Infectious Unease

Carlo: I must have been an unborn, my mum always sung, but not my kind of style I´m afraid ;-)) No to be honest I was nine yearsold when I started to sing in a church chor.

What have been some of the bands you have been involved in?

Carlo: In Holland I started to sing in some cover bands at school when I was sixteen, mostly Ramones and Sex Pistols stuff because we didn´t know more chords, later when I moved to Germany I formed a band with some freaks who were very into "Krautrock" music like Jane, Can,Kraftwerk and Ufo, the band was called "Fleischextrakt" it was a mixture between Krautrock and punk. Later I formed a band called "Invisible reality" we were very influenced in Cocteau Twins, Joy Division and the Names. In ´85 i started up with "The
Convent"

How did all of you meet?

Carlo: I worked in a car industry factory as a man maschine and met ourfirst keyboard player, the other members were friends and maids I knew before who joined in.

Adrien Borland past away on the 26th April 1999, Could you tell me more about him, What was he like to work with, How did he inspire you?

Carlo: I could write a book about him with 2000 pages I guess, Adrian has always been one of my favorite writers of all time, as well as MarkBurgess, Jim Morrison, Ian Curtis and Steve Kilbey. I met Adrian in ´93 when we did a cover of Winning for a German compilation. Several bands had to cover one of their favorite songs, the Fall and Inspiral Carpets were also on this compilation. I phoned Adrian to ask for permission, he agreed and asked me if I could send him a copy of the version, I did, he phoned me
back after he had heard it and he liked it very much. We met in Holland and Adrian asked me if I would like him to play some acoustic sets and support The Convent on their tour. I was stunned as you can imagine and immidiatly agreed. It was one of our best tours and every time Adrian and The Convent
played Winning together. We have had a brilliant time and became very close friends. Later I did some solo stuff with Florian (our Keyboard player from the early Convent) played it to Adrian and he liked it that much that he wanted to play guitar and wrote some songs as well. The project White Rose Transmission was born. Adrian inspired me a lot.

What do you all do when you're not working in the band?

Carlo: We celabrate life in all it´s beauty ;-))) No we all have to do our jobs, David Maria studies, Florian is working for Marshall Amplifiers and works as a keyboard player for Wolf Maahn ( a famous german singer songwriter) Claudia is a hair dresser and I have my own lable Red Sun, but to finance the whole thing I`m exporting german cars to scandinavia. (never trust car dealers) ;-)))

What is the meaning behind the band name?

Carlo: White Rose Transmission is a fusion between two things, White Rose was a anti nazi student movement in the early fourtees, they dropped anti Nazi propaganda folders in all german universities. The main leaders were brother and sister Scholl, both were killed by the nazi´s in Munich. White Rose also was part of a story by Oscar Wilde, The Nightingale and the Rose which I liked a lot. Adrian and I were very into joy Division and it was Adrian´s idea to put Transmission after White Rose.

What instruments do you all play and are there any particular instrument you enjoy the most?

Carlo: David Maria Gramse is a classical violin player and plays very well, Florian is a classical piano player and also very familiar into keyboards and composing songs and knows a lot about programming and Q-base. Adrian played bass on the first one, as well as all the guitars. Claudia did the backing vocals and I just sing and play some guitar, I wrote Vapour and Silver Age on the first WRT album but Adrian played the guitar ( otherwise the studio costs would have ruined our label ;-)))

What creative process do you go through when composing your music?

Carlo: The musical part was always a sharing of ideas, a brainstorming progress. We always had the agreement never to ignore other one´s ideas but to come up with a better one or leave it. There was no ego that ruled. We made a lot of compromises and had a lot of respect for eachother.

Many of your songs explore subjects such as elements like water, wind,sand, and air, mixed with thoughts, emotions, desires, and escape. Would I be correct on this assumption? What is it that inspires you about these subjects? Are you influence by books or movies or plays?

Carlo: As I said before I enjoy life with all it´s beauty as well as all the terrible things, I think that all the songs I wrote are things that happened to me and I write them from my point of view. There is so much out there that inspires me, it can be a good movie, a terrible expierience, a romantic one, everything can be a motivation to write about. Adrian and I wrote a lot about farwells and goodbye´s as well as about love in all it´s glory and sad moments, about hope, faith and trust as well as dissapointment, destruction and it´s results. Adrian was a very happy man sometimes and the next moment it changed, we have had a lot of fun as well as we shared a lot of negative emotions.. The 700 Miles of Desert album was about a dry period in your life, where it seems that you can´t see the end of it, you walk for miles and miles and
after you finished more than the half of it you keep "Digging for water" or you decide to go back the same way you came from, but you might loose it and die, you have to keep on going, don´t give up. It´s very sad to see it from that point of view, expecially when you think about the fact that Adrian sung "Walking in the opposite direction" Mark found an ocean after "digging for Water, and i keep breathing the most out of this life and keep
walking to the end of this desert.

What bands do enjoy listening to for pleasure?

Carlo: The Doors, Kraftwerk, The Chameleons, The Sound, The Waterboys, Echo & the Bunnymen, The Church, Nick Drake, Jeff Buckley, Talk Talk, David Sylvian, CAN, Velvet Underground, DEUS, Joy Division, Jaques Brell, Leonard Cohen, Elvis, Zentrifugal, Einstürtzende Neubauten, Teardrop Explodes, Julian Cope, John Lennon and the 2000 other albums I´ve got ;-))))

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Are you doing any side projects?

Carlo : I´ve done some demo´s with Bruhn (ex Sisters of Mercie) but just for fun to do some experiments, we have had a lot of fun but we never released it, I don´t know why to be honest. It was very trancy, lyrical dance stuff not dark at all and I enjoyed it a lot.

