Hey Hans, what's up? You've been involved in awesome things like Last Days
of Humanity, Lowland Records, etc... Are you currently in another band or
are you done with music/grind? Would you wish to start another band one of
these days, if so what genre would it be?
Hi Pierre, currently I'm not involved in any band i don't have the time in
daily life a run a petrol station in the south of Holland. The last real
musical thing I did was the release of the double compilation cd "Rest In
Gore" that contains almost everything what Last Days Of Humanity ever
released. I released it through Eye Of Terror Records together with to other
old LDOH members (Bart Boumans and Erwin de Wit). Bones Brigade does the
distribution of it. If I ever find the time to start a new band the musical
style will be brutal gore grind. (again).
You're currently working on a terrific Old School Grind & Death YouTube
channel! What pushed you to start this now? Are you working alone on this?
Are you grabbing the videos from your personal archive? Does it take you
alot of time? Is there more stuff to come?
Yeah, I started Grindtube666 a few months ago. I had a lot of video tapes in
my cupboard that I never watched because it's to much trouble to find the
things you want to see. So I came on the idea to record everything from my
tape's to DVD's and then cut them up and upload them on youtube. This way
the songs or bands that you want are only a few mouse clicks away, and even
better, the whole world can view them. I work alone on Grindtube666, in
between customers at my petrolstation I have time to kill. At this moment I
have almost uploaded everything that I have but in not to long I get tons of
new video's of a friend of mine (Steven Koster of Bowelcrust and ex
Rompeprop) He also has tons of concert video's of the late 80's and early
90's. So stay tuned!
I also noticed video clips, edited from various movies and stuff... Is
that your own making?
I made a few clips (2 LDOH and 1 of Regurgitate) but I'm not very good at
it, mostly it's just finding the right clips and put them in the Windows
Moviemaker.
About Last Days of Humanity, can you tell me about the early days... How
and why did you form the band? Who were the original band members, etc...
What are your best memories/best live performance from your time in the
band, etc...
Last Days of Humanity, the early days....
..Autumn 1989, Erwin (de Wit) and me (Hans) often came together in Soos
Plock, that was en still is a sort of youthcentre where you could hang out,
drink a lot of beer and see some cool bands. Bands like Blood, Agathocles,
and Dreft. Bands who were into the most filthy grind/noise that was around
in that time. It also was the time of some great other underground bands
like Fear of God, Napalm Death, Sore Throat, Anal Cunt, 7 Minutes of Nausea.
Those bands inspired us to go and make our own mind-blowing grindnoise.
Erwin al ready played in a grindcore band called Fatal Error.When Erwin
organised a gig with Drudge, Agathocles and some other bands December 30,
1989 in Plock he saw the opportunity to ad our own noise project to the
bill, Last Days of Humanity was born. Last days of Humanity at this time
consisted of only two singers (Erwin and Hans). The "music" was made by two
screaming voices that were deformed by a guitar pitch shifter.
In 1990 a real band was formed, the musical influences were Anal Cunt, fast
short chaotic songs. The first real gig of Last days of Humanity was on
October the 6th 1990 together with Fatal Error in Soos Plock. Then I came
across a Digitech Whammy FX pedal, that could bring down the vocals with 1
or 2 octaves. Man, this is what I was looking for, vocals that sounded like
a screaming pig! In 1993 we went into the studio to record our second demo,
a few weeks before we met a guy who was playing in a blue's band and he also
had a small studio. When we started the recording his eye's almost popped
out of his skull and his jaw fell wide open, he couldn't believe what was
happing such sheer sonic mayhem, but after a couple cases of bier he calmed
down and we finished our recording. Somewhere in 1996 we got our first
record deal! Who could imagine that! We booked 2 studio days to record our
first album. On the first day Erwin forgot to take his Bass guitar to the
studio, luckily he didn't forget his beer. After one day recording we only
got something like 12 minutes of music, way to short for a full length CD.
We had a problem, we had to come up with about 18 minutes of new material in
less than 24 hours! But heey, for professional musicians like us that was no
problem, the next day the rest of the album was recorded. The Label that
original would release the album failed to keep it's promises and kept us on
a leas with beautiful words, than came Nicolas of bones brigade in the
picture, he was starting a Label Nicolas and me were already friend for an
long time, I knew him from the time that he was working for Osmose
Productions, we made a deal with him and he released the first album shortly
after. This story is in short the first years of last Days of Humanity......
Originally, the band's concept seemed less gore-oriented and more about
darkness, etc... How did it degenerate into pure gore? Last Days of Humanity
is one of my favorite band names ever too, it seems more linked to this
early concept... Do you remember how the name came about? Do you remember
how drew the logo too?
Well, in 1989 there were not that much goregrind bands around. Our musical
heroes at that time were Napalm Death (with Lee Dorrian), Fear Of God, Anal
Cunt, Agathocles and 7 Minutes Of Neasea. Later the band moved to the gore
grind and the songs got faster and faster. Erwin de Wit came up with the
name "Last Days Of Humanity" I don't remember how and what, but it was/is a
catchy name compared to other bands that were and are around. I drew the
LDOH logo, it's my normal handwriting that is worked out as a logo.
What do you think of the band's evolution without you? It's strange that
the band continued with an almost completely different line-up...
