There's an interview with Klaas "Tronic" Janzoons on the website of BrusselNieuws (in Dutch).

Focus Knack also has an item about Klaas and his sister. Klaas renamed himself at school because there were 5 guys called Janssens in his class. He was planning to produce his sister's album, but he didn't had the time. Klaas took a one month break after the tour (he became father again), but in the meantime dEUS is rehearsing again. Mauro is also writing songs, but he has no clue where it will end. He expects the new album to hit the stores at the beginning of 2008.

Did anyone know Klaas' mother does also play in a band? The band is called Leonard, exists for about 15 years and they released their first album Fiesjt last year. Lief Verbeeck (Klaas' mother) does also play the violin. She's also running a sort of music academy for childeren in Borgerhout called Ward De Beer.

There's an interview with Alan in Humo this week. Here are the highlights.

• As most of you already know Alan played in a band called A Noh Rodeo in the eighties with his sister Hélène and Chris Whitley.
• He moved to the States and toured with Chris Whitley and did some session-work.
• Alan started as a drummer, moved to guitar and fell in love with the bass when he noticed he was always showing the bassplayer how to play.
• He developed his own style, but had to discover it all over after he studied bass at the Berkeley College of Music in Boston.
• His mother liked to sing and his father played the contrabass in a jazzcombo.
• His grandfather (a painter) brought macrobiotics to Belgium. The family founded a company called Lima in Sint-Martens-Latem.
• He had a disturbing relationship with Chris Whitley. They were very close, but Whitley hurt him deep several times.
• He moved to Denmark after he fell in love with a Danish woman. He worked mostly in Belgium (for Arno). When his wife gave birth to their son his wife more or less forced him to make a choice: stay in Denmark with her or work in Belgium
• He didn't know dEUS very good at the time of the audition: Alan played like an old Belgian and made a lot of errors, but his attitude made up a lot
• He now feels completely at ease within the band
• He thinks dEUS will be a fantastic band when they start working on the next album
• He's happy artists as Clouseau, Will Tura and Laura Lynn support 0110
• He likes to do something with Trixie Whitley and is planning to do some impro-stuff with Mauro
• His son has recovered from lymfekliercancer a couole of months ago. He was again confronted with the dilemma music or family. He choose for dEUS because it's his only mean of earning money.
• Klaas and Alan are the only fathers in dEUS. It will affect the next tours: they will only play the bigger cities and the tours will be shorter

Finally found some time to write a review of the Werchter-gig. For various reason my girlfriend and I did what devoted fans ought to do: we skipped all other bands and only drove to Werchter to have a look at dEUS. We arrived around 10 o' clock in the evening, had a drink in the press-area and entered the festivalfield around 11.

We looked for a place somewhere around the p.a and had a good view on stage. Instead of the Sun Ra-opening sample, dEUS entered stage on the What We Talk About-remix that won the Stubru-contest. They almost immediately knocked me down with fabulous versions of Turnpike, Stop-Start Nature and Instant Street.

I was surprised to hear them play Nightshopping (a song they didn't play a lot during the clubtour), but it rocked. Compared to the clubgigs they also dropped the Magnus-songs (which I don't regret). Once again Mauro was doing a great job. I've almost complety forgotten how Craig did Mauro's job.

It was clear they were also videorecording the gig (probably for the dvd). The big screens were only showing Brian Molko's face during Placebo's gig. But during dEUS they were showing (mostly black & white) images of the band and the audience.

Crowd response was very good. The olders songs were getting the most reaction. I heard a great version of Little Arithmetics and a superb Sun Ra. The festival exploded when Klaas played the intro of Suds & Soda. Definitely thé one and only rockanthem for Belgian people.

Before Nothing Really Ends Tom did his call for support for the gigs on October 1st. They used the big screens to communicate the sms-number. The regular set ended with Bad Timing. First encore was Pocket Revolution. A stunning version of Roses left Werchter completely knock out. I even think nobody noticed dEUS left stage a couple of minutes to early.

