Biography
dEUS – They Suffer Rock
by João Pedro Ribeiro
Although the first show ever of this band was in 1989, we can only consider dEUS a true band in 1991 when Tom Barman, together with Stef Kamil Carlens formed dEUS.
The name dEUS came from a song by The Sugarcubes and, on a Belpop documentary, was revealed that Tom Barman wanted the name of the band to relate in some way to God, being one of the names considered The Godmothers.
dEUS means God in Latin and still means God in some languages as in, for example, Portuguese.
As for the reversed capitals Tom Barman revealed that it was that way just to look better, as he didn’t like the graphic appearance of the name correctly written.
The name dEUS is pronounced like “play us”, which is different of the original pronounciation in Latin.
According to the documentary “Time is the State of My Jeans” Barman met Carlens when dating Carlens’ sister, and jammed for the first time together at the Monty, Antwerp. Later they decided to share a house, which door Tom Barman would leave open for anyone who wanted to come in and play with them. Barman and Carlens shared influences like Velvet Underground, The Violent Femmes, Leonard Cohen, Captain Beefheart, John Coltrane and Tom Waits. Carlens was at the time already in a band called A Beatband.
Although many sites and biographies throughout the internet refer to dEUS as a cover band, Tom Barman categorically dismissed that on an interview, saying that despite the fact that the band played some covers, dEUS have always created their own material.
The very first formation of dEUS was Tom Barman (Vocals and guitar), Stef Kamil Carlens (vocals and guitar), Gino (bass) and Kris Daans (drums) and this was the line up that entered the Humo Rock Rally contest.
During the contest Mark Willems replaced Kris Daans on the drums, Klaas Janzoons entered with the violin, Oliver Defossez played the harmonica and Mark Meyers joined on the guitar. Gino left the band and Carlens started playing the bass.
Meanwhile dEUS made a small tour in Spain, where Filip Eyckmans (member of the agency now known as Musickness) had some business. Back to Antwerp Mark Meyers and Mark Willems left the band leaving room for Rudy Trouvé, an experienced guitar player and painter, and Julles de Borgher, who previously was dEUS van driver, on the drums. dEUS played some gigs in Antwerp, sometimes being the supporting act for bands like X-Legged Sally, Walkabouts and Freddy Johnston, among others.
Between 1991 and 1992 dEUS recorded some demo tapes. dEUS And All, Crazy and Tonedeaf, Crazy and Tonedeaf 2 and No More Soda For Clarence. The demo’s sleeves listed the line up as being Tom Barman, Stef Kamil Carlens, Klaas Janzoons, Mark Meyers and Julles de Borgher, except for dEUS and All where the drummer was Kris Daans.
These demos already featured songs, that later would be part of Ep’s or albums like Via, Dea (later renamed Zea), Violins and Happy Endings, Mute, Right As Rain, Great American Nude and Suds & Soda. They featured some covers as well.
On March 1993 Tom Barman gave an interview to Rif Raf Magazine where he talked about the differences between dEUS from the Humo Rock Rally and the dEUS that were to follow:
“We’ve been working with this group for seven months now. I think this is the best group we’ve had so far with dEUS. It will be this group or no group. If it won’t work with these people, it never will.
This is also the first time I’m feeling we’re a real, solid band now. Which is not so obvious, because you know almost everyone in the band is also involved in other projects. dEUS is somewhat of a melting pot of that. (…)
We don’t have a lot of songs yet. A good mini-cd we could handle, but actually, we’ve got only one song we wrote with the entire band. We threw away a lot of the old songs, which we for instance played in the Rock Rally days. That’s a period which is over now. I did have good time back then, but it’s over. Only Klaas (violin), Kamil (bass) and I remain from that period. The mouth harmonica player we had back then has left, and we’ve got a new drummer and guitar player. Musically, we’ve got nothing to do with that period anymore. (…) The name isn’t that important. I think dEUS sounds okay, as long as you write it with a small ‘d’. It has to be written with a small ‘d’. Deus means God, while dEUS means ‘a god’, or well-educated young man”
1993 sees the first serious release of the band. dEUS joined with Peter Vermeersch and Pierre Vervloesem (known from the work with X-Legged Sally and Maximalist! among others). From this collaboration results the EP Zea that was first published under the label Jack and Johnny, owned by Filip Eyckmans and Christian Pierre. Later this label would evolve to the still existing Musickness.
