Actual Fantasy
Aardschok Magazine
01-12-1996
IN THE LAST ISSUE YOU COULD READ THE FIRST PART OF THIS INTERVIEW WITH HERMIT AND MUSIC MAGICIAN ARJEN ANTHONY LUCASSEN. THE MUSIC ON HIS LATEST CONCEPT ALBUM 'ACTUAL FANTASY', HOW IT HAS BEEN MADE AND THE VIDEO WERE COVERED IN THIS ARTICLE. HERE, EMPHASIS WILL BE LAID ON THE LYRICS, AND BETWEEN THE LINES WE WILL GIVE YOU AN IMPRESSION OF THE MAN BEHIND THE MUSICIAN.
Born in Hilversum but raised mainly in The Hague, the man is modest but cheerful and driven. A sober philosopher an creative dreamer, who tries to live every minute of every day to the max. Through impressive projects he expresses his explosions of creativity in sound, words and images. In fact, he needs nothing more than his partner in life and two good friends. His best friend is his own fantasy, with whom he spends every day from ten to ten in the attic. Lots of people will envy this form of escapism, that again has led to great musical achievements. The cult-status, creeping around underground, is very appealing to Arjen.
In the castle of cults, arts and the mystic
" 'Ayreon 1' is still doing well, though not every market has been covered yet. In the Netherlands still some three- to five-hundred copies are sold every two weeks. Japan is doing great and surprisingly there's a lot of attention from Italy. Only Germany could do a bit better. I never meant to make lots of money, just to earn back my investment. I make fans for the people who like it, not for a Rene Froger or Ivo Niehe audience (eh eh, Dutch joke, ed.). I have done well so far. And that with a pure cult-project, because that's what 'The Final Experiment' is. A long time ago I discovered Queen. Incredible, that was my kind of band. When I first saw them on TV and their music got more commercial, my love for them was gone. The magic, the excitement was gone, it became food for the masses. It's the same with movies, I rent the most obscure shit, read the most progressive and psychedelic underground magazines. That's just the way I am. I just love cult. A lot of artists say they don't want to sell millions of copies of their albums. That's what I say, but I mean it. Yesterday I received a fax from a record shop in Australia, in one word fantastic. They got 25 copies and sold them within one day. The last line said: ' you made us believe in music again'. Incredible. You can name your band 'Rotting Christ' but nobody's surprised anymore. When I released a rock opera people were surprised again. Disc jockeys freaking out, like Rob Stenders. I realize that I make music that people truly enjoy and take their time to enjoy it. It's still cult, it's mysterious. This is the real underground, not those alternative guitar bands. They're just mainstream nowadays. I sell enough copies to be able to make another album. What else would I possibly want? Take a look at how deep Europe (the band, ed.) has sunk, they have just dissolved into nothingness. Take a band like Hawkwind. They don't sell millions of copies, but they have been doing exactly what they want to do for 25 years. That's why I think I'll be making concept albums for a while. As soon as I'm done with all the interviews, I'll put 'Actual Fantasy' aside too. Then I'm going to work on something new, something bigger. I already have some fantastic ideas. Maybe work with a computer animator from the start. With CD-ROM, for example entering a large castle and opening doors in there yourself. The name of my studio is Electric Castle. The animation designer stimulates me too, so it will work both ways. No, I don't want to play in a band again. Never say never of course. But I don't believe in compromising, resulting in an album that's somewhere in between what every band member wants. A band only functions if there's a leader or if everyone is one the same wave length. I played on stage for fifteen years. I just want to create things now, and not spend most of the time in a tour bus or dressing room. In the case of the Ayreon projects there is no room for improvising, everything is arranged too tightly. Besides, it would be very difficult to organize. I'd have to contact several singers and hire a huge orchestra. Take a look at the Beatles, their years in the studio were much better than the live acts. Endemol came with a great offer for live shows. But I lost the need to prove myself on stage."