Here's a round-up of the feature in Oor-magazine. The article is written by Peter Lissen, who also did a tour-report for Knack (France) and Het Nieuwsblad (Greece). This time he joined dEUS in Russia.

• Klaas had a kind of breakdown in the States. He started crying on stage in New York. They were used to playing packed halls in Europe and I was difficult getting used to very small crowds in the USA.
• Tourmanager Ton Maessen says Klaas wasn't the only one having difficulties. According to Ton the Pocket Revolution-tour is one of the heaviest tours he has done (he toured with The Bak Seeds, Black Crows and Inxs in the past). They cancelled a couple of gigs (Bilbao and Agen) because of that.
• Manu Riche and Renaat Lambeets joined the band in Sint-Petersburg for the documentary about Tom. Tom's mother and sister also visited the band over there.
• The article also mentions a couple of parties and a karaoke-performance by Stéphane and Mauro. Stéphane did Faith by George Michael and Mauro Heart Of Gold, Strawberry Fields Forever and Falling In Love.
• dEUS has made it to the cover of the Russian Rolling Stone

Kenny Verbeeck mailed me his review of the gig in Cambridge last week. A couple of his pics are on Flickr.

dEUS in Boston! Eigenlijk Cambridge. In TT the Bear's Place, een bar waar ooit een jong Nirvana voor 13 man zou hebben opgetreden. En zaterdag dus ons magistrale dEUS. Iets na middernacht explodeerde de zaal een eerste keer toen het publiek de neus van Barman zag verschijnen in de backstage area die enkel kan beschreven worden als een opgeruimd vatenkot van een uit de kluiten gewassen jeugdhuis.

Nevermind the setting. dEUS has entered the building! Amerikaans Vlaanderen (en enkele Walen) stonden op hun kop. Te gek voor woorden, een fluo geel zelgeschreven kaartje als toegangsticket, een stempel van een paaskonijn om binnen en buiten te lopen. Een podium ter grootte van een flightcase. Nuts. Crazy. Big in Belgium? Big in TT the Bear’s! De zaal was opgefokt door de Eastern Conference Champions en twee andere groepen, welke het gevecht om mijn aandacht met de NCAA March Madness op de obligate TV in het Cafe hadden verloren.

Tweede ontploffing: Mauro, Klaas, Tommeken en de anderen wrongen zich door het volk om het podium te beklimmen. Pataat! Direct vollen bak. dEUS kwam en had al gewonnen. Wat hen restte was een Worst Case Scenario triomftocht Via Roses en Little Arithmetics naar de Turnpike. Geen idee op welke planeet Mauro vertoefde, maar zijn gitaarspasmen werden spontaan beantwoord met een zaal ritmische nekspasmen. Barman streed op leven en dood met zijn gitaar en de
metaalmoeë microfoons, verloor daarbij een pink, maar hoewel nothing really ends, zat de Amerikaanse tour er bij deze toch op.

Hoewel Vorst misschien makkelijker bereikbaar is vanuit Zemst, Leuven of Lier, geen enkel optreden kan tippen aan de dEUS powertrip in T.T. The Bear’s Place, waar de mosh pit groter
is dan de zaal, het plafond crowdsurfers beschadigt, de luidsprekers groter dan het podium zijn en Mauro’s molenwiekende gitaarsolo de eerste drie rijen fans letterlijk raakte. Bij de volgende Amerikaanse tour van Barman en rocking buddies, boek ik een ticket naar de Verenigde Staten en oorstopjes (nu een dag later hoor ik nog steeds een megapocket revolution in mijn hoofd)!

Pitchfork Media has an item announcing the upcoming US-tour. It mentions the USA-release of Pocket Revolution will have a slightly different track order (but it will contain the same tracks), but the tracklist they publish is exactly the same as the European version of PR.

