Dool: "There's no set way of being a human being. Everybody's changing all the time"

Although Dool have enjoyed recognition in their native Netherlands for several years with their first two records, "Here Now, There Then" and "Summerland", their big break outside their borders happened with this year's excellent record "The Shape Of Fluidity". In addition to the fact that here at Rocking.gr loved the album from the first moment but also had the pleasure of enjoying the band in its live presentation on the day of his release as part of Roadburn Festival, the opportunity to host Dool in our country was soon found. On November 22nd at An Club we will have the honor of seeing a special band in their peak.

So on the occasion of this appearance, we had the pleasure of chatting with the main member of the band, Raven Van Dorst, one afternoon when he was traveling from The Netherlands to Belgium. The iconic frontperson of Dool who has fully embraced their intersex identity and imbues a lot of their personal experience into the lyrics and story of the new Dool album, spoke with us about the rise of the band, the new album, the situation in music during and after the pandemic, their favorite music, their personal battles, how they found their family in Dool and of course, the concert in Athens. A personality with a lot to say unfolded with an excess of enthusiasm and appreciation in the memorable afternoon conversation you will find below.

I'm pretty excited because we're here with Raven from Dool and it's going to be your first time over here in Athens in a few days. Are you excited Raven?

Yeah, I really I'm very excited. First of all, because I've never actually been in Greece before. And what better reason to go there than to play a show with the band, I mean it's a win, win situation.

We're good on a on album, but we're better on a stage

I'm really glad to hear about it. You have a big tour coming. Are there any other places that you're going for the first time?

Let's see. Well, yeah, there's some venues, but not especially new countries or anything. But yeah, next week we're getting into the van and doing like a big three and a half week European tour together with Hangman's Chair. It's going to be co-headline and we're really excited about that because it's been so long since we had a proper club tour. I think it was even before the whole COVID stuff. So it's been a while and you know, we are a live band. We're good on a on album, but we're better on a stage, I personally believe so. For us not being able to work for such a long time has been very awful. So now finally, everybody is like waiting for four years.

Well, I'm actually really excited to hear that, but I was lucky enough to see you this year in Roadburn festival, which was pretty huge show for me and I wish it was also for you. How was that experience and I mean Rd. Rd. but it's a big thing. And also in your own home country. So how did it feel?

Well Roadburn, I think for everyone in the band is one of our very favorite festivals. We've been coming there for years, either to perform or see friends of us play or discover new bands. It's such a great festival and they keep evolving. For us. For Dool, I think our first show, our first proper show where people from outside the Netherlands saw us, was at Roeburn back in 2016 and it opened up a lot of new doors for us internationally back then, it got us an International Booker. It got us the attention from a lot of labels and before that, we didn't quite know lwhat are we gonna do with the band. Was it going to be like a part-time band or a band for fun. But after that show a lot of possibilities opened up, and then we decided, ok, well, people like it. Let's go for it. It kind of kickstarted our international career, so to say, coming back there with the last album release this year, it was kind of full circle because back then, we played in a small stage in Cul De Sac, which is a showcase kind of bar, maybe of one hundred – one hundred and fifty people capacity. And now suddenly with the new album we got the mainstage at 7:00 in the evening, a very good spot. And it was as nerve wracking as it was exciting to be honest.

Playing with The Nest with no audience was one of the weirdest performances I ever did

You gave it your best, it was pretty amazing and I'm looking forward to seeing you again. But I want to go to the new album, but before that I also want to ask you about your experience with The Nest, which was a commission project of Roadburn a couple of years ago where you had also participated in the vocals for this project. How was that experience for you?

Since we were confined to our homes for a very long time and there's nothing I love better than to perform on stage, this is, I think, my sole purpose in life and to be asked for to do a show in the middle of this whole pandemic thing was like a gift from the heavens and I was very excited to join in on that project and do this show. And Wolvennest and us go back quite a long time now and the whole project also with Alan and Tommy from Saturnalia Temple and all these other people. It was special and it was kind of like seeing your family again after a long abstinence and I really enjoyed it. I got to sing a very powerful song and it was amazing. Insane energy on stage and you could actually almost touch the tension or something, there was something special. Even though there was no one in the big venue of 013 in Tilburg, which is one of our biggest music venues, it's also where Roadburn is held, of course. It was so weird. And you give it your all and it was one of the weirdest performances I ever did. It turned out really nice and that they captured it on video.