On this EP the tracks featured were Zea, Right as Rain and Great American Nude. It was received enthusiastically by the Belgian press, and had regular airplay. A month after the realease, BANG! signed with dEUS and immediately made a reissue of the EP under their label. This second release contained the same three songs, but had four tracks, since the intro of Zea was cut apart from the rest of the song into a 45 seconds track.
dEUS dived back to the studio then, to start preparing their first LP to be released by BANG!.
From this resulted the first album of the band, Worst Case Scenario. It was released in Belgium on September 16th 1994. The reactions were very positive in Belgium and the first single was Suds & Soda. The song received wide recogniton and airplay not only in Belgium but also in England, where dEUS gave some concerts at The Garage and and The Marquee of Glastonbury Festival.
Island Records noticed the band and immediately signed them to a worldwide deal. This way, dEUS holds the milestone of first Indie Act to ever sign with a Major Label.
On October 10th 1994 Worst Case Scenario saw its international release. The tracklist of the album was the same as the Belgium release, except for Let Go that was left out and replaced by Right As Rain and Great American Nude, two songs from the EP Zea.
The style of the album was quite different featuring a lot of different styles all compiled together. This resulted in an exploding cocktail with constant zigzags between tempos and moods. Suds & Soda made stride getting a “buzzbin” at MTV and stayed on the number 1 spot for 10 weeks in Studio Brussels Afrekening.
Via also received wide regular airplay throughout Europe and dEUS were nominated for the MTV Award for Breakthrough of the year. dEUS won 4 ZAMU awards (Zangers en Musikanten: The Flemish Association Of Singers and Musicians), for Best Record (Worst Case Scenario), Best Video (Via), Best Band and Breakthrough of the Year.
Three singles were made out of this record. Suds & Soda, an explosive cocktail of excentric instrumentals making up a wonderful high energy song, Via, a moody track with complex construction and Hotellounge (Be the death of me), a cinematic track where, according to Tom Barman, Rudy’s amplifier bursting into flames can be heard. Each one of them getting a EP release which contained not only songs from Worst Case Scenario but also others that didn’t make it to the record.
The cover and artwork of the album were Rudy Trouvé’s paintings as well as all the covers and artwork on the single editions.
The band went on a Dutch sold out tour and were ready to start a bigger tour when Julles de Borgher broke his ankle in Berlin. Didier Fontaine filled in for Julles during four months of the tour.
On March 15th 1995 dEUS played at Astoria London a gig that later played on MTV. This show became later a Bootleg called “Hard Nights Daze” that also featured records from a show at The Trinity in Bristol from April 19th 1995. This tour was done essentially in Europe totaled more than 110 shows throughout one year, with shows at festivals such as Lowlands, Pukkelpop and Reading. dEUS haven’t toured in the United States because of the lack of support from the local record company. However they were featured in a couple of radio shows, mainly to promote Suds & Soda, the main single of the album.
The album received wide acclaim from the critics being praised for tracks such as Suds & Soda and Via. They were also criticized for the inconsistent mood of the record as well as the chaotic erratic construction of songs.
During the year of 1995 dEUS recorded what was to be a 3 or 4 track EP. However this came out as a totally different release, since everyone had composed so much material. My Sister Is My Clock turned itself into a 13 track, 25 minutes lasting record. All the songs are brutally different and all of them are individual compositions by each one of the band members. There is a rare Special Edition of this record, published by BANG!, that came in a thick cardboard box that contained five sleeves with drawings, paintings or artwork made by each one of dEUS, plus one sleeve for the cd. My Sister Is My Clock was also released in a simple jewelcase by BANG! and Island Records. However Klaas stated in an interview that the record label thought that releasing such a record would be commercial suicide.
