21 Eyes Of Ruby is de Tool van de Lage Landen. Geen grootspraak, gewoon een keihard feit. Hun recentelijk uitgebrachte tweede studioalbum ‘Conquer The World Pt. 4’ slaat meer, véél meer dan een deuk in een pakkie boter. Ik heb er een driedubbele oorontsteking en een lamme RSI-arm van het airgitaren aan overgehouden. De eerste drie wereldveroveringen waren mij niet bekend (te weten een demo (Part 1) en een dubbelaar (Parts 2 & 3)), maar dit deel vier overdondert mij zoals zelden gebeurt. En dat na aanvankelijk ernstige bedenkingen, want de eerste drie nummers van het album laten een lichtvoetigere vorm van alternatieve rock horen dat mij eerlijk gezegd niet enorm kon boeien. Deze kameleontische aanpak vraagt om een uitleg, en drummer/medeoprichter Martijn Soeterboek was niet te beroerd om uitgebreid op mijn vragen, complimenten èn bedenkingen te duiken.
Can you introduce the band within 50 words to our (mostly in metal interested) readers what 21 Eyes of Ruby is all about, without using the words dark, melodic, groove, Tool, Smashing Pumpkins and a shrubbery? Haha, well, we are not The Knights who say Ni, that’s for sure. We are 21 Eyes of Ruby, an alternative rockband hailing from the South of The Netherlands. Founded in 2006 and consisting of Antoine ‘TuWann’ Pütz (guitars/vocals), Martijn Soeterbroek (drums) and Alex van Damme (bass). We just released our new album ‘Conquer The World pt.4’.
Before 21 Eyes of Ruby, there was Festina Lenté and Rosenfeld. Why did those bands fall apart and what was the urge to create 21EoR to make it sound as it sounds? Rosenfeld for instance sounds pretty different… My previous bands Festina Lenté and Rosenfeld, where I met TuWann, both fell apart due to the usual band problems: lack of time, musical differences and so on. In the end, it didn’t feel like playing in a band anymore, we were more some kind of management team. Eager to start a new band to express our creativity, TuWann and I teamed up with our good friend and bass player Peter van Mulken. Within one day we recorded our first EP ‘Conquer The World pt. 1’. This was the actual start of 21 Eyes of Ruby. The same year, Peter left the band and we met Alex through MySpace. He was only 19 years old when he joined the band!
Our urge to make 21EoR sound as it sounds? Hmm, difficult question. From the beginning, we’ve wanted to compose creative, challenging music, inspired by The Fall of Troy, The Mars Volta, Smashing Pumpkins and so on. We have a decent musical background: TuWann and I both have studied jazz music. So we know what we are talking about musically. It’s just our big, very big rockheart, I suppose!
What are the former singers of those bands, Rémy Harrewijn and Digna Janssen respectively, doing these days, besides featuring on your song ‘Red Label Society’ of the first one? I thought Digna had a highly enjoyable, raw voice. You should come out your metal cave more often, because you evidently missed Digna’s new band Jodymoon completely! Together with former Rosenfeld guitar player Johan, Digna has already released two albums and multiple videos. Jodymoon are actually pretty more famous then we are, to be honest. Rémy nowadays has his own creative-productions-business-something. He continued the name Festina Lenté as a brand for creative output in various disciplines. He’s working with well-known artists like Kyteman and C-mon & Kypski, so he’s doing pretty well I guess. He did such a wonderful job on ‘Red Label Society’, too bad this guy is hardly on stage anymore.
You guys are pretty ambitious. In every article I read that the new album ‘Conquer The World Pt.4’ is part four of no less than 21 ‘Conquer The World’ albums. Obviously I won’t take the album title very serious (or should I?), but how far do I have to take your ambitions serious when it comes to those 21 volumes? I think there are only three Dutch bands in history that released 21 (or more) albums: Golden Earring, Normaal and BZN… Actually, we are pretty damn serious about those 21 parts of ‘Conquer The World’. Although there’s obviously a cynical undertone in it. Imagine a 21-piece jigsaw puzzle. It’s an exciting concept, which keeps us focused. The bottom line is, we will release whatever we feel should be released. Not necessarily just albums by the way. We don’t know if we will make it to the 21 volumes, but does it really matter?