Concerning the USA-tour it mentions that in Eastern Conference Champions will also be on stage in Montreal, Quebec, Ontario, Detroit, Chicago and Cambridge. And for South By Southwest dEUS will be joined by Daniel Balthasar (Luxembourg), Gem (The Netherlands), Grand National (UK), Girls in Hawaii (Belgium) and Syd Matters (France). Pitchfork doesn't mention Admiral Freebee supporting in LA.

I updated my tour-overview with the latest info.

(thx to Klaas)

Rebecca from Wenn's Rock Web TV mailed me with some great stuff.

• a video-interview with Klaas
• a live-recording from Instant Street

(both recorded in Substage, Karlsruhe on November 24th 2005)

Knack has a kind of special about the Belgian rockscene. Tom is talking about the dEUS-rehearsal room.

• They're currently rehearsing at Klaas' place.
• The have to warm it with a stove that needs wood every three songs
• It's a mess
• The clip for French Movies (by Magnus) was recorded there
• Their first rehearsing room was in Wommelgem, at the papercompany of Filip Eyckman's parent (Eyckmans was managing dEUS at that time)
• After Worst Case Scenario they moved to the attic of the home in the Drukkerijstraat where Tom and Stef lived together
• About the last repetition: Stéphane wanted to put out the light, but he used the wrong switch: he put off all electricity. And Klaas was programming his synthesizer at that very moment...

Other stuff: famous fans for Belgian bands (Mark 'Morphine' Sandman, Damon Albarn, Beck, Radiohead, Serj Tankian (System Of A Down) and Richard Ashcroft (The Verve) . They've even forgotten Muse.

• The Ideal Crash LP with autograph of Tom and Klaas
• Roses - digipack cd-single

An interview with Klaas from Revolver-club.de

There was a review in yesterday's De Volkskrant. Carin was kind enough to mail it. The album gets 8/10.

dEUS is een compleet andere band geworden

Ruim zes jaar liggen er tussen The Ideal Crash en het nieuwe album Pocket Revolution van dEUS. Een sabbatical van een jaar liep een beetje uit de hand, zullen we maar zeggen. Voorman Tom Barman wijdde zich aan andere muzikale projecten (Magnus) en maakte een goed ontvangen speelfilm (Anyway The Wind Blows 2003), maar de vraag was natuurlijk of dEUS de draad weer kon oppikken. Nee dat bleek niet te kunnen.
Gitarist Craig Ward en bassist Danny Mommens trokken zich halverwege de opnames van Pocket Revolution al dan niet vrijwillig terug, zodat van het oude dEUS alleen Barman en violist/toetsenist Klaas Janszoons overbleven. Het dEUS van Pocket Revolution is een andere vand dan dat van The Ideal Crash, en dat hoor je ook. Het is even wennen want het nieuwe dEUS komt aanvankelijk wat gewoontjes over. Maar het loont de moeite Pocket Revolution wat tijd te geven. Barmans teksten zijn beter geworden, de passie druipt ervan af en de liedjes kennen elk
een originele, sterke vorm. De rust in de nieuwe nummers, waarin Barman een enkele keer klinkt als zijn oude idool JJ Cale is slechts schrijn. Onder de oppervlakte broeit er vanalles. Vergeet het oude dwarse dEUS, het nieuwe heeft een ijzersterk rockalbum afgeleverd, en wat is dat Nothing really Ends toch een bloedstollend mooi liedje.

Am I a nice guy or what? Especially for all you non-Dutch-speakers! I have finished a round-up of all interviews in the Flemish press I mentioned the last weeks. I splitted them into a Tom- and a Klaas-part. Have fun reading! If you have remarks, just send me an e-mail.

You can still read the interviews from De Standaard and Het Nieuwsblad.

Here are the main items of the interview with Tom in the Flemish press.