To the readers who may have not heard much of your music how would you describe your sound?

Carlo: here we are with the most hated question of every musician !!! hahaha !! that´s a good one ;-)) give me a second.............well you´ve asked me before what kind of music I enjoy and I´ve made a list, count them together divide them and that´s us !! ;-))))) No to be honest, With The Convent we never tried to be dead individual, which is not good for the media and record companies, because you don´t come up with something fashionable, fresh or a brand new style. We liked a lot of these bands and
were very influenced by them.

With White rose transmission it´s quiet the same honestly, I mean some people think it´s quiet moody, some say very fresh and new, I don´t know really it´s very hard to be objectiv about your own music really, so give it a try and find out yourself. :-))) If I wouldn´t sing in WRT it would be my favorite band of all time ;-)))

How has the response been with White Rose Transmission?

Carlo: absolutely great here in Germany, we are nominated for the German record award we are album of the month in "Stereo Play" a high fidelity magazine. We are on a Zillo Sampler (gothic rock fanzine) we have got some brilliant reviews. I mean we won´t sell a lot of copies but we get used to that.

What was the inspiration behind the songs wild rain, digging for water, hallucination, walking the opposite direction, breath, and the swimmer?

Carlo : as I said before, it´s all about the dry period in your life, where everything seems to go wrong. There is no middle way it´s surviving or dying. All the lyrics are very surreal, so that the listener can find out and interpret his own life into it.

You have the vocals of Claudia Uman on the album how did she become involved with White Rose Transmission and will she be involved with White rose transmission in the future?

Carlo: Claudia was a fan of the Convent insince ´85 when she was twelve years old, her older sister was listening to our music. It was very funny, one day i met Claudia on a party in ´94 she told me that she was singing a lot, I asked her if she would like to do some backing vocals on WRT she agreed I loved it and so it happened. Whenever their will be a new album I´ll ask her again, I think she´s great !

Mark burgess from Chameleons play bass and sing the song Digging for water, when did he decide become involved with White Transmission?

Carlo: Adrian and I asked him after we went to a concert of Mark and Yves new band "Invincible" Mark and Adrian only met once so it was a great experience for both.

How long did it take to produce?

Carlo: four weeks from the writing till the finished mixes, Adrian was a freak, he just couldn´t stop , once he started. It was amazing how fast he could work.

What have you got planned for the next album?

Carlo: I´ve got a lot of material still we didn´t use because of the fact that you can only get 74 minutes of music on one CD ;-)) I will write some songs myself and I would like to work with Marty Willson Piper from the Church. I think he´s one of the best guitar players I know and he is a brilliant producer. I asked him about it when he was over, but it´s always just a question of time.The Church just finished their cover album box of birds and started to record some demo´s for a new album, so they might go
on tour as well soon. It doesn´t really matter because WRT has always been a project that whenever we have time for it, we will go for it. No time pressure, no release dates, nothing.

Where have you toured, are you planning any up and coming tours?

carlo: we planned to tour several gigs through europe but suddenly this sad news came in about Adrian, Mark and I decided to do the tour, because Adrian would have liked it to carry on anyway, music was such a main thing in his life. We asked Yves Altana to help us out and he came over from Manchester to join us. We did only four acoustic shows in Germany and they went out very well, the people enjoyed it a lot. Mark and Yves played some "Invincible" stuff acoustic and afterwards we did some old and new WRT songs and some Sound covers "Hand of Love, Winning, and Wildest Dreams" it was fantastic but sometimes hard to deal with our emotions.

In your future tours will you be planing on using string instruments?

Carlo: Oh I would love to do that yes, we will see , no plans right now, but who knows...

What gigs did you enjoy the most and what was the audience response?

Carlo: I always enjoy life gigs, thats one on the main reasons why I´m doing this, it´s great. Whenever the band feels great the vibe will get the audience...there´s no escape for that :-))))))

What gigs did you not enjoy?

Carlo: Cancelled gigs.......but there are none in my history ;-))))

Is there anything special incorporated within your performances?

Carlo: I´m singing naked ;-))))))) no sorry, i think that all our gigs are very intence I´m having self conversations and let the audience be a part of it. I´m always very excited afterwards and mostly I´m still shaking half an hour after the show. I love to be on stage, it´s sometimes better than
sex ;-))))))))))) (only sometimes)

When you have a performance what goes through your mind when you are on that stage. What is it that you feel? What sort of emotions do you go through when the eyes of the audience are on you?

Carlo: To much to mention really, I mean as I said I´m having a self conversation and everything that I wrote about comes back into your mind when you sing about it. Mostly I can´t see the audience because the spot light blinds me anyway. :-))))

What are your future plans?

Carlo: ah, ah , ah, ah staying alive, staying alive ;-))) no seriously I don´t know what this future brings, I will carry on writing, I´m working on a new album with The Convent and hope that we will be able to record in November.

Carlo when did you start red sun records and what are the philosophies behind red sun records how can people get in contact with red sun records. What sort artist do you look for, and what are the future plans for red sun records?

Carlo: I started in 89 with my booking agency called red sun agency, and two years ago I started with the record lable. Our philosophy is to keep this kind of music alive, make it available , keep the prices as low as possible, so that everyone is able to affort it. And pay the people who deserve to get some money for what they are producing. All kind of bands can connect us , but we can´t make any promises because
we are not that big to throw the big money at them. We want to help as much as we can.

Is there anything you would like to say to the readers out there?

Carlo: Keep the spirit going !! Inhale and don´t choke !! ;-)))))