| As you wander along
life's highway sometimes you stumble across something that becomes your
guilty pleasure. It is the treat you allow yourself to full
indulge in when you want to feel good. No matter how hard you try
to resist it you simply cannot live without having it in your
life. My favourite guilty pleasure isn't alcohol, it's not
chocolate and it's not even playing the wag from work, it's five guys
from Germany who bright sparkle and laughter, insanity and pure
indulgence to their music, they are The Pleasures and we catch up with
them shortly before their show in Newcastle.
MM - Hi Guys, how are
you today?
Dancette -
I'm fine thank
you. Today I am very fine because I have actually made a new
record, I actually managed to sleep for 7.5 hours, which really is
a record for this tour.
MM - How's the tour
being going so far?
Dancette
- The tour has
been very good so far. We have enjoyed every day of this tour and
every day we have had a lovely crowd. Each day has been a new
adventure and so far there have been no bad happenings, although having
said that yesterday there was a bad happening where we accidentally turned
the alarm on by accident in the rock club in the middle of the
night. The owner was who is a huge rocker and a very lovely person
said we shouldn't wake him up when it is so late at night. Sorry
again if you're reading this!
MM - You also have
some fans touring around with you as well.
Dancette
- Oh yes of
course, we have a lovely little fan club that are following us around
each night, lovely girls. I'm sure they will turn up again tonight
and we love it.
Sensai - Unfortunately one of these girls
thought we were playing this venue yesterday and so turned up a day
early and was waiting by the door yesterday for the club to open.
So she was here a day early and there was no band here.
Dancette
- Poor girl, we will sing her a song tonight.
MM - Every day of the
tour you have been doing little online journals telling everyone what
you have been up to.
Dancette
- Yes every day
we have been doing a little tour diary and telling people about things
that have been happening. There have been many things that have
happened on the tour and so we can't put every detail on line, but the
video's we put up are for the whole family to watch.
Neo - We're
shooting all the time and there is a lot of funny things happening and
we just capture it and put it together on the screens for everyone to
watch.
Sensai - I guess for me it would be really cool to
look at it in about a year because when I look at the videos, I just try
to realise what we were doing here and all the things we love to
experience.
MM - Over the last few
years you've toured the UK quite a few times and built up quite a
sizeable cult following, however there may still be one or two of our
readers out there that haven't yet experienced the wonders of The
Pleasures. How would you describe the band and it's music?
Dancette
- Well we call
the band a Glam Rock band, it's like pretend Alice Cooper has not found
his black colour and now he is maybe wearing some pink colour and some
glittery stuff. Pretend these guys are going to play on stage
after taking speed, or perhaps pretend the Backstreet Boys were not a
pop band and they would be a Rock band with make-up and high-heel shoes,
spreading glitter over the audience and having fireworks from their
instruments. I think that would be The Pleasures maybe. In
The Pleasures everyone is singing.
Sensai - We are more a
boy band than a rock band, we are a very rocky boy band.
MM - The setlist for
this tour, will it be mostly old songs or will we get to hear some new
ones as well?
Dancette
- For this tour
we have nearly twenty songs and sadly we can't play twenty songs each
night so every night we have to take a look at what we are going to
play. The fans say we should play all of the songs every night but
we can't, well we could if we could play for hours but the club owners
tell us how long we are allowed to play for. Maybe one hour or one
hour 10, or play 45 minutes, so we have to see what songs we can bring
into the setlist each night. It's a hard one because we think we
have to bring in every song but there will always be some songs that we
can't.
Disco - And of course we want the people to also see
Velvet Star so we have to share the time that the club owners allow us
with them.
Curtis - We also like to adjust the setlist
every day so it is not always the same. It's fun to change it
every night.
Sensai - I guess even if we did play the same
songs every night it would be OK because not even we know what to
expect. I know some bands that have to practice this in the
rehearsal room and agree that at this part in the song we will all take
the guitars up and we'll do some moshing, we've never rehearsed anything
like that. So every night something strange happens, something
that every night on the tour bus after the show when we are discussing
it we ask ourselves ... how did that happen?
Dancette - Also
because we know there are fans touring with us, we like to entertain
them so we feel we have to give them a new type of concert each
night. That's another reason for us changing the setlist each
night.