On behalf of the record Tom said the following on Baby Talk Fanzine, December 1996:
“How many times have you listened to it? Two times? Well, that’s not enough. This is something that has to be listened to several times. But I can see your point: If it doesn’t invite you to listen to it, it’s hard. There is melodic stuff on it but it’s less. I tell you what the original idea was. It was to be on a b-side. We had a bunch of songs and we came from a long tour and were happy to be in the studio. But there’s some strange music-ploice which decides that singles cannot be longer than 20 minutes. So we decided to put it out seperately. The record company weren’t really happy, though. There was no promotion or anything. My philosophy is that it found its way to the people who enjoy it. It’s not for everyone, though. “
This was the last full release of the Worst Case Scenario line up. Rudy Trouvé had already laid down some tracks for the next record, but decided to quit. On the Making of Worst Case Scenario Time is The State of My Jeans, Rudy reveals that he made up his mind in a show in Milan where he felt that dEUS became the “flavour of the month” and people were seeing dEUS not because of their music, but because of the hype. Consequently he didn’t like the show and didn’t wanted to made an encore performance, althoug he did. Rudy stated that by then he realised he wasn’t happy and didn’t wanted to do it anymore. He also wanted to be more time near home to keep working on a miriad of projects of him.
In 1995 dEUS reached to Eric Drew Feldman to produce their new record. Feldman had an impressive worksheet after collaborating with acts such as P.J. Harvey and Captain Beefheart, among others.
dEUS had been out of stage since August 1995 making only some appearances on single shows. During this time dEUS started composing what would become the second LP of the band. Some of the songs presented on it were already played in some shows of the Worst Case Scenario tour (for example Roses was played at a show in Portugal and Supermarket Song was played at Lowlands).
As said before Rudy Trouvé had already recorded some tracks. After his departure Tom Barman invited his mate on tENERIFE (a side project of Barman), Craig Ward, to replace Rudy.
Rudy Trouvé’s last show with dEUS was on August 26th 1995. However the cover of the new record and cd singles were still paintings from Rudy Trouvé.
The record featured the same mix of influences although it managed to be a little bit more consistent than Worst Case Scenario, although that is arguable too. For many dEUS fans it stands as the jewel of the crown of records of dEUS.
In A Bar Under The Sea was released on September 14th 1996. However the first single was released on June 1996.Theme From Turnpike was a dark high power song that featured a bass riff from Charles Mingus’s “Far Wells Mill Valley”. The videoclip consisted on an opening credit for a movie that didn’t existed. Renowned actor Seymour Cassel and Sam Louwyck, Belgian dancer, were walking down parisien streets with Sam Louwick acting weird disrupting the public order while Seymour Cassel would try to stop or avoid bigger trouble.
This videoclip was played on the theatres before Trainspotting, in Europe.
Following Turnpike came Roses, a soft song until a powerful and surprising, but very short, acceleration that sparks a spiral of details that add up to a paranoic stunning end, Little Arithmetics, one of the most pop oriented tracks by dEUS that had a total unpredictable and messy end, that probably avoided this track from being a regular hit on the radio.
Finally Fell Off the Floor, Man came together on a single reissue of Little Arithmetics in Europe, but had its own release on Belgium through BANG!. A rap-rock song of call and response between four voices (Barman, Carlens, Klaas Janzoons and Ward) with various mood changes that would surprise any first listener. Other great tracks are featured on the record like Gimme The Heat, Disappointed In The Sun and Guilty Pleasures, among others.
The first song of the record was recorded through a telephone as Tom Barman described on an interview to Baby Talk Fanzine in December 1966, which describes the sort of chaotic way of doing things, characteristic of the band:
“Yeah, it’s not on the advance-tape. We recorded it through a telephone, through a radio. We were nominated for a prize in Belgium. But we couldn’t come so they phoned us and told us we were the winner and we played this song through the radio through phone from France to Belgium. And someone recorded it. And that is the first song on the album.“
Although Stef Kamil Carlens recorded the entire bass tracks on the album and despite being featured as an official member of the band on the booklet that acompanied the record, Carlens decided to quit to have full time for his project Moondog Jr (known as A Beatband), that later would evolve to the still active Zita Swoon. Aparently dEUS were too loud for Carlens, but on the documentary Time Is The State Of My Jeans, he states that he missed home while going for long tours with dEUS. On the fansite hotellounge.com is said that apparently there was also a problem between Carlens’ girfriend and someone on the dEUS staff. However it was never confirmed by anyone officially related to dEUS. Stef Kamil Carlens last show with dEUS was on August 24th 1996.
At hands with another departure Tom Barman called another bandmate from tENERIFE. Danny “Cool Rocket” Mommens.