Aristotle
Though 'Actual Fantasy' is not a rock opera with a tight concept/story and characters, the eight songs are connected by a thin thread. The theme 'fantasy' can be found in all the lyrics to some extend. After the explanation of the single/video 'The stranger from within' in the previous issue, Arjen now comments on the other tracks.
"'Actual Fantasy' is the intro and starts like a fairy-tale, beautiful, with a classical orchestra. A voice says: enjoy, let yourself be taken away to a world that is as real as you want it to be. When the orchestra fades away you end up between monks in the first story. 'Abbey of Synn' is my interpretation of the movie 'Name of the Rose' with Sean Connery, in a medieval setting. Synn is the old spelling for 'sin' and furthermore a link to the important role of the synthesizer. The story is about a monastery, with lots of deformed freaks and other strange characters. Monks are dying, they all have a black finger and tongue. At first I try to create the atmosphere within the monastery. They live in a community where comedy is forbidden, laughing kills the fear of God. 'Laughing kills the fear within'. They have lots of books in the abbey, one of them is by Aristotle. The book is completely devoted to comedy but has been kept hidden. The monks discover the book, but the pages are poisoned; if you lick your finger to turn a page it will kill you. They try to save the book in the end, but finally the entire monastery burns down to the ground."
Computerized
"'Computer eyes' is a story of my own. It shows the theme of the album very well. It is about someone who has been playing a computer game for days. At a certain time he isn't able to tell anymore whether he's someone playing a game or he has become part of the game. He's lost in the game, cannot break free from it. 'Lost in a world created by man.' He's seeing incredible things, but hey 'there's no escape, I'm locked in this universe'. This is where the word play starts. 'Where fantasy dies, material lies'. Thus materialistic lies, but the second voice says 'materialize'. His dreams are being materialized. The first voice then sings 'Computer eyes'; he's seeing things through the eyes of the computer. The second voice sings 'computerize'. Everything has been computerized. Virtual reality is clearly shown in contrast to actual fantasy. He also says: I don't know if I'm real. He doesn't feel any emotions anymore, has become like a hologram. He cannot find a way out. But this song is certainly not an attack on computers, for this album could never have been made without computers. It just all depends on how you make use of computers and virtual reality. I don't want to preach, but I would never play a computer game. In that time I could write a great song, would be a waste of time. I am someone who likes to be creative, but other people should choose for themselves."
The black nothing
"'Beyond the last horizon' is also a story I made up myself, again in the middle ages in the days of the crusaders. They went to Jerusalem to free the Christians from the Muslims. One of them is ambushed and is killed. After that the same old story: he sees a light and on his horse he rides towards it. He's on a road that disappears beyond the horizon. Beyond that is the 'last horizon', death. There is the 'valley of death'. In most stories you read that beyond there's a beautiful light or heaven. But where he is, is nothing but darkness. There is nothing beyond the last horizon, he will disappear. Heck, those are in fact my thoughts, I don't believe in life after death. As long as nothing has been proved, you can fantasize whatever you want. That your soul is going somewhere, it's all a guess. I'm with my feet on the ground with these kinds of things. I would do the same as the person in the story. Not going into the light but fighting to stay alive. He finally survives and wakes up on the battlefield. Just like the girl was cured in 'The stranger from within', he cures himself with positive thinking. Not by thinking there's something more beautiful after this life. You're living now and you should to that with heart an soul. I enjoy every moment. I have been lucky to be able to make music that people like. But I've always lived like this, otherwise one wouldn't become a musician I guess. I'm fairly educated but didn't want to continue studying. I chose to be a musician. I try to be aware of every moment I live. I enjoy every sip of shandy I take, I really enjoy every minute of this interview. This is how I live, intense but with my feet on the ground."