MM - Will there be any
new songs in the setlist tonight?
Dancette
- Of course yes,
you will hear a lot of the new songs.
MM - I remember the
back end of last year you were talking about working on a new album?
Dancette
- Yes it is
nearly finished, we're probably at around 90% done now. Craig took
a wild picture last night in the rape-den which we may even use as our
new cover. Maybe, who knows, we haven't decided yet. We're
still working on it and I will be a happy man if we can release it some
time later this year.
MM - What sort of vibe
do the songs have?
Dancette
- Well this is
the first time that every single Pleasure has wrote on an album.
Before most of the writing was done by two or three people writing the
songs. but now the album has been written with all five Pleasures having
input into it. It's not always easy to write songs in that
combination, but what we have got out of it is very new and I think you
are going to like it.
MM - The back end of
last year Lord decided to move on to pastures new, did that come as a
shock to the band or did you know it was coming?
Sensai
- It was
something that we had seen coming a long time before it happened.
There were some signs of it before it happened, the life situation for
him had changed that much that it came to a certain point where he had
to say that it was time that he would go. He didn't just go, he
talked about it with us some time before it happened so that we could
get Curtis and so that we could get him trained well. They did
some training together and this was the provision that we could make the
quick change over and everything would be cool.
Dancette - Yes
as Sensai said we had the time before the prepare. We are a real
close knit band and we've been together seven years now. There are
things that have happened that could break this band, we have played so
many shows and been through so much crap already. Some days we are
just broke on our feet or our amps have started to burn, or I couldn't
find the right lipstick, or the hairspray and glitter was gone ...
Disco
- That show was actually cancelled! (laughs).
Dancette - Yeh,
yeh! (laughs). But we have come through a lot. I think even
when there is a change, well life is changing always and I think we can
cope with that as we are strong musicians in this band and so we can go
on.
MM - That leads us
nicely to the new member of the band, can you please introduce yourself
to our readers ...
Curtis - Hello
I'm Curtis and I am a Pleasure. I've played with the band since
November last year. I heard about the position and was interested
very much as soon as I came into the room and saw all these nice
guys. I rehearsed some songs that they had sent me through email,
we all liked each other but it was not definite as they wanted to hear
other guys also. They had a small casting.
Sensai - Well
he did not have to play like those because when he walked into the room,
his demure told us that he was the guy for us. We had some really
really cool guys that came to play for us, but there was something about
the chemistry with Curtis that we knew he was the one.
Curtis -
Yes that's how it was for me too. I felt very good and I have
to have that emotion when I play on stage and that is what these guys
give. I have been to the UK before but I have never played here
before. I am really enjoying this tour.
MM - How are you
finding the fans?
Curtis
- I really like
them. We had a day off the other day and we had a small BBQ party
which was really nice.
Disco - We love the
fans! We really do! |
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MM - Which Pleasures
song are you most proud of as a musician and which one do you enjoy
playing live the most?
Dancette
- I would say
'Some Like It Rock' because I sing from my heart. I have always
loved this song but I think now I love it even more as one of our
greatest fans has had a sentence from the chorus tattooed on her body, I
think there is something really magical about that song and I really
like it. I like how the bands playing that song and I think every
single word of that song is so true and so The Pleasures.
Disco
- My favourite song changes when we are on tour. Then I can
see what songs feel best for me. Right now it would be the new
song 'Billion Friends ', it feels very new and fresh to work through, but
of course I enjoy playing all of them. They all have good energy
and it's kind of like, every evening it's a different song that works
well on stage, maybe better than the night before. There are
always something that's surprising so there isn't really just one song
for me.
Neo - I would go for one of our new songs 'Billion
Friends' not just because it's new and exciting, but because it's also a
very funny song. It has a lot of new elements that we've never
used before such as samples of different noises and stuff like
that. There's a lot of tricks to the song and it's always
challenging and good fun to play.
Curtis - For me it's
'Dead But Still Alive' because there are different guitar parts in it
and they are a little bit different from other guitar parts. There
is more clean guitar and picking also and I really like to perform with
Neo on it. We do some solo thing and there's two different voices
on it, so that's the one I like to play the most at the moment.
