Delain – Charlotte Wessels
Milton: So what is it like for you, to be a regular hometown girl who likes to sing, joins a band and the next thing you know, you’re touring the world playing for a thousand people every night, sometimes crying and screaming and trying to get a hold of you on stage? Does it ever get scary?
Charlotte: (laughter) It’s really weird! (laughter) It’s so great to have the opportunity to do that, you know? To travel places where you always wanted to go and meet the people who seem to like you because of your music. It’s very strange how your music can affect other people and it makes you very humble rather than arrogant. It’s a very surreal experience, but really awesome. The reasons why I started getting involved with bands, which are that I enjoy writing music and singing songs are all still there so it’s great. On the other hand, it’s also very complicated because I’m still in college. I try to study in my time off because the band takes practically all of my time. Sometimes is hard to explain to teachers why I’m gone for two months. For some reason people don’t see past the Number 1 hits in the Top Ten charts. They don’t understand that there’s more to the music scene than the Madonnas and the Britney Spears out there. Sometimes is hard to make people understand why I devote so much time to this thing that I’m so passionate about and why it’s so important to me. Some people however, at the university get it. And it’s really nice when people get it. I hope I can finish school in a year or a year and a half, and then I can focus completely in the music.
Milton: Cool! What’re you going to school for, anything related to music?
Charlotte: My major is Art History. It’s not really related to music, but it can be very inspirational for music. I really like the stories, like Greek mythology for example. It’s really cool. It has given inspiration for a few songs and it’s kind of a match really, the art and the music. I really like the combination of the two.
Milton: I find it really interesting that you say you get inspiration from art. When I look at DELAIN’s lyrics, and I know you write most if not all of them, my perception is that they come from more day-to-day themes and experiences instead of fantasy or mythology stuff.
Charlotte: And you’re completely right. When I’m writing lyrics, I usually just take the inspiration from things that happen to me, or happening to people around me. But still, even when you’re just describing a day-to-day thing, it’s cool to have kind of a scene to your lyrics. For example, the song Virtue and Vice is really about having a problem with yourself and trying to deal with it. A very day-to-day thing, but the way the lyrics are written, they’re based on the Roman virtues and vices, and I’m kind of calling to them “If only I could be like you.” The line goes “Fortitude I be like you”. Fortitude is like the personification of strength and power and that she’s really not scared of anything. And then I say “Fortitude I be like you, but I only speak when spoken to” which is a real-life action so to speak. I try to take stuff that I know from my studies and incorporate into the lyrics. It’s a nice way to give shape to them. I try to write mainly about stuff that really happens in the end.
Milton: So based in the lyrics, I don’t suppose you have come across a dragon or a wizard yet…
Charlotte: (laughter) That’s the thing I usually say when people ask me why we don’t have these fantasy theme and lyrics, and I just think I can write more convincing lyrics if I write about things that I’ve experienced myself. The day I meet a wizard, I’ll write a lyric about him, but not before that. (laughter) But you know; if you’re really good at making stuff up, go for it. There is plenty of amazing fantasy writers out there, and I don’t want to make it sound like their stuff is bad. I guess it’s just not for me.
Milton: I find the whole lyric-writing thing to be such an amazing process. I remember interviewing somebody once and he said “I don’t really give a crap about my lyrics, I just write whatever comes to mind in the studio.” (laughter) It’s so cool that it’s different for everyone.
Charlotte: I guess so, yes. Martijn, our keyboard player, for instance, he doesn’t have a thing for lyrics. He doesn’t listen to them. Of course he cares about them, like if they’re good or not, he thinks they should always be good. Some people find it really important, while others mainly listen to the music. I can imagine that if you’re an instrument person as opposed to a vocalist, then maybe lyrics aren’t as important as if it sounds right or not. The meaning of the words is not as important, I guess, as to how it sounds with the music. I think I heard the guy from MUSE saying that he sings what fits best with the music, the sounds like the ohs and the ahs and the ehs and I can imagine that. Actually, I must admit that since I started playing piano, when I think of an idea for a song and find myself singing really rubbish lyrics that sound really good to the music, but don’t really mean anything, sometimes it sounds much better than when I actually try to do it with actual lyrics. I guess it really depends on which perspective you’re writing, but in an ideal situation you should obviously care for both.