Speaking about powerful songs and the post-pandemic experience, we mentioned before your new album, "The Shape Of Fluidity" where you somehow managed to make something more powerful than Summerland. I don't know how, but you did. And I want to ask a few things first. Well, how much of that quarantine experience went into deciding to make an album with such a deep connection to yourself and your identity. Because I believe it took a lot of you to make an album and music like this.

Yes and no. Of course it's related to the whole pandemic thing because I think me, the same as lots of other people being confined to your house for two years almost in solitude, you kind of get trapped in in your head for two years. You have to face all of your demons and deal with a lot of issues that were still unresolved. I mean, plenty of people had this kind of experience during COVID, you had no escape. It was just you and maybe one other person. This is something that I was still dealing, my birth, me being intersex and not being able to talk about it. The taboo that was there andnI don't know how do you say this. I thought a lot about it and I felt I had to do something with it because I felt that I was living a lie, that I was forced into at my birth. I mean, you kind of know the story, right?

Because I don't want to be deleted by bureaucracy and by society, as if I have never existed in my true form

Yes but I'd love if you share it in your own words!

So, I was born in intersex, both male and female organs inside and out, and the doctors decided that I should be a girl. And then my parents should never talk about it. That's in short the whole story. Then I found out later, and I'm trying to put the pieces of that puzzle back together all my life. This was just another step during COVID that there was still some stuff mixed inside me. Things like why do I still have a female name? Why do I still have female gender in my passport? Why do I have female pronouns? Why am I using this? Because the doctor said at my birth, that I should do, and that didn't feel right. And this is something that I said during covid, OK, no more of this. I'm going to choose another name. I'm going to change my passport, change my birth certificate to what is the truth, because I don't want to be deleted by bureaucracy and by society, as if I have never existed in my true form. So that's basically what I went through during COVID and the results of that, just flew, drifted into the lyrics of the new album unconsciously, because we never ever said, hey, we're gonna make an album and it's going to be about. But it just happened kind of.

Well, we the last two albums I wrote by myself, "Summerland" and "Here Now, There Then". But on this album also the guitarists Nick and Omar, they wrote a lot. They had a big part in it. When they started to contact me like, hey, let's make some songs. I have some ideas. I could just pour out my heart over their ideas without thinking too much about it. It was a whole different way of approaching songwriting and approaching writing lyrics. So I guess in this way stuff came out a little more intuitively because I had the space to do so, because Nick and Omar kind of did a lot of musical work as well.

There's no set way of being a human being. Everybody's changing all the time and that's OK you don't have to know everything about yourself or know everything about the world

Yeah, I see that. If I may ask, because I know that unfortunately in our communities, sometimes people were more unaccepting of different gender or sexual identities and sometimes they were pretty critical about it even. Do you feel more, more embraced now by the community? Because it seems to me that you find the place inside Dool to be able to do that and express yourself. Do you feel supported by the scene now?

Well, I don't want to be embraced by people who don't understand me, or who have something against me. So for all I care, fuck those people. I hope they rot in their own misery and I don't care about that. The most important thing for me is that. my friends and my family and my bands, which is basically the same, that they understand and I can be myself around them and the rest of the world. I never care too much about those opinions, to be honest. But on the other hand, it is a comfort for other people, It's very hard to express themselves on certain subjects and certain matters. So in that way I feel that we want to send out a message for them . It's OK, you're not alone, you know. And this is kind of what the whole album encapsulates, with the artwork and with the with the title like hey, you can be whoever you want to be. There's no set way of being a human being. Everybody's changing all the time and that's OK you don't have to know everything about yourself or know everything about the world. You can experiment. You wake up one day and decide you want to be someone else. It's all good. It's all fine. So don't be so black and white. Or so binary. There are many ways of being alive, basically.

I think an album or a song become becomes stronger as soon as you can twist it around a little bit in your head to make it fit your situation

So "The Shape Of Fluidity" is like an album that from what I understand is more about having people to relate to it rather than inform people who don't understand about your own experience, or anybody else that has been in the same or similar position to you.