Sensai
- For me it changes because it would have the be the songs that
allow me the opportunity to get in contact with the audience. We
always change parts where we interact with the audience and sometimes we
go into a loop until each and every one of us has been in the audience
and then made it back on stage. This is what I really like so it
often changes for me.
MM - The moments
before you step out on to the stage, everyone has different feelings
about that. Some feel excitement, some fear, some just want to go
to the toilet. Generally before you step out on to the stage each
night what goes through your mind?
Dancette
- I think for
everyone it is different. If you asked me than I'm totally nervous
before every show because no show is like the other. Sometimes I
am just sitting in front of the mirror and I am asking myself what the
hell I am doing here and please can I just go home and watch some TV and
have a massage. But then inside I also feel like a wild animal,
maybe like dogs do before they go hunting. It is a mixture of
these two feeling that I have before I go on stage each night. I
try to warm up and get prepared for my voice. I am always very
nervous and also very excited.
Disco - I'm not so nervous
but I would say it feels a little like the moments before you have sex,
when you're really excited about it and you know you're going to get
there and it's going to be a wild night. That is kind of what it
feels like for me.
Neo - I think that I don't think
anything before I go on stage.
Sensai - That is because you
are the Robototron.
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Neo - Yes I am the Robototron. As
we prepare 1 hour before the show my mind is still set and it is just
the next logic step after having done the make-up to go on and do the
show. Before the show I try not to have any expectations so it is
more surprising for me what can happen during the show.
Curtis
- For me I am a little nervous but there is almost the feeling that
you are awake, it wakes me up and I concentrate. Then when I play
the first note on my guitar or sing some vocals I really enjoy it and I
try to feel the music and try to get into it. I try to get into
the crowd and try to perform.
Sensai - I am in the lucky
position of never ever being afraid to perform on stages. I have
been performing on stage since I was 14 years of age and I am lucky to
never have had to experience the feeling of fear that other artists have
and I have never had this problem. I just feel like I am getting
hungry to go out, I am like ... let me go! give it to me, give it
to me!! ... (laughs).
MM - The band
generally do headliner tours when you perform over here in the UK,
however if you could tour with any band, either as headliners or
support, who would that be?
Dancette
- I would like to
tour with Strange Fruit. I would love to tour with Venus in Furs,
that would be lovely.
Disco - Right now I would like to
tour with Steel Panther.
Neo - I'd like to tour with
Rammstein I guess because they seem to be violent persons but they also
have funny and perverted lyrics like we do, so I think we would be a
good fit.
Curtis - I would like to tour with many bands but
my dream would be to support Van Halen or Guns N' Roses.
Sensai
- I guess I would join Neo and go for Rammstein and even though it
does not fit in any way, I would also like to do the 360 degree tour
with U2. I would love to play one day on that stage with
U2.
MM - After this tour
what are the bands plans?
Dancette
- When this tour
is finished we have a big open air concert in the middle of
Hamburg. That is an outdoor festival in front of the town hall and
there will be thousands of people there. After that we will have a
band meeting and we have lots of things to finish like the record.
We also have to do some work on the very special show we will be doing
at the end of the year. It will be an unplugged show. The
last time we did those was two or three years ago, we used to do them
every single year but the last couple of years we haven't done that so
we're looking forward to putting that show on as I think it will be very
special indeed. That will happen somewhere in Germany and will be
unplugged. I think maybe Hamburg but this is something we need to
work out.
MM - Any last words?
Dancette
- We are looking
forward to the show today and we hope everyone will show up and join us
on stage, or maybe online and check us out on record. If you want
a live show just give us a call and we can talk about it.
Sensai
- I would like to say than you because when I was a little boy I
never thought I would be flying over to another country and
playing the songs we wrote and having people have a blast with us I
would not have believed it, thank you again.
With that we left the
band to start getting ready for tonight's show and to put on their
make-up. We'd like to thank them for taking the time out to chat
with us this evening and for the fabulous show they gave us all later
that evening. If you haven't seen the band live yet or caught up
with their songs check out the video below ... this is what the band are
all about ... and we LOVE them!
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