LDOH had many line-up changes but 90% of the members are close friends, they
almost all left in good friendschip and most of the members and ex members
saw each other every week at the local bar or at gigs. With new members
there were new influences.
Why and how did you come back to do vocals on the last recordings? Do you
know the reason why the band ultimately split up?
The band was already split up (why? I think they just were fed up with it
and wanted to do something different) before the last studio release "Putrefaction In Progress" Bones Brigade asked LDOH if they wanted to do 1
final studio album. The band agreed and went into the studio. But somehow
they kicked out their last singer (Erwin De Groot) and then they were
knocking on my door asking if I would do the vocals on the last studio
release. I was very happy that they asked me because now I as band founder
could be part of the last release. Great! They gave me a CD with they rough
musical mix so I could know the songs. Then a couple weeks later I went to
the studio and did my thing.
What's your personal favorite Last Days of Humanity release?
My Personal favourites are the first album "The Sound of Rancid Juices
Sloshing Around Your Coffin" because it has different of songs on it with
cool intro's and I really like the last album "Putrefaction In Progress"
because it's sheer brutality. No compromises just ultra brutal gore grind.
Now on to some Lowland Records questions... Do you remember When and why
you started doing Lowland Records? How long did it last? And why did you
ultimately end it?
I started Lowland Records in 1992 by the release of a 7"EP of Excess Of
Cruelty, started it to promote small underground bands and it was a great
way to get lots of other ep's, cd's and lp's by trading them with other
labels. The last release was a cd release of Sacramental Sachem, that was in
1995. After that I got less and less time to visit gigs, on gigs there I
sold most of my stuff. So I quit the label.
Do you have the list of all your releases? What's your favorite release
that you made (Besides "Effortless Regurgitation of Bright Red Blood"
maybe)? You never released any Last Days of Humanity stuff through Lowland,
did you?
LOW001: Excess Of Cruelty - Excess Of Cruelty 7"
LOW002: Sacramental Sachem - The Dolcinites Were Wrong 7"
LOW003: Subject - Diaphanous Writhes Of a Soul 7"
LOW004: Dead End - Wartime In Eden 7"
LOW005: Dysentery - Brings Me No Tears CD
LOW006: Pathology / Bowelcrust - Split 7"
LOW007: Regurgitate - Effortless Regurgitation Of Bright Red Blood CD
LOW008: Sacramental Sachem - Recrucifiction CD
Beside the RGTE album I like the Excess Of Cruelty, Subject and Bowelcrust
eps'a lot. I never put LDOH on my label because I think that it had to be
good enough that other labels would like to release something of it. I mean
this, other labels had to think that LDOH was good enough for a release,
good enough to invest some money for a 7"EP or a CD.
11)How did you end up releasing "Effortless Regurgitation of Bright Red
Blood"? How did you get in touch with Regurgitate originally? How many
copies were made of this one?
I was in touch with Rikard from the time that they released their first
split EP with Vaginal Massaker, after their split CD with Dead I asked him
if they wanted to do a full lengt on Lowland Records. There were about 1300
copies made. Later it got re-released by Relapse.
What's your favorite period/era in the grind scene? What are your all
time favorite grind bands, all time favorite albums? What other types of
music are into besides grind/noise/death metal?
The best periode for me were the late 80's until the mid 90's the time when
Grindcore and Deathmetal were born, the time when it was pure underground
with tapetrading with people from all over the world to get to know new
obscure bands. My all time favourite bands? There are a lot of them, but to
name a few: Brutal Truth (the old stuff), Fear Of God, Agathocles, Dead
Infection, Carcass (old), Napalm Death (old), Morbid Angel (old),
Terrorizer, Suffocation, Cannibal Corpse (with Barns on vocals), Blood
Duster, Nasum, Mortician, Extreme Noise Terror, Blood, GUT, Disrupt, State
Of Fear, Pestilence, Necrony, Carnage, Regurgitate, Autopsy, Embrionic
Death, Death, Skit System, Exhumed, Dead, Cliteater, Inhume and many many
more. Beside Grind/Death I don't buy or download anything. When I drive my
car I listen to the radio just normal top 40 stuff. And I got a couple cd's
of Dead Can Dance, great relaxing music.
My top 10 all Favorite albums:
Slayer - Reign In Blood
Brutal Truth - Extreme Conditions..
Napalm Death - Scum/From Enslavement to obliteration
Pestilence - Consuming Impulse
Terrorizer - World Downfall
Morbid Angel - Altars Of Madness
Testament - The Legacy
Carcass - Reek Of Putrefaction
Death - Leprosy
Suffocation - Effigy of The Forgotten/Human Waste
Bolt Thrower - Realm Of Chaos
What do you think of today's bands/scene? What are your current favorite
bands? Do you still attend live gigs and stuff?
I am not realy involved in the scene of today, I go to concerts a couple
time's a year, only to bands that I realy want to see. Last gig I saw was
Brutal Truth in February this year.
What's your current music & movie playlist?
My current playlist is very much the same as I stated above, as for newer
bands, check out FUBAR, they are signed by Bones Brigade Records. Great
band!
That's all for now... Thanks for going through this stupid question
hell!!! You have the final word!
Thank you pierre for the interview, it was not boring to fill out. Check out
my Youtube Channels:
http://www.youtube.com/Grindtube666 (Lots of gigs from old and new
death/grind/crust bands, the channel is with almost 500 clips still growing)
