Everon Interview

Stefan Hennig

It's been 16 years since the release of North, but about 18 months to 2 years ago, Everon's name began appearing on YouTube due to Moschus releasing videos of the band.

Oliver Philipps: I had nothing to do with this, it was entirely Moschus who was responsible for this. I would not have released this material due to the very poor quality. When Everon came to a stop, we were still pre-smartphone. At the time of the Bridge and Flesh albums, Everon had a pretty good live sound and set up. I wish there were recording of this period, but there just aren't any.

So, what you see in these videos are recording done by out lighting engineer back then who had decent, for that time, video cameras. He used to set it up to record the show. There are other shows he recorded, but they ended up with a Coke bottle or something being placed in front of the camera. These recorded shows were never intended to be released. If it were left to me, I would not have released these videos, due to the poor quality and my obsessive nature with wanting to make sure everything released was of the best possible quality.

How did you go about writing the material for the new album?

I consider songwriting a state of mind. I don't know how it works, but when I begin writing for a project, it tends to come. I have been writing music all these years now, as well as producing. I've been doing production for films and TV, as well as music generally. Writing music for me begins with the purpose, what direction is needed, and once that is in place the ideas just tend to come. I don't know how it works. After 30 years of doing this, I still cannot describe how things work. When I agreed with Ed van Zijl (Head of Mascot Records) that we would like to produce a new Everon album, by the time we came to record the ideas where already formed.

(Promo photo by Axel Jusseit)

Do you produce a demo of tracks to the band with the songs?

No, that's not how I work. What I do is record the songs in a fully formed and produced version and then provide these to the rest of the band for them to add their parts. It's not like there is a democracy within the band, this is just how things worked out. In the beginning I tried to encourage the rest of the band to get involved, but as time went on it was left to me to write the music for the band. It's not like I present it to the band and ask "do you like it?". I just give them the music and say "here you are".

How did the decision come about to make the new album?

We had not spoken to Ed van Zijl for about 10 years. I dropped Ed a line to say hello, how are things. Just before this, I had been going through some old documents and came across the original contract between Everon and Mascot Records, and it appeared we had the option with them to do one more album. In my email to Ed, I just said as a joke, what about doing a new Everon album so we fulfill our contract. He replied back straight away, and said "any time you want to, let's do it".

I thought he was joking, but he said "no, I think this could work, so let's think about it some more". Then we spoke on the phone a week or two after, to see how serious he was about it, because we needed to think about budget and things to make it possible. It turned out he was serious, very serious. It was then that I contacted the other guys in the band to see how they felt about it, and they all said, why not!

If you stop to think about the prospect, you can find as many reasons not to do it, as you can to do it. My first concern was that I didn't have any music. In the past, when we presented the idea of an album to the record label, I at least had the core ideas to give them. This time, to sell the label the idea of a new album, be presented with the budget, and cash it in, with no music written, at the time felt almost like fraud. But I relied upon myself to provide the music, and when I sat down the songs came one after the other. I don't know where they came from, but they just did.

Having heard the new album, it might not be millions of people, but it should make quite a few people very happy when its released.

It has already surprised me the interest shown. The band were never huge, and had been away for all this time, I thought that nobody would care about a new Everon album. For me, it is utterly surprising and flattering the amount of interest already shown for the new album. There has been such a positive reaction to the news.

One of the things about Everon's music, is that it has a timeless quality. Having listened to Flood again the other day, I would challenge anyone to say this album was released 30 years ago.

That might be because the first two albums that Everon made where recorded at Woodhouse Studios, which was a very fancy studio. If you compare Paradox and Flood to the third album Venus, which was the first album we recorded ourselves, you can hear a clear decline in quality. We managed to catch up with quality on the following albums. But looking back at the Venus album, it hasn't aged as well as the other albums.

Shells contain a number of guest musicians, one of which is your wife, Helena Iren Michaelsen. Is this the first time you have sung a duet together?

It is on an Everon album. Obviously, it's been sixteen years since the last Everon album. But if you like to hear more you can on the Imperia albums. If I remember, the first album we sang together on would have been The Secret Passion album, then on each of the following albums there is at least one track that I sing on. This is because she asked me to sing on the albums, I didn't push to sing on them. I don't think I'm a good singer to be honest. I had to be pushed to sing on her albums. Obviously, Helena is a very good singer which is why we put her on the new album.