Straight through mother Earth
"'Far side of the world' is based upon 'The navigator', an obscure Australian movie. I'm sorry, but this story is again situated in the middle ages. You have to watch the movie a couple of times and really use your imagination, otherwise you just don't understand its meaning. It's about a boy who lives in an English village, where the plague is killing most of the inhabitants. The boy falls and has a vision: a hole straight through the earth must be dug. On the other side, they have to place a cross on top of a silver tower. By doing that the village would be cured. Nobody believes him. But when more people die, they decide to give it a try. They dig a hole and go into it, the boy and the hero up front, with torches. When they get out on the other side, they are in present day New Zealand. They're in the midst of modern civilization, wearing rags. They find the cross and put it in place on the tower. But someone falls off the tower, and suddenly the boy is awake. So it has been a dream. But the entire village is cured by the time he wakes up. He still doesn't feel comfortable, because someone fell off the tower in his dream; someone must have died. Everybody thinks the hero will die. But it appears that the hero was the one who brought the plague to the village, and is cured now. And that it was the boy who fell from the tower, and is caught by the disease. So he is the only one who dies and the rest of the village survives. A very beautiful story."
Back on Earth
"'Back on plant Earth' is a science-fiction story of my own. Usually, in a sci-fi movie, there's someone who encounters aliens, or who's dreaming that he's in space. In fact I reversed the situation. A boy in a space station, where people don't have any feelings anymore. He overhears the older people telling stories about the old days. About Earth, where they came from. The boy gets curious and tries to find images of Earth on his computer. He goes back and sees the most beautiful things, flowers and mountains. He would like to live there. Then he finds out what happened to Earth. Sort of 'The Final Experiment' with wars and environmental disasters. It became such a mess that people eventually had to go out into space to survive. But he has learned something, he saw people with emotions, laughing. Therefore he would rather have died on Earth, than being in that cold space station. It's not some kind of nightmare vision I have, but I don't think this will go on without problems for a long time. There are more people every day, and with that more idiots. I was watching TV last night, something I rarely do, and I saw a bunch of neo-nazi's shouting 'Heil Hitler'. And they loved it. I was thinking: 'how can this be possible?'. How easy it is to manipulate people, they would really believe anything. That's frightening. I'm very positive with regard to myself, but again, I live in my own little world. I rarely got out, have few friends. All I need is my girlfriend, my family and my music. That's all. Pure escapism. Maybe that isn't a good thing, but I'm happy this way. Though I'm glad not everybody is like me! But I can say all this easily, because my hobby became my profession. Sometimes I'm wondering if I'm enjoying the things I have enough. But then I see people sleeping in cardboard boxes or tents. And I'm complaining that my heating system should a bit better. Shit, you wouldn't believe this. But you get used to everything. I once lived in a room of 2 by 2 meters in The Hague, and I was happy then. Happiness does not depend on how big or luxurious your home is."
Fantasy rescued
"'Forevermore' is again based upon a movie, 'The never-ending story'. A boy steals a book from a store. But in fact the salesman wanted someone to take it. The boy goes to school, but arrives too late for class. He sneaks into the attic and crawls under a blanket to read the book. A book in which the fictitious world 'Fantasia' is crumbling down and is being eaten by the Nothing. That's symbolizing the fact that nobody's fantasizing anymore. The hero in the story has to cure the empress from her disease, and save 'Fantasia'. The boy is becoming part of the book more and more. It becomes clear that the empress can only be saved, if the boy from the real world gives her a new name. Finally he discovers that he is the one who has to come up with that name. In other words: that he has to use his imagination. He is that little grain of sand that has to save fantasy. He calls out a name and fantasy is rescued."
Coda
"'The dawn of man' is a bonus track for the Japanese market and will appear on the single in the Netherlands. A very experimental song, with vocoder and scratches on it. The story is based on Stanley Cubric's '2001' and '2040', but with my own fantasy and interpretation incorporated. The listener should do the same, the lyrics cannot be explained one way. Well, I've said enough about it, just use your fantasy!"
After the interview Arjen phones me several times. To add some details he forgot and to say that he never in his life has heard Ozzy's 'Mama, I'm coming home'. Just in case someone might accuse him of stealing after listening to 'Beyond the last horizon'. Arjen Anthony Lucassen, perfectionist and artist, hermit and lord of the castle, modest but enthusiastic, but above all a pure musician.