Interview made to Lacrimosa during the program "Gaveta 12" on May 23, 1998.

Clauzzen: They wanted to visit Mexico a long time ago; they were just waiting for the best moment to do it and thank us our patience. Tilo is very happy because though his music is sung in German and it is not very easy to understand, is impressive the number of people that follow him.

Clauzzen: Is this your first time in this continent?

Lacrimosa: Yes, as Lacrimosa. In private we have been in some cities of USA like San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Clauzzen: Did you have a specific image of Mexico, before talking with the people that contacted you?

Tilo: We are big fans of the movies and we have closed to Mexican movies, but they had been cliché images, stereotypes. We just arrive here and we can’t be aware of what to expect.

Anne: As well in letter they send photos. And one of the most fascinating things is to see how Lacrimosa’s fans are.

Clauzzen: They are some cliches, when we watch TV we suddenly notice a strong and worrying tendency to the racism and Nazism in Germany and Nordic countries.

Tilo: We are not a band which goes to the stage in order to say our politic, religious, etc, points of view. It is only what we think and believe, but we are not trying to choose a direction. It is very bad that some bands use the stage in order to project all of these questions. Once upon a time in Germany, the gothic scene was associated with these neo Nazi movements, but we don’t have anything to do with that, besides that was not the objective of the gothic scene, they were different things.

Anne: Lacrimosa's objective is that people have their own opinions and do not follow the others opinions just because they are on stage.

Clauzzen: This is a necessary question that we don’t like to do, but we ask to all band to give us a brief story of what has been the band.

Tilo: Since I was on the school, I always liked to write my feelings, poetry, short stories and suddenly I was anxious to combine it with something atmospheric. At the beginning I wanted to do a cassette that I'd like that only my friends were listened to, with certain sounds and effect sounds, and then I couldn’t stop. I always look for independency from a recording studio, which would tell me what and how to do, but I always tried to keep my independence in order to do what I really wanted to do. Tilo mentioned his first albums and said that "Satura" is a conjunction of stories joined together (something conceptual) and also is a gift of the gods. Later, Anne enters, I met her when I saw her on stage and she amazed me with her projection, first I just wanted someone who sang the choirs, but I was fascinated with her and I felt I needed the contrast (as the cover art of the cds that are a contrast between black and white), so I was fascinated for the way in which feelings could be expressed as I saw it in Anne and that was when she enters. We started to work together, the chemistry was immediate.

Anne: It was not easy for me to make the decision of leaving "Two Witches", a band in which I were for 7 years, but also I was surprised for Tilo’s proposal and I mainly was amazed for the way Tilo compose music, it was not easy but I don’t regret, I took my things and went to Switzerland.

Clauzzen: How hard is to find several things that are like barriers inside Lacrimosa's music? As the one you mentioned: the language…

Tilo: The lyrics are important, first are the lyrics and then is the music, but the music is like a kind of mirror of the lyrics which through… That like a fusion, they will be really impressive. You realize if the lyrics are expressing their meaning through the music, even when the language in which they are sung is not well understood. One of the things that amazes me the most is when suddenly some people tell me what they feel with our songs and it is exactly what the lyrics of the songs mean, and this indicates us that we are in the right way, because at the end the music is totally fused with the lyrics.

Anne: One of the most important things is that each one does a kind of paint, a picture of interpretation of each one of the parts that usually coincide, even when you are not really convinced or you don't know what exactly are telling us the lyrics. So that in the last releases we have included the lyrics in English so as to leave more people could understand them easier (because English is the universal language).

Clauzzen: Could you please tell us about the general themes of Lacrimosa?

Lacrimosa: Considering the art is different perceptions we can have about a "bottle" (during the interview was a bottle in front of them and they used it as an example); but what are the different points of perception?, that is what Lacrimosa is trying to do, to express a life-style, to express feelings, it is always fascinating to discover what is the soul and human mind, for example, "Stolzes Herz" tell us about how many times you fall down and then you only have to stand up with a smile on your face, but you realize that you have fallen down, then there are those kind of human expressions, about knowing what is the mind and human feelings, this is one of the main ideas of Lacrimosa.

Clauzzen: How do you describe your music?

Lacrimosa: We describe it as dark music, classic metal. We grew up with what was the 80's classic gothic scene, bands like Bauhaus that even when they don't exist any more, always bring that kind of emotions with us. However, we have to go beyond because there are many bands that try to copy the work of these great bands, but where are you really going to? We are not interested in someone who tells us: "that drums don’t sound as gothic" because we cannot find the point, and the main idea is give all the evolution and development to this kind of music, there are many bands which try to copy but at the end, one of the most important things in Lacrimosa’s music is the classic music that some obscure bands don’t point out how it may be or the influence it may have.

Clauzzen: What kind of people follow or go to Lacrimosa's concerts?

Tilo: They are a lot of people, since those guys who like metal until gothic guys, mostly gothics of course, as well "normal" people go: as the parents, people older than us, but the most fascinating is to see all these people joined there without conflicts, without problems, enjoying a proposal that is our proposal (Lacrimosa’s).

Clauzzen: What are your influences (of any type)?

Anne: Everything, each act of life, each thing I breath, each thing I see, there is not really something that influence you directly because you weren't doing the yours truly, or everything will be… for example, I can't tell I like Metallica and then steal them a riff, we don’t manage it in that way.

Tilo: Many times you have different influences, but the thing is to transform this into something new. For example, when we recorded "Angst", which does not have guitars or drums but everything is with keyboards, I was very influenced by Bauhaus in that time, however, if you listened to "Angst" it does not seems like them, that is fascinating, use your influences in order to transform them into something totally new.

Clauzzen: How much support do you receive in your country?

Lacrimosa: Metal scene and gothic scene have different treatment, we can see that nobody dares to touch the gothic, unless this movement is starting to come out and in some places it is played this music. Despite the album "Stille" has had a high ingress to the charts, the most important music channel did not play it, and that is unfair.

Clauzzen: What do you think about people who are jealousy because specific music of some specific bands is played for the media (as the radio)?

Lacrimosa: On one hand it is comprehensible that this may occur, is the human nature, because you always think you have something special, and when you listen to it massively, it means they are entering to your world. On the other hand, this is an attitude that shouldn't be taken, that is not correct, because is a little unfair, for example: if only some of the present people have our albums, we couldn't come here, and one of the great problems and misunderstandings in this medium is that if a band goes out is bad.

Clauzzen: What is the meaning of the Harlequin (clown) for each one of you?

Tilo: It is that you cannot always touch the music (that sometimes you cannot see or touch the music), and what is the harlequin is Lacrimosa itself, he is placing our contrasts.

Anne: Contrasts of melancholy-happiness. When I met him for the first time on 1993 and the moment I listened to the music, he is the summary of all that could be read between lines about Lacrimosa.

Tilo: Charles Chaplin shape influenced it, since he was a person who could found the essence in a beautiful way and went deeper and all of this is represented by the harlequin.

Clauzzen: What could be expected of this Lacrimosa's concert?

Lacrimosa: Well, this is like an album or like our music, you cannot say that you can expect this thing or that other thing, but you have to discover it, mainly because it is not something theatrical, it is only the things following their way, flowing, each concert is unique and the people's feedback is important, that interchange of feelings and since there depends a lot how is flowing Lacrimosa's play. By now, we cannot say more because we just arrive here, but we are sure that at the moment we take the airplane to go back to our home we'll have a lot of memories we are not going to forget, and we hope not to disappoint you with our work. And thanks to all the people that have followed our music, despite the barrier of language and for being loyal to us because thanks to you we are in Mexico.