Yeah, well, I think it's always important that that the listener can relate to your subject one way or another. I mean, I pour a lot of myself into the lyrics of this album. But you know the other four people in the band, they also have their own way of relating to this album. So there's only maybe one song that's very explicit about my situation about gender. That's "Hermagorgon". But I mainly like to leave a little bit of fantasy and a bit of interpretation open to the listener, because I think an album or a song become becomes stronger as soon as you can twist it around a little bit in your head to make it fit your situation.

I can understand in general through the music and the lyrics that I can manage to understand through "The Shape Of Fluidity", that it's generally about the process of finding yourself inside constant change whatever that self is and I think you tried very hard and it goes through that many people can relate to this. Basically what you were talking about before. There's this opening with "Venus In Flames", which also translates into the video for that song because you've had a video clip about it. It's very symbolic to me because I understand also through Greek mythology about how Venus is like the very textbook symbol of femininity that sometimes the genders in the two sides and the two binaries that you were talking before fight inside yourself and you don't have to find your spot in the spectrum and just stay there. It's a constant fight of how you feel and how you express yourself. And it's something very powerful.

Yes. And also within that fight you can find some peace, you know, like, I don't have to pick a side. I don't have to be one or the other, but you can be one the one day or be another the next day. Or you can be something which embraces both and it's not only about gender, it's about a lot of uh subjects and topics.

That we usually see as binary, yeah.

Yeah, definitely.

There is a lot of drama inside "The Shape Of Fluidity"

So on the music side of things, on "The Shape Of Fluidity", you kind of went all forward, I think it has a little bit more of a darker atmosphere than your previous records, but also very - I don't want to say angry, but it shows this need when you are drowning with thoughts and feelings and you want to express them so much that it goes through like anger but it's not anger. It's like: "I need to say those things". I need to get them out of me so. Maybe help both myself and other people.

Yeah, there's a lot of drama in in this album. It's also very profound. It's very heavy. It's bombastic, you know, and it's not only me.

Like in the chorus of "Evil In You".

Yes, exactly! We believe there's more punk. That's kind of angry in a way. But it's what you hear is the sound of five people not being able to do what they want to do for a couple of years, it's a lot of tension. Maybe there is anger, but there's also a lot of sadness. It's a very profound emotional and musical background for this album. And I think everybody feels it this way. That's what makes it so powerful, I think.

The new album is only the beginning for us because everyone is very inspired by what's going on musically in the band and very eager to continue

And may I ask about some of your musical influence that got into this heavier songwriting for "The Shape of Fluidity"?

Like Nick, for instance, he listens a lot more new-wavy stuff. He wrote the hook for "Evil In You", for instance. You can really hear he's been listening a lot to like new wave and this kind of stuff as well The Cure. He's really into these sounds and if you listen to the album, you can hear it every now and then in the guitar parts coming through as where Omar, this is Omar's first album with us basically. They come from a black metal background, but he's also really into folk. So it there's new light shining upon Dool with that and you can hear that coming through as well. So there's like loads of new influences into what was already Dool. I think it's an interesting evolution at this point, especially also since we have a new drummer, Vincent, who is a very different animal than Micha used to be. Micha is very, you know, slow and determined drummer and Vincent is more playful and he's more experimental and you can hear that. He's more fluid, more definite and not just in his drumming. You can hear that the music is dancing a little bit more. I think all this together has created kind of a new sound for us and this is only the beginning because everyone is very inspired by what's going on musically in the band and very eager to continue.

Dool helped me to wonder who am I and what do I want and how can I deal with the things around me, instead of only trying to change everything around me

This brings me to wonder, how do you relate now with your previous musical projects? For example other bands that you were in the past. How does it relate to you now that you have been in a road of being more comfortable with yourself? Was it the same for you back then writing music for other projects?

That's a very good question actually because before I started Dool, I was mainly really fucking angry with the world and I come from a punk background and I always was very activist and idealistic. I was political, I used to be in a lot of feminist scenes and bands and projects. But in the end I got a bit tired of just being angry all the time and then I found the the band that is now Doll and we started playing together and that also changed my way of writing music and writing lyrics because it was not about being angry to the outside world, but it was more introspective, like who am I and what do I want and how can I deal with the things around me, instead of only trying to change everything around me. That's basically when Dool started out. So it's a more introspective way of writing.