• after Craig and Danny left, he had Mauro in very fast, but he hadn't taken enough time to process everything
• Tom finally broke down: he couldn't sing and write anymore
• he's keeping a diary now: that way he can see things he went through in the future and use it for healing
• he's happy to see everbody's focused
• he had just learnt his father only married at 35 and his glad to know. He had the feeling he was missing things
• during the past 15 years the importance of music in his life has grown
• Pocket Revolution and Include Me Out have helped him to get through the hard period
• the best compliment he received is that people see them as survivors of the nineties
• there were times when he thought everything on MTV was better than dEUS
• Tom describes himself as a drama queen
• becoming 30 made Tom doubt even more
• the light at the end of the tunnel came in Spain when he was driving to a soccer match in Malaga with Filip Eyckmans. They listened to (a rough mix) of the album in the car.
• he didn't read the bad reviews of last year's summer tour because he was in Portugal
• he wears all media-attention for dEUS as a badge of honor (there aren't that many Belgian bands who line-up changes get into the newspaper, ...)
• he's glad they produced the album themselves
• Craig described Tom as a PJ arvey: he surrounds himself with talented people, but not forever
• Stef and Rudy leaving was a picknick compared to last year's break up
• they share a tourmanager with Nick Cave
• Craig was a perfect klankbord: ,,if he said it's ok, then it's ok"
• he has never written a song after dreaming about it at night. He only got out of bed for Dream Sequence in Ronda
• he's feeling good in Antwerpen (again): he's gonna buy a place to live
• his mother is in the final scene of AWTWB, she comes and sees concerts from time to time
• he tought a lot about his father in the studio
• Right as rain was written right after his father's death at the time Tom and Stef lived together
• his moviecharacters are based on persons he knows, his songs on himself
• he had a tought time writing the lyrics because he was trying to bring it to an higher level
• Tom had a writer's block: all his ideas are on PR, there are no other songs on the shelve
• dEUS is not a group of friends, there's just mutual respect
• Klaas thought Tom was showing off too much in the early years
• he's getting nervous from all Tom-and-Stef-hyping
• Danny is throwing mud because he had a bad conscience
• breaking up with Craig was harder: he wrote Tom a letter with all his mistakes
• Revenge was one of the motivations while recording PR
• "I'm not a tyran, i'm just he guy who has the vision"
• dEUs is not Tom's solo project: all members can contribute songs. Tom is disappointed they don't.
• Alan was the first one in 15 years asking him what a song was about
• PR would be his father's favorite record
• he thinks positive feedback from elderly people is important
• his mother thinks PR is the best dEUS-album so far. She likes the harder songs a lot
• one of the working title was Used Future. They dropped Future because it was too techno. Used referred to Tom's feeling and it's an anagram for dEUS
• he asked Craig to come back at the end of 2002. Craig wanted to, but he didn't want to invest emotionally in the band
• they signed V2 because the local affiliates were very enthusiast to promote the album
• they left Island without problems: they could take everything they recorded
• The album is financed by Island, V2 and Universal Belgium
• they made a lot of mistakes during last year's tour
• Mauro worked hard on the new songs and kept a distance, while CJ was Tom's personal coach
• PR is a guitar-record because Tom wanted a lot of uptempo songs
• Tom agrees he's singing better than ever
• he's happy the press welcomes them as survivors of the nineties
• he never tought dEUS would be forgotten because they built a big fanbase during the years
• he has considered blowing dEUS up
• he did about 250 interviews the last weeks
• ,,PR is a victory"
• he wants everybody to be focused. Showing up halfdrunk and 1,5 hours too late is no longer tolerated
• My Sister=My Clock was mistake because it slowed things down in the UK
• Bill Funk on Cold Sun Of Circumstance is a technician from ICP-studio's
• Interrogation was also a working title because Christian once said Tom did no more than interrogating himself
• the leaking of PR comes from a Italian, German of Swiss journalist
• he's disguted about the mentality of downloaders
• there's a lot of hatred in Pocket Revolution
• Tom played 7 days the first time for his mother and sister. His sister thinks it too confronting
• he hopes to work on a moviescript during the tour, he'd like to make a comedy

Here are the main items from the interviews with Klaas in De Morgen and De Standaard this weekend. You can still read the interview from De Standaard here.