We cannot not mention the very sad passing of Moschus, which occurred during the making of Shells, and I, on behalf of all involved at DPRP want to pass on our belated condolences to all who sadly lost a family member, a friend, and a college. The song We Will Meet Again is a wonderful tribute to his memory.

Personally, I feel that the vibe of the song does not really fit the lyrics. But let me put things into perspective. This song was the last song I was working on for the album. While I was working on this song, it happened. So, when it came to the lyrics for the song I felt the topic was not really fitting. But the words urged themselves upon me. This is how most of the song lyrics happen. The music is already there and the ideas come to me. It is sometimes well into writing the words before I realize what I'm actually writing about. With this song I tried to steer away from writing about this incident, but I always choose to roll with my inspiration and not try to second guess it. But when he passed, we tried to look for positive things, some silver linings.

That is when I tried to do to make my piece with the matter. The way he died was that he was doing something he was loving doing. He was found dead in the morning, it was natural causes, most likely a cardiac arrest. It was the proverbial lightning out of a blue sky. I know that he would have preferred this way of passing rather than spending 10 years suffering with cancer or some other disease.

It was totally unexpected and up to the last day he was full of inspiration and totally motivated to get the album out. Mascot Records have chosen We Will Meet Again as the third track to release as a single, and I tried to steer them away for doing this as, to be honest, I don't really like the song. This is because I cannot hear the song objectively. When I hear it, I automatically am connected with something negative.

I can no longer relate to the song as it has changed so much since I began writing it. When I finished the track, it felt unreal. It was one of the weirdest experiences of my life. What made it worse for me, was that the only thing I had left to do at that time was the new version of Flesh which has his tracks on it. So, for four weeks listening to the tracks of your dead brother. Not that I thought about it all the time, but all of a sudden, the realisation comes back to you.

Cover for No Embrace

On the new album, the tracks No Embrace and Pinocchio's Nose have a distinct folky or Celtic feel to them. When my wife heard it, she has become a fan particularly of these track.

That's the second time I have heard that today. I was doing another interview earlier and the person doing the interview said a similar thing about how his wife liked the new album.

The lyrics to Children Of The Earth appear to touch upon the various conflicts going on in the world today.

In particular, it reflects the way religion is instrumental in conflict. I read that Putin had found some sort of Russian Pope type rip-off, that had told him reasons why it was in the interest of God to invade Ukraine. I find it so disgusting how religion gets itself involved in these types of things. I am not a religious person, but I'm not against religion. I don't think having faith is a bad thing, because I prefer that people have good values. But the institution of religion, regardless of which religion it is, gets instrumentalised into the world as it is. What every you are doing you can always find an argument for why God is on your side, and you are fighting the good fight, and you can get a higher approval for something earthy you are doing. I just find it hard to discuss.

There is a wonderful, if short instrumental on Shells, titled OCD. I want to ask who was playing guitar on this?

I played the guitar on this track. This is the silly track of the album. The reason it is called OCD, is the track just didn't want to stop. I totally don't like showboating, but nevertheless, I find myself guilty of doing it myself. I think the track is immature and silly, but I'm glad somebody likes it.

Another guest on the album is Leah. Where did you work with her before this?

I think it was on her album Kings And Queens in 2013. Moschus was doing the production for the album, and it had taken much longer than expected, and the guy who was supposed to be doing the orchestration on the album had another project he had to do, so Moschus contacted me to work on four or five songs on the album. It worked out so well that I was asked to produce her next album, and we have worked together ever since.

(Promo photo by Axel Jusseit)

How are you managing in the music industry at the moment.

We have ups and downs. Covid had a big impact. Before that I was working a lot on background music for TV and the like. When Covid hit, that stopped and has never really come back. 2019 was an awesome year, then everything went away, it is slowly coming back, but it is certainly not a safe business to be working in.

Well, thank you for your time, Oliver, speaking to you is one think I can check off my bucket list. Another one will happen soon, when I can add a signed copy of your new CD to my collection. When I saw Mascot were doing signed copies I put my order in straight away.

This is one thing waiting for me when I get back to Germany, I have been told the new CD's have arrived, so I will be signing these when I get back.

That's great, hopefully we can catch up again sometime. Maybe when you release the next Everon album!

Well, you never know. Now we have made one album, it's as easy to make a second. Hopefully we will get around to another one!