Interview | Stephan Lill – Guitarist Vanden Plas

40 Years Going Strong

Stephan Lill was born on 30 November 1968 and his interest in playing guitar was awakened while listening to Angus Young of AC/DC. He has released eleven studio albums with Vanden Plas. Besides the guitarist of the band, Stephan Lill is also a composer and songwriter and Vanden Plas is now on their 40^th anniversary tour playing throughout Europe. In Heerlen, my hometown, I have the chance to talk to Stephan about those 40 years Vanden Plas, so without further ado, here we go.

THE EARLY YEARS

40th anniversary tour, but your debut album was released in 1994, so have Vanden Plas really started 40 years ago, or later?

,,Yes, my first concert was in 1984, when I was a kid of fifteen years old…so I had to ask my parents to play a gig because the original guitar player of the band had left and the rehearsal room of the band was in our house as my brother was the drummer. I was always at the rehearsals of the band and I knew all the songs, so the guys asked me to play the show and I was fifteen… you know, and they went upstairs to my parents and asked if I could play the show with them and after some discussion, they said it was okay as my older brother was in the band; but I had to be home before twelve o’clock, ha ha…”

When did you call yourselves Vanden Plas then?

,,Already in 1984, it was Andy who invented the name; he saw the name on a car and he liked it, as it sounded cool and at that time you had Saxon, Judas Priest and Iron Maiden and all that heavy stuff, but our music was not that heavy or raw; we were much more commercial, we were different, so we called ourselves Vanden Plas, also different, ha ha.”

THE HIGHLIGHTS

So, forty years of Vanden Plas, what are/were the highlights for the band and for you personally?

,,We have been in a stable line up for forty years, just recently it changed a bit as you know we have a new keyboard player, but it is almost unbelievable playing with the same guys for forty years. Although we never had that huge success with Vanden Plas, like playing in front of 10.000 people or so, but we can be proud that we are still in the scene and that we are recognized as a good band; we have a certain reputation, as even other prog metal bands in the scene seem to like us and appreciate us. But we are still a small band….”

However, some people, like me for instance, call Vanden Plas the German Dream Theater, how about that?

,,Thank you, yes, that is the name we have, but I think that it just because in this scene of music there are not that many bands that make this kind of music, so, you have Symphony X, Dream Theater and the common thing we have with DT is that the basics are still eighties prog rock/metal, but they are far more technical than we are. We have the base of the songs, while DT is very technical and we go for the atmosphere, you know.”

DISAPPOINTMENTS

Of course, there were also disappointments in those years, or not?

,,I mean, real disappointments, not that I can think of, but we had some problems with businesspeople regarding money and that is not good of course as it is really tough to be a musician nowadays and make a living from your music. So, if you earn some money, you should get it, ha ha… right?’’

For this 40^th anniversary tour you had to come up with a setlist, how difficult was that?

,,I always make the setlist, but this one was very difficult indeed, ha ha…”

Well, how and why did you choose the songs then?

We had to play some songs from the new album of course, but we also had to play old songs, classic Vanden Plas stuff, tracks that we already had played live several times before, and I was not sure if we should play them again; maybe we should try other songs…. But, fans expect certain songs to be played, like ,,Holes In The Sky’’ or ,,Rainmaker’’, but as we have a support act tonight we cannot play all songs as the time is too short, so we had to skip ,,Rainmaker’’…but somehow that one does not really fit in with the rest of the tracks on the setlist, so maybe it was a good thing to skip that song from the setlist. So, it is always hard to make a “perfect” setlist, we have to play certain crowd pleasers and songs that WE like to play, like ,,Soul Survives’’ from our debut album.”

But still, I think that fans, and me, will miss ,,How Many Tears’’ tonight…

,,Yes, indeed, we do not play it, because it is also a ten-minute song and it does not really fit in with the other songs, which are more prog rock/metal like, while ,,How Many Tears’’ is a 100% rock song.”

THE NEW ALBUM AND AMBITIONS

For the new album `The Empyrean Equation Of The Long Lost Things’, you wrote all the music, how was that, and where did you get your inspiration?

,,I do not know, ha ha, which is what Andy asks me all the time, ha ha. I am immensely proud of our new album. I just get ideas all the time actually and it is essential that I finish a song very quickly, so in two or three days. So, every song you hear from me is completed in only a couple of days, because if I am in the mood, so to say, I come up with riffs and then I already feel how the song will come together. The riff from ,,Postcard To God’’ came to me in the middle of the night, so I got out of bed, played it in my music room and I had the basic and the next day I finished the song.”

Do you still have ambitions after forty years in the music business?

,,Absolutely, we still want to make records and play live and if we would not have goals, we would not do that. I already have a couple of songs for a new album, so…We still have fun in what we do.”

Last question, if I were Stephan Lill and you were the music reporter, what would be your last question?

,,[Starts laughing loudly] Oh, my god, this is really tough, you got me, I never got this question before, no, never, you got me, I have no idea as I had never thought about what I would ask myself. The thing is, what I can say, that I keep stuff private, so I would not ask something too private, but I really have got no idea, you really got me there; super question!!”

Thanks for your time, Stephan and enjoy the show.

Live photos by Raymond Helebrand