Late Night Venture – 31-05-2008

Interview with: Søren Hartvig
By: Sabine van Gameren

Late Night Venture is on their European tour. As the weather was very nice, me and the singer of the band, Søren Hartvig, went outside to do this interview.

How was your tour so far?
Søren: “Well, It has been very nice! We have played five jobs so far. Tonight is the sixth. Usually we have a crisis right now, because we are tired, but it has been very well. Many people saw the shows and we sold a lot of cd’s. The best part so far was that we got so good feedback from the audience. We have been talking to a lot of people.
Yesterday we played on the radio, Amsterdam FM. It was very nice to try that, it was acoustic and we are not an acoustic band at all. It was good to try that!
All around we met nice arrangers, nice places. The only downside is the heat, because we are traveling in an old bus with no air conditioning.”

So, did your tour bus make it this time? I have read you had a lot of bad luck with your tour bus before.
Søren: “Oh yeah, it’s every time. We have some sort of trouble with the bus, this time it is the air conditioning, which is more an old school air conditioning.”

Explain us a little bit from your background, what kind of band is Late Night Venture?
Søren: “In the most general term, we are an indie band. But we have so many other backgrounds. We have been playing much different music. I personally like a lot of the post-hardcore stuff. Post-rock, electronic. Also when we go in the bus, we listen to Sepultura. That means that we have a different background than most indie rock bands.We are adventurous. We like to make small journeys with a pop twist.”

Did you know each other already when founding the band?
Søren: “No we didn’t. Me and the drummer, Peter, played together for many years in different bands. We use to play in a punk band, then Peter played with another guitarist and we started to make music again. After 1 or 2 years Jens (bass) and Jonas (keys) joined and finally the guitarist for some years ago.”

I read you have been working with Magnus Lindberg(Cult of Luna), How did you met him and how did you like the cooperation so far?
Søren: “First of all, we are Cult of Luna fans, so I really like their stuff. We were touring with a Swedish band called Jeniferever, and the have a really good organic sound on the album. We talked with them and they said it was Magnus from Cult of Luna that produced it. When we were going to recordings we pretty much just called him and when he listened to the stuff he said: ‘yeah it’s great’. He wanted to do it. We talked about doing it in Sweden in his studio way up in the north of Sweden, but we didn’t want to drive that far, so we had him flew in and produced it in Denmark in a very cool studio.
Magnus is just a very cool guy. He is very down to earth and he has great ideas. It was a great time working with him. He lived at my place, we had some beer and had some fun and we will use him again. We already talked about continuing our cooperation.

For the next album?
Søren: “Yeah, it will definitely be Magnus. We really love his sound and we like to work with him.”

So you are now working on a new album?
Søren: “Yeah, well we are not currently working on it, because we are touring, but have been rehearsing and we have a lot of new stuff. It is also the stuff that we play on the tour now. Those are the things that gonna end up on the album.”

Will it be a total different album than 2006 Late Night Venture album?
Søren: “The 2006 album was produced by Jorgen Jørgensen, he is also a very nice guy. We choose him at that time, because he had this garage approach. We are an indie band and we wanted some more punch in it and that is what he does. He comes in and makes the sound more compressed and keeps yelling out: make the song shorter and go for the radio. He was absolutely right, because we had many songs played in Danish radio. It was more based around short, pop-ish songs, of course still the noise twist and the journeys that we like.
Now, I think we went more for the longer journeys. Thinks we might have got from Cult of Luna. Not that we sound like Cult of Luna at all, but the ideas that you have to sit back and listen and not go for some radio hit. That is pretty much the main difference.”

Do you already have any idea when exactly we can expect it?
Søren: “We hope to be recording it around November.”

Are you think of making music video for a song on the album as if the album is going to have a different approach, I saw you made one of Pay The Moon (from the last album)?
Søren: “Yeah, we will do that. We will do it when it is finished, but we don’t know yet what to do with the album. It is so different what you can do with it nowadays. Probably a lot of digital things. And then a video to support it.”

Do you see music video’s as an extension of the song? Do you feel like people get more connected with the music while watching the video instead of listening to the song on cd or live?
Søren: “Not exactly, it is just a way to promote ourselves. Of course it has to be nice and look good for the kind of music we make, but it is not a direct extension. I think we would do more in making live video’s, putting them on youtube, because that is what interesting to the listeners of our music. To be able to watch us playing live”.

What influence had making a video of Pay The Moon had on the fame of the band.
Søren: “Not that much, I think people liked it and it’s ok, but I don’t think it had too much influence, because listeners of our music just put the record on and listen to that.”

Is there anything specific you would like to tell the world via your music?
Søren: “Our message is non-political. It is not like we don’t have political ideals, but we just like to play abstract and let to people their selves what they get out of it. I would describe it best when you go to a museum watching abstract paintings. Everyone get their own interpretation out of it. That is the best thing of it. Of course, I have my ideas of what a song is about, I write the lyrics, but I never write such explicit lyrics that there is a straight message. You can interpretate it yourself. That is also what many people have said to us. A song meant something specific to them”

So where do you get your inspiration from?
Søren: “I am a huge The Cure fan. A bit comes from that. Also, some comes from imagination. Just thought works, I am trying to get ideas from small stories. We have a lot of influences musically, but lyrically I think it is more the poetic stuff.”

Do you feel like the music is very personal to you?
Søren: “Yeah, some lyrics can be personal, but then again, it is abstract. It is not like you can connect it with a real life story. It can be much like an idea I had, or just a dream.“

If you think of your future, is there any point you want to work to, what would you like to achieve with the band?
Søren: “Well it is just about getting the basic knowledge of the people here in Europe. Of course it would be nice to go world wide, but first Europe. First found a base amount of people that want to listen to this music, support it and have it on their cd player. That is the primary thing; we will never going to be like those big Coldplay-like bands. Sometimes it is even the best to play in small clubs, get the intensity and be close to people. It is also nice to play at the big venues, we do that as well but personally I prefer the small clubs.
It is also the point: we are just friends, having fun together with playing the music that we love.”

Will there ever be a point in your life where you say: I have all I wanted with the band?
Søren: “Everytime we release an album! Or some music that can be digital. Then it is a sign for ourselves to be satisfied with what we have achieved, but also when we played a good show.”

Any last message to the readers of Tempelores Magazine?
Søren: “The most important message is to go out and listen to some live music. It is so much different from what you can experience at home in your couch. Don’t be afraid to go out and watch some unknown bands, because there are so many good ones. I personally find a lot of good bands just by surfing the net and see them.
Pretty small bands, but I don’t care!”

Links:
Late Night Venture MySpace
Late Night Venture Official