Following In A Bar Under The Sea came a world tour comprising over 160 shows throughout four continents. On February 1997 dEUS served as supporting act for Placebo and on March they performed for the first time in the United States on the festival SXSW (South By Southwest) in Austin, Texas. The critics were heavily impressed with the band and dEUS earned a couple of great reviews on Rolling Stone and Spin. Still in the United States dEUS performed as opening act for Blur in some shows and also for the Boston trio Morphine.
Towards the end of 1997 Tom Barman and Craig Ward performed a set of acoustic concerts that would wrap up the tour.
dEUS earned a title for Cultural Ambassador 1998, this title was promoted by the Flemish Government to promote Flanders and its culture abroad.
1998 was a creating year for dEUS who spent most of the year writing in Ronda, Spain, performing few shows where they would rehearse the new songs for the next record.
The recording sessions, that took place at the En Frente Arte studio, that belonged to Filip Eyckmans of Musickness, are told to be very dark and with a cold and depressive environment between the members of the band. On March 1999, Craig Ward stated:
“If you were on the studio while we were recording the album you would notice how angry we were and the atmosphere wasn’t friendly (…) That’s why we work in a very strange way. We don’t even talk to each other. When our drummer went to the studio to hear some stuff, two days after the recording sessions he didn’t recognize the songs “Oh! This is like that now???” Communication is a hard thing when it’s concerned with dEUS”
Craig also acknowledged that he and Tom Barman had very precise Ideas of how things should sound, but in opposite ways which would probably cause a clash between them, a clash that would become more notable as time advanced.
Tom Barman, on the other side, said that the year of 1998 was a bad year, and the recording sessions for the album were frustrating because everything was going wrong. David Bottrill was called and dEUS finished the album The Ideal Crash.
On 22nd February 1999 Instant Street was released as the first single. A song with a beginning that emanated an childish like feeling with its soft and sweet chord progression, that later would turn out in an uproar full of colour and power to end the song in great style.
As much as Instant Street was a catchy tune it was also six minutes long, which led to a radio edit where the song was cut short, like in the videoclip, losing some of its magic. Radio stations at the time, like nowadays, were not willing to pass long tracks, so Instant Street was in disadvantage.
The videoclip for this song was shot at café D’Anvers in Atwerp, after the band had issued an invitation to everyone who wanted to show up. It was inspired by an incident that happened three years before where Craig Ward and Tom Barman were mistakenly arrested by drug dealing in the same Café. In one of the scenes, policemen can be seen one of them being portrayed by special guest Rudy Trouvé. After that the video consists in a group of people, dEUS member and dancers, dancing along the streets.
The Ideal Crash was released on 15th March 1999, and was a very gloomy dark record, although with a very consistent atmosphere, a thing t that the first two albums strongly lacked. Featuring paranoid tracks like Put The Freaks Up Front, Let’s See Who Goes Down First and Everybody’s Weird at the same time with tracks full of feelings and moods like Magic Hour, Magdalena, Instant Street and Ideal Crash.
The reviews found the record to be the darkest of all until then with a very gloomy side which left behind the inconsistent madness and chaos that characterized dEUS on the previous records. This was the first record without any contribution from founding member Stef Kamil Carlens and ex-dEUS guitarist Rudy Trouvé.
At this time, and according to some interviews dEUS had grown frustrated with lack of record sales and the lack of support by the record company. They wanted to play in bigger rooms in England and France but nothing happened and dEUS kept playing for audiences ranging from three hundred to three thousand on average.
On 31st May 1999 Sister Dew was issued as the second single of the album. A song with a very sad feeling about a man that kills his girlfriend and goes through three stages: the good, the justifying and the evil. The videoclip was shot in Stockholm by director Adam Bergh, contrary to the normal, which consists in Tom Barman directing the videos. Despite Tom not liking that much the video he also states that he had no time to shoot it.
The last single out of the record was The Ideal Crash on October 1999. Another heavy feeling track that consisted in a major carousel of instruments, with several guitar, drums and synthesizer layers. This was a bit of a hit on alternative radio stations even before its release as a single. Despite being a great track it revealed itself too complicated to be played live and dEUS only tried it twice during pre-tour shows in 1999. On 2011 at Lowlands dEUS exceptionally played that track, however it’s still to be seen if it will get back on the setlist of live shows.
