When they had time, my parents liked to travel in a small van on safaris and road trips.
On the whole, I was a very happy child, but travelling around had a certain impact on my life. I don’t think it was always good for me. But I did see a lot of the world, in a positive and a negative way. I got to see first-hand that not everyone lives like us.
Within Temptation first got together in high school. It was a little before my time, but the rest of the guys would meet up when they didn’t have classes and go to the smoking room -- Dutch schools have special smoking areas -- and talk about music, all huddled together having cigarettes.
We were asked to perform in a group of theatres in Holland and Belgium that were looking for a new audience. We’d been playing for 15 years in the same kind of venues around Europe, so it was nice to go to a different environment and change the way we perform. That tour was the first time we had done a fully acoustic show, so it was a nice twist.
Our latest single, Utopia, is a song about how this beautiful world should be perfect, but isn’t. The video’s pretty preposterous, I must say, but very philosophical.
My son, Robin Aiden, is now four months old. He was born at seven months, so we weren’t completely ready. But he’s fine. I already have a little girl, who’s now three, and like anyone who has a busy job you have to find a way to cope, but it’s also so much fun. Having children gives more depth to your life.
At school, I was a Nirvana girl and liked grunge. But later, when I met Robert [Westerholt, the band’s rhythm guitarist and den Adel’s partner] in college, he introduced me to his kind of music. Robert was inspired by a lot of different bands, from Iron Maiden to Enya, and I’m a big fan of Tori Amos and Hans Zimmer. Put all those in a blender and we’re what you get.
When we started our first album, we were all doing our bachelor degrees, so music was a hobby. In Holland, we don’t really have a culture of becoming professional musicians. If you say you’re a musician, people start laughing and ask what your second job is.
I have no classical training -- I just learned from listening. I tried singing lessons, but when you’ve spent so long teaching yourself to do things your own way, it’s really difficult to go back to basics.
My degree was in fashion management, so I’ve always loved design. I design a lot of the clothes we wear on stage and our merchandise.
Injustice makes me angry, particularly when it’s directed against those who can’t defend themselves, like children, animals and the elderly. It’s a cliché, but it’s true.
I have a lot of heroes, from members of my family to people like Gandhi and Mandela.
In 20 years, I hope I’m still making music. It’s a passion and you can’t stop passion. Maybe not performing, though -- not the way I am now, anyway. I’ll probably need the stage-outfits two sizes bigger by then. And I can’t see myself head-banging when I’m 55.
An Acoustic Night At The Theatre by Within Temptation is released on November 2.
www.within-temptation.com
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