Milton: You mentioned MUSE, is that one of your influences, or your favorites?
Charlotte: Yeah, I like them very much. They’re very talented musicians, though I must admit I haven’t listened to their music for a while. Back when they released the Origin of Symmetry album, I was really enthusiastic about them. I guess I was about 14 and that was the first real big concert I went to. It was exciting, and I remember getting the t-shirt, and the poster, and spending so much money at the show. (laughter)
Milton: So more than anything, you know what it’s like to be the fan, and go to the show, and buy the merchandise and really be hyped about the band. I’ve seen a few guys in the metal scene that are in bands and refuse to “be fans” of other bands for the sake of looking “professional.”
Charlotte: Yeah, I still remember, not that it’s long ago for me, but I remember what it’s like to be in our teens and admire the bands you like. You look at METALLICA, for instance, they’ve always been really honest about being fans of MOTORHEAD and stuff. Even when DIO passed away just recently, they issued a really loving letter declaring how big of fans they were. I think that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. A few weeks ago, I went to see Amanda Palmer in concert, and I really love her. You could say that I was acting like a fan, and I took a picture of her with me and I was so excited I was going to post it on Twitter. For a second, I could imagine people saying to me “Oh, you shouldn’t do that, it’s not going to look professional and it gets you off your pedestal when people see that you admire somebody else.” It’s so silly, why shouldn’t you love other musicians as a musician. I must admit however, that it’s harder now to listen to other metal bands with female vocalists. It has nothing to do with the image, but if I listen to it, I start asking “Is our music good enough,” “how do we compare to this band,” and etc. You start looking at it in a different way even if you don’t want to. It’s not recreational anymore. So I actually don’t listen to that so much anymore, maybe in the future this will change, but now it’s become kind of like work-related. I still have really big respect and admiration for those bands, but I don’t come home and put on their album anymore.
Milton: Since you bring up the female fronted metal bands, let me go into that for a second. On the first DELAIN album, Lucidity, Sharon den Adel from WITHIN TEMPTATION and Liv Kristine from LEAVE’S EYES were guest singers on it. What was it like for you, a fairly inexperienced singer back then, to be recording duets with these two renowned singers? Was it hard to not compare yourself and your parts to theirs?
Charlotte: Yeah, totally. That’s one side of it. Actually, that was the first thought that crossed my mind. It was so intimidating, they’ve been doing it for such a long time, while I was completely green, didn’t know what to do. (laughter) But that thought was replaced pretty soon, as soon as I realized that they don’t let me sing this because I’m crap. Also, I had written lyrics for that album, and I Sharon, who I had been looking up to for a long time, was singing the lyrics that I wrote. Wow. That made such a huge impression on me. I was so proud of that that it washed away all of that insecurity stuff. “Hell Yeah, I’m gonna record this album with all of these amazing singers!”
Milton: And now you look at yourself, and you’re being put on the same level as all of these other great singers. People now think of Simone Simons, Floor Jansen, Sharon Del Adel, and now you. How does it feel to, within two albums, to be put in that level?
Charlotte: That is really strange, you know? I mean, it’s really cool when people make a list of names and you’re one of them, but I also think it’s funny when I am in one of those lists. We’re all such different vocalists, you know? There are many big differences. People put them in the same group, but if you look at it, Floor is so different from Simone, for example. They’ve all been classically trained, maybe Sharon hasn’t but she hits the classical high notes too, while I always took jazz and pop lessons. I mean, I’ve been singing Nirvana for a long time! (laughter) It’s so different, but at the same time it’s really cool when people put me among those names.
