too generic, uninspiring and repetitive after a few songs.
I also listen to a lot of non-Metal music such as music from Video Games, ‘80’s Hard Rock, Darkwave, EDM/Industrial, (Medieval) Folk, Latin, Psychedelic Rock, Punk and sometimes even some Classical Music and Blues as well.
11.What are some of your non musical interests?
I really like to travel, see new places and meet new people from different cultural backgrounds.
I also speak four languages (Dutch, English, German and Spanish) on a more or less fluent level and I am a bit proficient in a few others. I have also written a few lyrics, or parts of lyrics in languages other than English.
Moreover, I really like to read and learn a lot about computers and software, history, politics, psychology or science in general, but I am also just a guy who likes to hang out with friends, visit concerts, drink a few beers and watch some crazy underground, cult movies. I also occasionally perform as a writer and poet in the local area where I live.
12.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?
I would just like to say.
I really want to thank the people and the fans who really helped me with Walter Fornication the past two years.
Most importantly, I want to thank my big friend Jur from Y.U.R. Frontal Core Studio who mixed and mastered all the tracks for ‘On A Journey Through Time And Space’ and also remixed all the tracks for A Revolution’s Dawn, the first demo album, which you can find online right now as well.
Without his help, time and effort, the albums wouldn’t have sounded half as great as they do now.
I also want to thank:
Wesley from GFR (Gewoon Fucking Raggen) who made the logo for Walter Fornication and the album art for A Revolution’s Dawn.
Vince from Cavum Scriptorium who made the album art for the second album.
Dimitrios from DrainHope who made the first two official music videos for Walter Fornication.
Cátia from Against PR who let me do this interview.
Thank you guys, couldn’t have done it without you. 😉
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