(Interview with Andy Dörner, Caliban's singer, on the 1st of March 2007, in Caliban's tour bus, in Paris, France.)

Loudside.com: Hi, how are you?

Andy: I’m okay, a little tired but... I slept good, but I’m just tired.

Loudside.com: I heard you just came here in Paris a few hours ago. Did you manage to visit anything?

Andy: No, not really. I just woke up at one or two. Our drummer was visiting in town, but not me.

Loudside.com: You come from Germany, where do you come from exactly?

Andy: It’s the Midwest. Mark is from Essen. We’re not all from the same area.

Loudside.com: Did you manage do visit Paris before?

Andy: Years ago, I was here for holidays for the weekend with my girlfriend at this time. But this was about 10 years ago. I have no time for holidays. Caliban takes too much time.

Loudside.com: Let’s talk about your latest album.

Andy: We finished the recording just two days before we left for this tour. It’s coming on the 25^th of May, The Awakening.

Loudside.com: How was the recording session?

Andy: Stressful, because we were on tour the last year. We just had around two and a half months for writing the songs, preproduction and go to the studio. We went to the studio for three and a half weeks, maybe four, and the whole preproduction time was around 4 weeks.  It was very stressful this time. But the result is very good. I think it’s more brutal and heavy. We have a little bit more keyboards, more effects. There are less clean vocals on it, there are 4 songs with clean vocals. The other songs are pretty much straight in your face, very heavy and brutal. I think they are more metal, and less hardcore than before. We still have breakdowns, but they’re different, more chaotic. All in all, it’s a little bit different. I think people will like it, I’m very happy with the songs. I think it’s the best from all the past things we ever did. It’s more back to the roots.

Loudside.com: Was the stress and pressure coming from the record label?

Andy: No, it was like they said try to put it out, and we did it. It was our decision to do it. They wished that we could do it at this time, and we did too, so... I think we can work better under pressure.

Loudside.com: What about the song writing process, does everyone contribute?

Andy: It’s pretty much Mark and me.  Mark writes all the music, I do the lyrics. We didn’t have so much time for practising the songs, so Mark did most of the stuff, at home. Usually, we have a bit more time, so the other guys bring in some more elements. But everyone was cool with it.

Loudside.com: Your previous album was a split with Heaven Shall Burn, how did this happen, this idea of doing a split with them?

Andy: This is the second split we’ve done with them. We’re very good friends, Mark has another project with guys from this band. It was our last record for Lifeforce. We didn’t have enough time to put out a whole album, so we talked to Steph from Lifeforce, and we said what about another split, so you get a full length and we put six songs on it and that’s fine. It was our last goodbye from Lifeforce.

Loudside.com: Was there some kind of problem with Lifeforce?

Andy: No, he said we should leave. Because, it was impossible for him to push us more, he was on his limit. He said if you have the chance to go on a bigger label, do it, and we did it. We’re still friends with him.

Loudside.com: What do you think about this new trend of constantly being on tour?

Andy: Before we signed to Roadrunner, it was more like a hobby, I had a normal job, some of us too. There was only time for shows on weekends and holidays. Then we changed for Roadrunner, it became a full-time job, we tour a lot, almost the whole year, to Europe, the States, Japan... This year we recorded the record, now we have this 5 week tour, then we go to Russia, Spain, Greece, Argentina, festivals, UK, Japan, the States... we’re getting pretty much used to it.

Loudside.com: Do you like it this way?

Andy: I have to. I mean, I like it anyways, but if you have to do a band for full-time job, you live from being on the road, selling t-shirts. You can’t live from it if you just sell cds, except if you’re like Metallica. Whatever, you have to go on tour to pay your bills.

Loudside.com: What do you like about playing live?

Andy: I don’t know, I like the energy on stage, I love to scream, play with people, get contact, show what we have. I like to be on the road, meeting people, parties. Sometimes it’s hard to live with the same people. Most of the time, everything is cool. There are always some moments when we piss at each other off, because we’re all together in a small space. But then it’s okay. We’ve known each other for years.

Loudside.com: How did you start with singing?

Andy: I started at school. It was just like we met, and I was always the singer. I just did it, scream. It was horrible at the beginning. It was like uahhh. My throat was sore. I didn’t have singing lessons. But then your voice becomes strong, you get your own singing techniques. Two years ago I got some singing lessons. It helps, it was for a couple of months, and it’s very expensive.

Loudside.com: How do you like America?

Andy: We’ve been there 8 times. People are more brutal. I think they really like kickboxing. They show no fear, sometimes it looks like a big fight. You don’t know if it’s real or not. Sometimes a real fight breaks out. It depends where you are, but some places are very brutal. On one show I broke up the set for 8 times. I can’t do anything about it. I say stop fighting, but they’re groups who don’t like each other. You can’t do anything about it, you can just say do that outside. Europe is more into moving, circle pits, same thing but calmer.

Loudside.com: Thank you, do you have any message to your fans?

Andy: Thanks everyone for your support, I hope we keep in touch. You should get our new cd, The Awakening.