Rockezine.com interview with Crystal Dream on May 14, 2002

with Gerwin on May 14, 2002

Recently, I had the pleasure of interviewing Gerwin, the guitar player of the Dutch band Crystal Dream. Here is what he had to say…
		You have been together for over 9 years with Crystal Dream. How did you guys get together? Actually, Marcel (the singer) and I have known each other since kindergarten. At the age of fifteen, we started our first band. We covered songs of Iron Maiden, Slayer and Vengeance. After that we both joined other bands, in which we also played our own stuff. This all didn’t really work out, so we started Crystal Dream in 1993. Our goal was to become known in the Top 40 circuit. This slowly came to happen and now we have about 80 gigs per year, which is quite reasonable, considering that our music is quite heavy for this circuit!
		Why did you decide to wait 9 years before releasing a CD? Well, we didn’t. In 1996 we released our first CD single, which got reasonably successful throughout Holland. It was a rock ballad, sung in Dutch. After that we released two cover CD’s. A few years ago we started writing our own stuff. But recording the demo’s and the actual recording took quite a long time, because we were quite busy with the gigs and at that time we had also got a new drummer and a new sound company.
		You have been the support act for quite some bands, but you also do your own gigs. What was the best show you ever did? One of the best shows is always the ‘Hengstenbal’ (Stud ball, Dutch festival – GA). It is a large tent, which is visited by about 5000 to 6000 people. Also the best cover acts of the region play there. We have already played there 4 times and it was always very cool!
		Like I said, you have been together for over 9 years now. What keeps the band together? Although sometimes you have to work your ass off and at times you don’t get any further with each other, I think it’s the rock ‘n roll spirit of the die-hard core that keeps us together!
		What were you influenced by? We used to listen to a lot of hard rock and metal, such as Iron Maiden, Helloween and Dream Theater. I used to play my Maiden records and tried to play along on my guitar! But also today’s NU-metal and even Marco Borsato (Dutch love song singer – GA) as Madonna have influenced us. Overall, the better rock and pop music.
		Where do you see the band in the future? More CD’s or more gigs, like usual? Nowadays we play where we are booked and we play our own stuff and covers. But in this circuit people actually just want to hear covers, that’s what they know, right! We have some bigger shows coming up later this year, in which we will be playing more of our own stuff.
		We’ll just have to wait and see how the reactions to the CD and the singles will be. Especially in Hilversum (where the big radio stations are – GA) it’s very hard to get your stuff played. However, more and more regional radio stations start doing that with our work.
		It looks like Crystal Dream started out a lot heavier than can be heard on their CD. But I think they will achieve their goal. Now that they have a CD and some singles, I reckon they will be in the Top 40 in no time! (Gonneke Arts)