I'm more and more letting go of the idea that I only have to be strong and have to wear like a harness or an armor

That's pretty interesting. So it kind of feels like finding your home, the correct spot in your life that you feel more comfortable with yourself.

Definitely. Plus also the band, everyone in the band is my best friend. First of all, we're friends. And second of all we are a band. I think I'm also more and more letting go of the idea that I only have to be strong and have to wear like a harness or an armor. I can just be vulnerable as well within the music and within the band. And that's a very interesting process for someone who has been angry and screaming all of their lives.

So you have to stay angry all the time and you have to stay on guard and not being patronized all the time

It's sometimes this need that people with feminine presenting characteristics in these hard sounds like metal and punk have, the need to present themselves as more brutal and harder in order for them to be respected. Sometimes I feel that way, I don't know how it is about you.

Yeah, definitely. You need to be tough all the time and otherwise, you're just being run over. I had that when I was when I was younger and I was in one of my first punk bands and I already have been touring a lot with other projects. and then I came into a venue. Many times, you come into a venue and the sound tech says, hey, let me do the settings on your amplifier – nope, screw you, don't touch my fucking guitar. So you have to stay angry all the time and you have to stay on guard and not being patronized all the time. So that used to piss me off a lot. But now I couldn't care less. Because I'm going to do it my way anyway.

I can see where you're coming from pretty much. Do you have in mind, any newer bands that have formed in the latest years that you believe have mixed pretty great music with let's say, being vocal and pretty strong about it, some new bands that you think are important for the people to know and hear.

Ohh wow, let me think. Well, maybe not really in the metal genre. A person who I really like is a Fever Ray. I don't know if you're familiar.

Yeah!

OK, yeah, this is a very interesting project that I can't get enough from and I saw them live for the first time a couple months ago on their tour. And they have such a creative way of dealing with music and with image and the performance and everything, this is something that inspires me a lot. It's almost like, David Bowie used to do in a way, you know, like really hurting yourself every time, reinventing your image, creating a mystery around yourself, and also be vocal about important issues and make good music at the same time. Well, that is something that does not happen a lot.

Yeah, I mean their whole career starting from The Knife to going to Fever Ray was quite a ride.

Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, yeah. Well, if this is the first thing that comes to mind, basically.

Let's wrap this up with the five albums you have on rotation in the past few weeks!

Woo, ok, let me just quickly check my Spotify here, but I had a really weird party last week, so it can be a bit weird! (laughs). I've been listening a lot to "Flowers Of Evil", the album by Ulver.

And to think that the video clip of "Venus In Flames" was reminding me of the artwork of this album. Something between the knight women in the and Joan of Arc on the artwork of "Flowers Of Evil". It kind of connected in my mind.

I think everyone in the in the band is a big fan of Ulver. So I think we'll take that as a compliment! I've been listening also a lot to the album "Grip" by Serpent With Feet. It's American, queer, black, hip hop dancy electronic kind of stuff. It's great. And it's very radical and beautiful, and it has rhythm, it's totally different. I really have been listening a lot to "Pale Swordsman". The album by Këkht Aräkh the Ukrainian black metal artist. It's like old school black metal, very romantic. And I think it's a one-person project only, just a fresh wind in the black metal genre. I've been listening to a lot to the album "The Great Bail Out" by Moor Mother, which is experimental and radical jazz from from the States, I believe she lives in New York actually, but I don't know this for sure. I don't know too much of the background of the artist but this is also great, very experimental. Lot of spoken words, lots of soundscapes. Finally, I rediscovered "On Dark Horses" album by Emma Ruth Rundle.

Yeah, I saw her on an acoustic live a couple of months ago and I was amazed.

She is so good, she makes the Best songs. She's such a gifted, talented songwriter. I mean, there's nothing huge going on, like it's not rocket science, her songs. But the way they are simple, their simplicity gives it a bit of genius. And I really like it's kind of music.

If you don't mind, we can close this up with something that you want to say to the audience about the upcoming live in Greece or whatever you feel like!

Well, come to fuckin' Athens show! Are you there, by the way?

Yes, I'm going to be there!

OK well you and everyone, please come and give me some of your good raki or what is it called? The drink you have there?

That one and ouzo, they're different but both strong!

That's great! I'll open my mouth and you pour something in. We'll see each other and have a great time!