• During the past 5 years he hasn't tought a second about dEUS
• He tought it was over after the 1999-tour
• He has been busy with his bar and concerthall Plaza Real in Borgerhout
• He quit school at 17 to play with dEUS
• He considered making a solo-album
• Tom helped him a bit with the Résistance-soundtrack. The production company of the movie prefered a different kind of soundtrack. The movie was a disaster. Maybe Klaas will edit the things he recorded and release it.
• He can look at dEUS from a distance now. And he finally sees how fantastic the albums are
• ,,dEUS would remain dEUS even if Tom and I leave''
• he compares dEUS with U2. Tom and Klaas have never known anything else than dEUS.
• He and Tom are not the kind of friends that talk a lot about their private lives. Tom wasn't even invited for the opening op Plaza Real althought they recorded NRE the same day
• He doesn't know what Tom's lyrics are about
• In the early days Klaas wasn't happy with Tom getting all the attention
• Stef asked him to join dEUS: they knew each other from school
• the main evolution of the band is that they make more mainstream, structured music
• this line-up is the most professional one
• he noticed dEUS is hip for the younger generation in a way Velvet Underground was for them
• he enjoys being on tour, but since he's a father now it will be different

De Standaard is also bringing some dEUS-stuff the next days. Tomorrow there's an interview with Klaas, next tuesday there's an interview with Tom and next saturday there's the review of Pocket Revolution. Check www.standaard.be/deus for all info.
Update : the interview is here.

Here's an extensive track by track analysis from Pocket Revolution. It's based on various source. If you have extra info, just send me an e-mail and I will add it.

Bad Timing

If you don't get what you want

Here are the main items from the Deng-interview

• Tom has a very good feeling about PR, he's feeling relaxed
• Last year he said the new album would be very Velvet Undergroud, but it isn't so
• He repeated his statement about Sister Dew from Zomergasten. He thinks he doesn't sing it good enough. Nick Cave or Kurt Cobain would do a better job.
• Craig described Tom once as a born tune smith. According to Tom it's one of the few positive things Craig had to say about him
• The album is produced by dEUS. First Craig was going to do it, but it didn't work out. Tom spent most of the time. Stephane attended a lot of the mixing part and Mauro and Klaas gave some very good remarks
• Breaking up with Craig was hard
• ,,Mauro saved me"
• Tom is proud of all dEUS-line-ups
• ,,The new line-up is the first conflictless one. But it's not less talented."
• Stef and Rudy didn't leave only because of Tom's ego, also because of their own ego's
• The first dEUS-gig was in the Paradoks on November 20th 1989
• The riff from Fell Off The Floor, Man has inspired Blur for Song 2. Damon Albarn admits that
• Tom hasn't played as much guitar on a record as on Pocket Revolution
• 3 tracks are about women
• Producing Magnus was fun. Producing dEUS was hell
• They rehearsed 25 songs for the tour including : all songs from Pocket Revolution, the classics, one song (from WCS) they have never played live before, one cover (Oh Well - Fleetwood Mac) and probably two Magnus-songs (Assault on Magnus and Jumpneedle)
• They are planning shows from about 1,5 hours. If the atmosphere is ok, they can go up to two hours.
• Tom will be disappointed if not all shows are sold out
• Tom doesn't think the public interest in dEUS is less than before
• About the Vlaams Belang-concert: it will be one big party with good bands and (hopefully) a lot of people. Don't expect political statements whatsoever.

BTW: The Deng-website has the cover-pic with Tom as a background. You can download it here. And if you subscribe Deng you get Pocket Revolution for free

The De Morgen-special about dEUS also contains an interview with Klaas.

(thx Arthur)