The tour that followed the album comprised over 120 shows throughout all Europe, shows in Israel and one show in the United States. The performances would often include dancers on stage and also some circus elements. Tim Vanhamel joined dEUS on the tour playing guitar and synthesizers. His previous work consisted on being a member of the “deceased” mad band Evil Superstars, who had been dismissed by their leader, Mauro Pawlowski, in 1998.
At the end of the tour everyone went their separate ways and no one could foresee what would be next for dEUS. By the end of the millenium dEUS consolidated themselves as one of the most influent alternative bands in Europe, despite the low number of record sales. The band was followed by a resilient group of fans going to their shows everywhere in Europe and that became the main point of satisfaction for the band, instead of sales numbers.
On May 2000 Tom Barman said on in an interview that he was preparing to shoot a movie in September, and also said that he had a meeting with the other dEUS members and that there would be a new album to start next year. Despite this report from Tom Barman one year later on other interview he referred to his movie as a motive for dEUS lack of news. Vive La Fête, the other band of Danny Mommens, and Millionaire, the band of Tim Vanhamel had released records, and on the same interview Tom also says that dEUS were planning to release a boxset full of old material that wasn’t released yet.
The boxset Tom Barman announced eventually became their greatest hits No More Loud Music, released on November 2001, that featured their singles from the three previous records. Barman stated that the ideia of a greatest hits came from the record company, but dEUS only wanted to release a DVD. They only accepted the making of a greatest hist because not everyone owned a DVD player at the time. dEUS also demanded that the album had a new song, that would also be released separately, so people that had the first three records, could buy only the new song. Nothing Really Ends was recorded for the effect and became a classic hit from the band.
On the 25th March 2002 dEUS released their DVD entitled No More Video. The DVD had a videoclip from each dEUS single, together with the two Electronic Press Kits (EPK), The Making Of Ideal Crash and the Making Of Nothing Really Ends. The DVD also brought dEUS archives with commented photos, quicktime movies from backstage and a collection of songs, mainly b-sides and unreleased tracks.
On November 2003 Tom Barman and Guy Van Neuten released a record with songs played in several venues in Europe. Amsterdam, Antwerp, Porto, Dublin, London and Roterdam were the cities with songs featured on the album. It featured some dEUS songs played only on the guitar and piano, as was all of the concert.
2003 saw the departure of Julles de Borgher for unknown reasons (rumours at the time pointed that Julles had been fired by the band, because he was not reliable and often missed rehearsals. Although no official information was given), and Stephane Misseghers, ex-Soulwax, replaced him on the drums.
Tom Barman’s movie only came out in 2003 “Any Way The Wind Blows” represented the debut of Tom Barman as long feature director, a city comedy film that despite the lack of a consistent plot, has a 7/10 rank on IMDB. The movie already featured songs from a record from Tom Barman with CJ Bolland that would be released on 29th March 2004, Magnus – The Body Gave You Everything was a dance music project.
Magnus went on releasing French Movies, Summer’s Here, Hunter Collector and Jumpneedle from their debut album. The videoclip of Jumpneedle won the award for Best Videoclip at the Internationaal Kortfilmfestival Leuven.
2004 was to be the year when dEUS would come back to life. The band gathered to start the record and some tracks were recorded. However and claiming that he wanted to spend more time with his family, Craig Ward left right in the middle of the record sessions. Despite the official report it’s hard to not think that there was a clash inside the band, as Danny Mommens also followed leaving the band, claiming that he wanted to focus on Vive La Fête. With only Klaas left and new member Stephane Misseghers, Tom Barman recruited Alan Gevaert and Belgian rock legend Mauro Pawlowski to finish the record.
Pocket Revolution became the fourth original record from dEUS. A very dark record with a somewhat sad feeling. Tom, in later interviews stated that it was a very difficult album to make and that mainly he wrote songs about one isolating from the others to be busy only by himself. This probably had to do with the departures of Julles de Borgher, Craig Ward and Danny Mommens. This record had no producer, as it was produced by dEUS which can be noted in some rather messy songs as Sun Ra where the mix is not the best. It had no producer because at first Craig Ward was to produce the record, and since he left dEUS made the rest.
