Entrevista a Uli Kusch 

Uno de los mejores bateristas dentro de la escena del power metal, nos responde una serie de preguntatas acerca de sus nuevos proyectos, asi como su salida de Masterplan entre otra cosas bastante interesantes..

Por Raziel...

WOP: -As you may know, you are one of the most active drummers in the world nowadays, you carry so many projects with you; and keeping them all active must be a difficult task. In your opinion which is the project that drains you out the most? or that you work on the most?. And why? 

Uli Kusch: Every project or band I work with is same important to me when it comes to music and productions. And once I decided to work on something I just wane make it right, so that on the end I can enjoy the fruits of my work. Right now, Ride the Sky takes all my attention to create a strong debut album, and to find a direction, which is very important to me and the other members, because I see that as a new beginning and a big chance. And once that is done and there are no gigs or tours I focus on something else. I am a fulltime musician and I don’t wane sit around and wait for the next opportunity to jump on a high rated tour or something. Then I rather start to write some new songs or lyrics etc. But I won’t start anything else before RTS is done 100%. It’s just not possible to do two or three productions at the same time. The music and my life would suffer. And for Mekong Delta for example I create the drums only, so that was not as intensive and time consuming work. It will show on the end if one of my main bands will eat up all the time. And as long things are going well and moving that’s just fine with me. I just hate still stand. What you need is a calendar and a marker to schedule it right;) 

WOP: -It was interesting to see you, come up with a band including a female singer. But what was more interesting was the fact that the music was not the "conventional" female metal band; but something much more aggressive including the melodic traditions that female fronted bands have. How did you reach this concept? And how much did Magali Luyten influence you in the song writing / producing process? 

Uli Kusch: Actually it is more “conventional” then you think if you remember “Hard`n Heavy” bands from the 80s like Lee Arron, Lita Fort, Vixen, Doro etc.. I just didn’t jump on the “gothic trip” with an opera voice. And the music I write is more or less Heavy metal. And when I was listening the first time to Magalie`s voice I knew that one day we will gather and make something together, though her creative contribution to “the unexpected” wasn’t that big. Important for me and her was to present her to a larger audience and to have her voice on the songs present. And that’s not because I didn’t wanted her to do more, it’s because most of the ideas where already there. She created some great vocal lines and fixed some of my ideas for the some songs and finalized some lyric ideas. She likes a lot what she did on the album, but it is not exactly what she has in mind when it comes to writing songs since she has a different background and different influences…we will see how that will change with the second record. And it’s just up to her to give that a call. 

WOP: -As we all know Mekong Delta reunited and you joined their ranks. What are your hopes for this band, and how do you feel about working them? What is the current status of a new release with them? 

Uli Kusch: I was very happy and proud to be part of the production and it was eventually the most intensive and interesting work I did for many years concerning the drum arranges. This music is so different compared to all other bands I was involved. And somehow I felt that there where no limits within the frames. With “Lurking Fear(album title)” it will be interesting to see how peoples react on this piece of art. But since BS and RTS are my main bands I consider it rather difficult to think of any gigs in the near future. 

WOP: -The problems started arising in Masterplan with the departure of Jorn Lande. Still, fans remained faithful to the band, believing in the power of Uli Kusch's and Roland Grapow's songwriting capabilities. And then you announced your departure. Which direction do you think Masterplan will now take under the command of Roland Grapow? And are you planning on working with them again in the future? 

Uli Kusch: Well, I just left, so please give me a break, he he…I mean Roland has his style and he knows what he wants and what not. Or let’s say, he should know. The new line-up is very good, but they need time to find their new musical concept which appears automatically and defines new it self if half of the band has been replaced. The new album unfortunately is just ok, but considering the time circumstances for the production of MKII no wonder. I like Mike Dimeo though. Definitely it’s a new chapter and time will tell. 

WOP:-What do you think of Mike Terrana replacing your seat in Masterplan? 

Uli Kusch: We have some more contact recently and it turns out to be a good understanding between us. Great funny guy, awesome drummer, I respect him a lot and whish him all the best! 

WOP: -Tell us a little bit about your new band Ride the Sky (by the way the logo looks great!) what genre of music is it? And why the name Ride the Sky? 

Uli Kusch: hat name popped up in the middle of finding a name actually a couple of weeks ago. And my first reaction was “GREAT” that’s it. And if I remember, that Helloween Song was eventually THE song which let me buy a second bass drum in 1985.When “walls of Jericho” came out I played drums three years at this time and it just blow me away. Before I could even dream about to ever play in that band. 
I passed the idea to Benny and Bjørn and the immediate reaction was positive, without that they knew the background with this song. The music is not related to the “Helloween “music in that way. Of course Helloween influenced also my song writing and some elements in the music will be found. Bjørn has a very rusty voice and reminds me of “Graham Bonnet (Rainbow)”.So that will be another world. Benny is such a flexible player who originally comes more from the fusion side. But he is very open-minded when it comes to adapt new things he never did before. Its open and it will include my style of song writing as well Benny and Bjørn came up with very powerful tunes. You gone find “melodic heavy metal, hard`n heavy, AOR, Doom, prog elements, some epic tunes,orchestral arranges, a ballade, some crazy stuff…its more heavy then Masterplan was but it will be the same melodic. And what we have so fare is closer to what MP3 could have been then I expected. The band is complete with Kaspar Dahlqvist (Dionysus/Stormwind) on keyboards and Mathias Garnås (X-saviour) So I am very optimistic and looking forward to enter the stage hopefully in early winter this year on a tour. 

WOP: - Recently in an interview with Roland Grapow, he stated that there was currently a project with Michael Kiske and Kai Hansen. What do you think about this, and do you think you will be part of this amazing line up? 

Uli Kusch: NOPE, I will not be part of this. Roland asked me a couple of times and I never liked the idea of making a kind of “formation with ex Helloween members”exept Weikat. It’s so obvious what this will be about and why it is born. Roland thought it would be a great revenge, I thought it’s boring and cheep and cheesy. Never the less I can not imagine working with Hansen anyway. 

WOP: -Which is your favorite song from Helloween? To play live? 

Uli Kusch: Hard to say…maybe “power, why, the chance, the time of the oath, eagle fly free, dr.stein”…it really was depending on my day condition, and the response from the fans, the sound, the light and the foot that day;)… 

WOP: -One last question that I think has been in the minds of a lot of Helloween fans (including myself) What do you really think of all the "bad" reviews (according to Michael Weikath) that "The Dark Ride" received? 

Uli Kusch: It’s his view and his frustration about the “dark” input and influence of our time. The Helloween music was never mend to be that dark he always said. And I understand this. He just should have spoken up his mind before the album production instead of going through all this with refusal and being so destructive on the end. To me that album is just updated melodic metal the way it should sound nowadays, not more and not less. I love it.