The band name is an ingenious combination of the singer’s name and the Smashing Pumpkin’s song ’Thru The Eyes Of Ruby’. But who is this Ruby in this song and in what way can we hear influences from the Smashing Pumpkins in 21EoR, because I can’t hardly hear them. Maybe an ex-girlfriend of Billy Corgan? It sounds cool, don’t you think? ‘Thru The Eyes of Ruby’ is one of my all-time-favourite SP songs since I was 14 years old. Especially the lyrics: ‘I believe in nothing, I believe in all the way. But believe is not to notice, believe is just some faith and faith can help you to escape.’ To me, that sums it all up. It’s all you need. And that’s why we named the band after this song. Soundwise, I disagree with you. Listen again…The Smashing Pumpkins are a big influence in our music: harmonies, structures, rhythms, my way of drumming. Of course, ‘Yessyana’ is pretty Tool-ish, but check out for example ‘Days of November’: one of the songs Billy Corgan wishes to write for his next album…
Here we are at the influence section of the interview. In my review I mentioned Tool no less than nine (!!!) times, so that must be pretty annoying for you. Sorry for this exaggerating guys, but still, despite the first three songs I think your sound and atmosphere have so many similarities with Tool that ‘Conquer The World Pt.4’ will be the best album of 2009 that Tool won’t make. Maybe I’m a bit anal and too much fixated with this band and can you explain to me that 21EoR’s music contains so much more vibes, influences and sources? Wow, ‘The best album of 2009 that Tool won’t make’, I take that as a big compliment, thanks! Why should the Tool-reference be annoying? You’re right I think. Tool’s a great band. Tracks like ‘Yessyana’, ‘Mama’s Heart’, ‘The Act of Monstrousness’ do indeed sound like Tool. But for me personally, Tool is just one of the influences we have, while composing and arranging our songs. I grew up with bands like Soundgarden, Faith No More and mentioned above Smashing Pumpkins. Those bands are still the basis of my musical taste, along with Motorpsycho, The Mars Volta, Miles Davis and so on. ‘Conquer The World pt.4’ was meant to be a more or less consistent sounding album. Compared with our older and newer songs, the metal influences are quite big this time. However, we didn’t search for a particular Tool-sound at all. It’s more a similar taste for dark sounding riffs and layered compositions, I guess.
The epicentre of the album is unmistakable the ten minutes of ‘Yessyana’, an incredible piece of epic, alternative metal from the highest quality; a definite highlight in Dutch rock history. The only drawback is that it took the band half a year to compose this song. Why took particularly this song so long to write? Are you slow writers, is it because of the length, or is this the first song that shows a darker side of 21EoR: a style that dominated the second part of the album? Stop it man, I’m starting to blush… In general we are fast writers. At the moment we are busy with at least 20 new songs for CTW5 and CTW6! But back then, we are talking the end of 2006, ‘Yessyana’ was a real bitch to put together, haha! You should know, writing some good riffs or difficult grooves isn’t that of a problem for us, the hard part is to make it a real composition, a decent song. Although ‘Yessyana’ lasts over 10 minutes, it’s still a song. That’s very important to us. At the time we were evolving from a more mainstream band to the alternative progressive rock band we are now. ‘Yessyana’ definitely has put us on the right track. After that, to compose songs like ‘Red Label Society’ and ‘The Act of Monstrousness’ only took us a couple of rehearsals.
I’ve understood that the lyrics of singer Antoine [TuWann] are a mixture of autobiographical elements, memories and fantasies. The metal scene is already filled with (silly) fantasies, so the more autobiographical parts of the lyrics sound more interesting to me. For instance, who is this Thessyana in ‘Yessyana’ that killed a friendship? And don’t tell me that it’s up to the listener’s interpretation, because I won’t buy that… In general you could say TuWann’s lyrics are a mix of his own experiences, memories and imagination. Obviously Thessyana is a friend of ours. TuWann got inspired by her personal story and wrote some lyrics about it. I’m sorry, that’s all I can tell you about it.
Your album blew me away, but that mental hurricane only started with that fourth song ‘Yessyana’. Before that song, we have three other songs with a lighter, more up-tempo and more accessible sound. To repeat the last line of my review: why guys, why? Uhh…bad taste? Or good taste? Depends form what angle you look upon it. To repeat a statement earlier this interview: we will release whatever we feel should be released. That includes more mainstream or poppy songs. Because we really, really like good pop songs! Interesting though, you consider opening track ‘Couldronemo’ being an accessible song, while it’s the most progressive track of the album musically speaking. Not a 4/4 signature around! It’s funny how people react differently on our music: on live shows, ‘Days of November’ and ‘9 Friends’ are definitely crowd pleasers, while ‘Yessyana’ and ‘Nightmare’s Over’ apparently are more album favourites.
One Alfredo, who passed away, did the artwork. It looks to me as an intriguing combination of Karel Appel’s ‘Rotzooi’ and the results of the cock fight on zZz’s ‘Running With The Beast’. Did you guys know him and by using his painting is your way of saying goodbye to him? I personally never met Alfredo while he was still alive. TuWann met Alfredo a couple of years ago and was very inspired by his personality and creative work. They kept in contact through email and the Internet. Since we all love his paintings and artwork very much, it wasn’t hard to find a nice cover for our previous double-album ’Conquer The World pt. 2 & 3’. Alfredo was very honoured to permit us the use of one of his paintings. While mixing CTW4 in summer 2008, we received the terrible news that he had passed away. By then, we had already decided that we would use again an Alfredo painting for the cover of CTW4. It’s a comforting thought that this turned out to be a kind of saying goodbye and thanking him. On CTW5 there will be a song called ‘Boy in the Attic (Alfredo’s Song)’, which is dedicated to Alfredo.
The first song ‘Couldronemo’ is a pretty strange title, which the band won’t reveal where it comes from. So here are my two guesses:
1) It’s actually called ‘Geronimo Could’; about the Native American leader of the Apaches.