The first single for the record was the song If You Don’t Get What You Want, that was available for download on dEUS website on August 2004. Universal disapproved this move because dEUS published it only on their online store on their own site. The server crashed almost immediatelybecause of impatient fans that rushed to get the song. Buying it you would also get a couple of pdf files to print and cut so you would have a proper jewel case or sleeve edition. The covers were made by the band.
The album version featured some differences as well as some aditional guitars by Tim Vanhamel. The song is a high tempo progression, starting not very noisy but ending in an uproar of sound that turned this song into a staple and a high moment on live shows.
7 Days 7 Weeks was the second release from the record. A calm soulful song about Tom Barman’s sister, who was going through a tough time. Tom considered very hard to write about someone who is so close to him. This single was released on 22nd August 2005 and came with two b-sides, Wheels and Meeting You, as well as couple of tracks from the record.
The last single was What We Talk About (When We Talk About Love) released March 2006. A rather strange track with some parlando and distorted voices. This release had the original version, an acoustic radio session of the song and a remix. There was also a track called Sentimientos, Quando Hablamos de Amor, which was an identical song but with Tom singing in Spanish.
Other notable tracks of the record were Pocket Revoution, Nightshopping, Cold Sun Of Circumstance, Sun Ra and Bad Timing. This album also featured a re-edition of Nothing Really Ends that was re-recorded and had a different mix, but very identical to the original. This album also featured the first reunion of dEUS with Stef Kamil Carlens as he did some vocals on Pocket Revolution and Sun Ra.
The tour comprised over 150 shows, that served for the new line up to tighten up. However, in 2008, in an interview Tom stated that during the tour he decided to finish dEUS on the end of the tour because he wasn’t getting any fun or joy doing it. He also said that he changed is mind after a show in Paris that went extremelly well and was very fun.
The Pocket Revolution tour ended perhaps on the highest point with the 0110 concert. Organised by Tom Barman, Arno Hintjens and Frederike Sioen this concert was to promote tolerance and represented a fight against racism and social discrimination.
However, being the show one week before the municipal elections in Belgium, Vlaams Belang, the extreme-right nationalist party took it as a campaign against the party and started a wave of intimidation upon those who were organising and participating on the show, sending open letters to artists asking them to not participate, instigating people to make a mail bombardment towards the participants. Tom Barman received hate mail and was threatened while walking on the street.
The shows happened all the same in Antwerp, Brussels, Ghent and Charleroi, totalising over 100,000 people that attended to the shows that gathered dozens of bands in support of the show.
During the Pocket Revolution tour Tom Barman stated several times that they were working on a live album. Despite those statements no live album was issued.
dEUS began working on their new record in 2007 using for the effect their own studio for the first time. It was build on some building owned by Klaas Janzoons and was called Vantage Point, name that would also be the next album title.
Dave McCracken was the producer of the record and this was the first record totally written and recorded by the new line up. It was recorded in three months and, according to Tom Barman most of the songs were written by him but some of the songs also resulted from jam sessions within the whole band.
The record, released on 18th April 2008 became a much lighter record than any of the previous dEUS albums, and definitely lighter than Pocket Revolution, because the record sessions were much easier and relaxed than the Pocket Revolution ones.
The album featured a couple of special guests such as Lies Lorquet, from Mintzkov on Eternal Woman, Guy Garvey from British rock band Elbow, on Vanishing Of Maria Schneider and Karin Dreijer Anderson from The Knife who sang on Slow, the first single outside of Belgium. A heavy weird song with pronunciated guitar chords and strange atmosphere added to some gregorian chants that, for the first time, featured the whole band singing at the same time. The video of the song featured scenes on dEUS studio and a dancing performance.
The single released for Belgium was the rock-disco song Architect, with samples from Buckminster Fuller quotes in the begining of the song and in the middle, because the song was inspired by the futurist inventor. It also had Mauro singing lead vocals for the first time on a dEUS song. The video was a simple one featuring the band performing the song, however it was recorded with photocameras, one shot 8 pics for second and the other 10, which gave a totally different and original visual style to the video.
Rock hit Favorite Game was the next single of the record, on 14th July 2008. This song was, simply put, about sex with your ex and some reports state that the song had much more graphic lyrics and was called re-fuck, but it was toned down to suit the public and got a new name. A straight forward rock song with a high power ending.
