Rockezine.com interview with Masterplan on Jan 04, 2005

with Roland Grapow on Jan 04, 2005


		Your second album Aeronautics will see the light of day on January 24th and my first impression is that you delivered another great album. Are you satisfied with the final result and how has the general reaction been so far? The reactions have been very good so far. My first impression is that people expected a strong album but not just another copy of our debut release.
		For those unlucky people out there who are still anxiously awaiting their first spin of the disc, can you tell them what they can expect to hear? And how does Aeronautics compare to your self titled debut album? I would say that it has more depth and feel to it with a bit more progressive elements; all in all a band album made by five songwriters and arrangers. It is very different from our first album and I think you can hear that. We found more of our own style I guess.
		Although Aeronautics isn’t a concept album in the real sense of the word, there is nevertheless a certain concept behind it. What exactly is this concept and how does the title Aeronautics tie in? It is about flying in general. Lifting up from the ground and seeing the world from a bird’s eye. All the borders and problems get smaller or disappear. Flying in general stands for a positive feeling which is also reflected in our music. We hate to be limited and have borders for our music.
		Your debut album received raving reviews and not without reason I might add. How much pressure was there on the band to create a worthy follow up and how did you deal with this pressure? We tried to ignore the pressure. I mean we have been in the business for a long time and we do what we want. We definitely didn’t try to copy the first Masterplan album, which isn’t really possible to copy to begin with: it stands for the feeling we had at that point in time.
		The line up of Masterplan is one of the most experienced ones in the current metal scene. In what ways do you think this experience shows in Masterplan’s music and how much of an advantage does it give you compared to younger bands in the scene? Experience is the key for us I guess; particularly Uli (Kusch) and I are the most experienced members of Masterplan. We know best what is important in South America, Japan and Europe and what works well in different countries. We are the pilots of the band. We say yes or no to the songs we are recording.
		The German metal scene has been blossoming for as long as I can remember but in all those years only a few bands seem to have gotten real recognition outside of the country. This is currently changing. Why do you think this is happening and why only now? I don’t really know, honestly. I’m not trying to analyze the German scene at all. We are just a part of it, even though we have a Norwegian singer. Haha.
		You (Roland Grapow) went to visit Roy Z in Los Angeles early in the year. What was Roy Z’s input concerning the song writing process of Aeronautics? Honestly, he did inspire me on five songs I wrote for Masterplan. I always need someone I can respect and trust as a friend (producer/guitarist) for inspiration. We talk about the future, music, Masterplan and so on. We also converse about our idols. It helps me to reload my batteries for writing and arranging songs.
		The song writing in general was a rather complicated process that involved multiple locations. Could you tell us a bit more about it? We started writing separately, which also included my trip to LA to visit Roy Z. Then I met up with Uli to see what all the band members had written. We selected the best stuff from Jan (Eckert) and Axel (Mackenrott) as well as from our own songs. A few weeks later we had a meeting with Jorn (Lande) in Norway. We worked on the arrangements and worked out the vocal parts. After a week I went back home and we worked separately for another month. Finally we (Uli, Jorn and I) met again in Norway for the final arrangements and we even wrote some other songs during that time. All in all we spent seven months of song writing.
		Aeronautics was mixed and mastered by Mikko Karmila and Mika Jussila in the Finnvox studios in Helsinki. Why did you choose these studios and the aforementioned people? Was the album also recorded there? The album was again recorded in my own studio (Crazy Cat studio) in Hamburg with Andy Sneap as the main producer. I also engineered during the recording of both our albums. The guys from Finnvox are just the best for our style of music; I don’t know anyone better at mastering and mixing than these guys.
		I’m normally not a very big fan of Mika Jussila’s sound (too clinical) but Aeronautics has definitely a very good production. How big was your own input concerning the whole producing, mixing and mastering process? During the mixing I was there every day and made certain the sound wouldn’t turn out to be too clinical. It helps a lot when you deliver an already good recorded album to these guys. Even without the mixing it sounded already great.
		In 2003 Masterplan had a very successful tour with Hammerfall. What are your plans concerning an upcoming tour? Are you supporting another big act or will it be a headline tour this time? We are concentrating on festivals the upcoming year. Concerning a headliner tour we want to first see our album sales to get the right impression for analyzing the tour and venue size.
		Thanks a lot for the interview and success with the release of Aeronautics. Is there anything you would like to add to this interview? Thanks a lot to you and I hope we will soon see everyone on tour. Yours, Roland Grapow, Masterplan.
		(Frank van de Voorde)