2) It’s an anagram for ‘Loco Mourned’, dedicated to Alfredo; or it’s an anagram for ‘Croon Module’, because Antoine fails trying to sing like crooner Frank Sinatra. Haha, totally wrong! But a very nice try. (TuWann is grumbling Frank Sinatra is indeed a great inspiration.)
I mentioned in my review that I really like Antoine’s voice in the darker, more metallic songs, but not so much in the more lightweight songs. The darker and the more intricate the material, the more I like his venom spitting voice. In the more alternative rock-orientated songs I tend to think Antoine does not perfectly fit in the music. He also sounds a bit too explicitly Dutch. But what am I thinking? I’m just the failed musician that became a journalist… Or is there somewhere, somehow something to say about this thought of mine? I think TuWann’s voice is in the category ‘love it or hate it’. His singing has improved much since we started the band and still is. Too explicity Dutch? Hey, we ARE native Dutch speakers, why should we sound like native Americans? That’s really stupid in my opinion. Check some Dutch renown acts like Krezip, they’re way worse. The Scorpions… do I need to say more? People who keep nagging about some accent or not, are totally missing the point of our music. Next!!
I can imagine that the diversity of your compositions is interesting for the band. It gives the band more faces; although I get the idea that most reviewers prefer the dark side of 21EoR. Does this have influence on your future workmanship (and do you have yourself a special liking for one or the another), or don’t you give a rat’s ass about opinions and do you continue to write both types of songs? I mean, you are already working on ‘Part 5’, so what can we expect so far? It’s a common fact: if you want to write metal anthems, you’ll only write power ballads and vice versa. Like I said before, at the moment we are very busy writing new songs for CTW5 and CTW6. We have some ideas about how we want to structure and arrange these new songs, but not which style they should be in. Metal, pop, groove, light, dark, it’s too early to say anything about it. However, our new tracks won’t sound more mainstream than CTW4, that’s for sure.
Most interesting song for the average reader on Lords Of Metal is ‘The Act Of Monstrousness’. That’s another fucking monster! Can you tell this “average reader” why this song is an absolute must-hear song for every metalhead? Because it’s the ultimate killer-guitar riff James Hetfield never was and never will be able to write!!
21EoR is a three-piece band. That’s not a lot man on stage, especially when you listen to the complex music. So I suppose there are a lot of tapes and guest musicians on stage to recreate the music? Oh no not at all, just the three of us! Although TuWann and Alex both use impressive pedal boards on stage. Of course, on the album we did some vocal and guitar overdubs, but just some basic stuff, nothing special. So what you hear is what you see is what you get!
There aren’t many live shows on your curriculum, although you did play on some famous festivals like Bospop and Progpower. Since you receive only raving reviews for this new album, I may assume that you get more phone calls from venues these last couple of weeks? No man, it’s a horrible situation… obviously, we are the wrong band at the wrong moment. Maybe you can tell us what we can do more, besides moving to Amsterdam or New York? We simply don’t know. In Holland, we are a unique band (besides maybe Textures, but they are way more metal) and, if I may be that arrogant, easily the best alternative rock band around. I don’t wanna be too cynical about it, but programmers just seem to ignore us. In my opinion they completely lack an adventurous mind. Forget about all the British disco crap and boring retro stoner stuff, here are some guys making MUSIC! That’s what it should be all about; but people are numb and ignorant. You know what? It might be a big conspiracy against 21EoR!
You released the album on your own label Summer Kimono Records. What and/or which bands can we expect from this label, or is this record label only invented as an excuse to release your own music? We completely mixed and produced this album ourselves. A consequence of this was the start of our own record label. In March 2008, TuWann and I started Summer Kimono Records (SKR), named after the very first song of 21EoR. In the long term, we’d like to develop SKR into a kind of platform for 21EoR and TuWann as a producer. We can record, produce or just help other bands and artists we like. So far we’ve released, besides 21EoR, ‘Roze Bril’, a single by Dutch singer songwriter Ravaage and ‘Coffeecups and Fairytales’, an album by Americana band Quramitry. Musically, both are completely different from 21EoR, but we truly believe in these acts!
The DIY (Do It Yourself) mentality of 21EoR is very high. You guys do a lot of things yourself, including the production and the video clips. Lack of money to invest in professionals and/or big names, or just a matter of confidence? No, we’re just very, VERY stubborn! Of course, while there’s no big label involved, we don’t have any budget at all. Then the best option you have is to do it yourself. Me personally, I don’t have any media or design background whatsoever, but I have produced an album, directed and edited multiple videos, designed websites and written lots of articles and interviews. Just by starting and not stopping before I’m satisfied. Live your dreams and go for it!
To conclude with a silly genealogical thingy. Your bass player Alex van Damme is documented on the famous IMDb being the cousin of Jean Claude van Damme. Do we have here the same Alex, or is this a coincidence? Alex van Damme or Jean-Claude van Halen? Maybe, maybe not…haha!
Can you introduce the band within 50 words to our (mostly in metal interested) readers what 21 Eyes of Ruby is all about, without using the words dark, melodic, groove, Tool, Smashing Pumpkins and a shrubbery?
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