On 25th August 2008 Eternal Woman became the fourth single. A playful charming song with Lies Lorquet voice on the chorus. The videoclip was directed by Tom Barman and was awarded as the Best Videoclip at the Internationaal Kortfilmfestival Leuven. In fact the video is a very well produced video, shot at the old control room of Flemish radio, with Italian actress Martina Stella playing the Eternal Woman role as the band plays the song. The song then is transferred by morse code to the control room that would broadcast the song later on.
Two more singles were extracted from the record. Smokers Reflect, a song about the thoughts over the time of smoking a cigarette, something very familiar to Tom Barman who seems to be a compulsive smoker, and Vanishing Of Maria Schneider, with Guy Garvey singing on a song that epitomizes Maria Schneider as the eternal youth. Maria Schneider was an actress better known for her role on the movie Last Tango In Paris where she co-starred with Marlon Brando. Maria Schneider passed away on February 3rd 2011.
The tour was a rather short one compared to the previous ones with over 80 shows. This tour showed a much tight band live, with the setlist featuring some old beauties that had been out for some time such as Magdalena, Morticiachair, Gimme the Heat, Little Arithmetics, Let’s See Who Goes Down First and Everybody’s Weird, among others. This made this tour probably the most well balanced between new songs and old songs.
At the end of the tour Tom Barman stated that they would release a new album in 2009, but, like many other things Tom Barman said before, it was not quite like that. Mauro Pawlowski was featured in a show with Contemporary Dance Group ULTIMA VEZ, writing and playing live the soundtrack for the show NieuwZwart, delaying the recording until 2010, because despite of the band gathering together to rehearse, there was no time left to record and even if the album was ready they could only start the tour in late 2010. dEUS played just four summer shows in 2009 on Belgium and Netherlands. Tom Barman performed several times as a DJ in that year.
2009 saw a Special Edition of the first LP from dEUS. Worst Case Scenario was released in a Deluxe Edition celebrating the fifteen years of its release. This release brought the cd remastered with all the fourteen original songs, plus an extra cd full of rare b-sides and live performances. The other extra was a DVD with a documentary called Time Is The State Of My Jeans where the original members of the band, people involved with dEUS at the time and some guests talked about the beginings of the band and the Making Of Worst Case Scenario.
In the summer of 2010 the band performed some shows, mainly at summer festivals. On the first show of that mini tour in Porto, Tom said the new record would be out on February 2011. dEUS signed a contract with a new label. Play It Again Sam (PIAS) became the new label for dEUS after the end of the international contract with Island Records. However the new record would still be published by Island on Belgium, due to contract issues.
On 2011 the new record was finally done. David Botrill was called to produce the record again, after working with dEUS on The Ideal Crash. The release date for the record was for April but in that month PIAS anounced that they wouldn’t have everything ready in time for the release so it was postponed for September 2011. Despite the postponing of the record dEUS toured anyway starting in May 2011 with shows on Turkey.
Keep You Close was released on 19th September 2011 with the first single being Constant Now, a groovy song with a chorus sang by the bass player Alan Gevaert which was a totally new thing on dEUS. The videoclip featured dEUS members dressed as entomologists relating to the cover of the album, where two entomologists are shown photographing an insect.
For France the single was the title track Keep You Close, an ode-like song featuring some notable string arrangements.
Special guest Greg Dulli sang on two tracks of the album. Back vocals on Dark Sets In and lead vocals at the end of Twice (We Survive).
And here stand dEUS. A band made famous by their impetuous inconsistence that led them through downs but mainly made them a genius band on their ups.
dEUS became one of the main names on the European music scene and left their chaotic approach behind in favor of a more consistent and oriented creation. The band imploded and started again twice and never stopped being original. There are no plans ahead of Keep You Close, but we will certainly be surprised, as dEUS always manage to.
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Special thanks to Bart Van Belle for the loads of info on the forum, Pocket Revolution Blog and Hotellounge.be and to Jyves for having such a well organized In the press section. Thanks to instantdREAM for making the correction. And thanks to Fume7DuBelge, Lucie and Bart Van Belle for volunteering to read beforehand to check the facts. Thank you very much.