Back in 2020, Charlotte Wessels began a rigorous release schedule of writing and releasing one song a month as a solo artist. She’s since released two Tales from Six Feet Under releases as a compilation for those who don’t follow her on Patreon. But now we are on the eve of her newest release, The Obsession, which takes a different shape. Instead of a direct lift, she brought back four former Delain members into her band along with Sophia Vernikov to bring these songs into a full-band sound. We chatted with Charlotte about the process, her continued monthly releases through Patreon, mental health, and much more.
Dead Rhetoric: After the monthly Patreon songs and the two Tales from Six Feet Under albums, how do you feel that songwriting approach has benefited when you did The Obsession?
Charlotte Wessels: I have been doing a song a month for a long time now, since May of 2020. I’m still doing it. For this record, I kind of made it part of the process, because I figured if I wanted to work on a traditional album again and if I was ambitious…I had ideas. If then, at the same time, I still wanted to do a song a month on Patreon, it was probably going to be very challenging. So I decided to make that a part of the process. I’m still going to release a song every month; I’m just going to let my Patreons know that. Before, I would consider songs that made it to the Patreon finished…they were done.
That’s also what the Tales records were. I wrote the songs and put them up and that was it. I might have tweaked here and there when I put them on the [Tales] record, but not a whole lot. I just told them [Patreons] that I’m going to keep doing the same thing and post music every month, but contrary to what it was before, this music might still change or become something else, or I might re-arrange it. It’s the first incarnation of the song. It might grow into something else from there. For the Tales records, the Patreon version was where it ended. For The Obsession, it was the end of phase one, which was the writing and introspective part, which I do here in the basement. But then, I took it to the next phase, which was rearranging and rewriting. This was also something I did with the band. Timo [Somers] did a lot of work in taking the guitars and building it into amazing arrangements. We made the songs ready for the band recordings. Vikram Shankar did some amazing key arrangements as well.
Everyone put their stamp on how they recorded the songs when they recorded their parts. I went over all my vocals again. I had recorded them already but I went over them again with Oliver Phillips. I still did a monthly song because it really helps me to keep me going, but for The Obsession I made it a part of the album process, where it was the first version of the song. Now people can see how the songs have changed with that entire process coming after it.
Dead Rhetoric: It might actually be kind of cool that the people following you get that sneak peak and see that initial version of the song and how it changes.
Wessels: Sometimes I also keep forgetting it. I’ve been putting videos out too, and I have always given the Patreons a preview of the video and then it was like, oh cool they are going to see the video but they already know the song since it was a song of the month. In my mind, I’m still in the same place, but I keep forgetting that they haven’t heard the new version of the song. They just know what I put on Patreon back then. They are hearing these songs in this form for the first time. It’s very cool! Now when I give them the song previews, they hear the music and see the videos for the first time, which is a different experience altogether.
Dead Rhetoric: The Tales albums were very diverse and eclectic, breaking away from the more traditional symphonic metal sound. Do you feel more confident in rediscovering your own voice as a solo artist now?
Wessels: Yeah, I’ve been experimenting so much. In the beginning of this Patreon adventure, it was very intentionally not doing symphonic metal since I was still in Delain and I would kind of keep those ideas for new band songs. So in the beginning, I was only doing different things. After the band split, it kind of started mixing back into the material again. But I was still all over the place and enjoying mixing different genres and sounds and ways of making songs. It was interesting to me after working for so long inside a certain framework.
But when I started thinking about doing this album, and I didn’t want it to just be a compilation of what I have done, and I wanted it to be a different kind of project and effort, with a start and a finish. Songs that were written to be on an album together and have a cohesive sound. I really started to think about what I wanted the songs to be, and what songs made me really happy. I was also thinking about the band, because when I wrote the songs here during COVID, on my own, you make different choices musically, because electronic elements will sound really cool when you play them that way. But it might be different when I do guitar parts on my midi keyboard, because that’s how I do them, because they might not sound as cool. But now, we did the shows with the band and I had talked about the album and they wanted to do this project with me. So knowing that the band would be there, I started writing differently and with the band in mind. It was a whole process.
I could still have more confidence, I have space in my confidence meter. But in terms of doing things outside of the genre that are maybe expected of me, I’m confident.
Dead Rhetoric: Looking back at a previous talk with you, there was a feeling of songs ‘not being good enough’ or not finishing them, but the Patreon monthly piece helped with that. Do you feel that you’ve gotten more confidence in your writing ability in the past few years?
Wessels: I guess, but there will be always be part of me that has self-doubt about everything. I’m very happy about this record, and how everything came out. But I can’t, in all honesty, say I’m confident because I’m not really. I’m sorry, it’s a thing [laughs].
Dead Rhetoric: Aww, It’s an honest answer. I think if someone is like, “my stuff is GREAT,” that leads to its own potential problems too. Not even to the point of being cocky, but you are so sure that everything you do will be fantastic, you might not try new things or look things over the way you should.
Wessels: That’s true, that makes me feel better about that.
Dead Rhetoric: So what was it like to gather this group of individuals for the band, particularly in knowing your shared history with Delain for Timo, Otto [Schimmelpenninck van der Oije], and Joey [Marin de Boer]?
Wessels: It was amazing. We always keep our personal connection. I don’t think anything really changed in that. It was just very special and emotional to share the musical synergy that we have again. It’s weird, because you can’t really explain why or how something works in a combination of people when you put them together in a studio. But we did the drum recordings, Joey is a phenomenal drummer of course, but we did that with the entire band there because we wanted ‘that feel’ to it. We wanted it to feel organic.
I think too it’s quite common in this genre to really edit the drums to make them sound really like a machine. It can sound really cool, no shade to that, but we wanted to do something different where it could be very organic, which you can do when your drummer is as good as Joey. When we were all in the studio together, it was just really wonderful. I have no other words for it. We have that personal connection, but now we got to share our musical connection again also. For me, it was an emotional and very good moment.
Dead Rhetoric: I think that for many long-time fans of Delain, myself included, it’s really cool just to see the four of you doing something together again.
Wessels: And Sophia [Vernikov] is doing great! She’s the new one. I feel that we all have that shared history, but she had her own full circle moment of herself with this record as well. We recorded grand piano and Hammond for The Obsession on a number of songs, which she did at Sandlane Recording Facilities, which is fun because Joost van den Broek, who works there, actually recommended me to her. So it was really nice that she got to do her part for the record there.
Dead Rhetoric: I know you didn’t want to do a ‘band’ for a while. Did your choices of people make it feel more comfortable in that scenario?
Wessels: Definitely. I didn’t really consider it any other way, to be honest. I do think that it is a very big part of it for sure.
Dead Rhetoric: I hate to bring this up, so apologies in advance, but knowing the way things go and the way things get written up, are you ready for the inevitable Delain comparisons?
Wessels: No, I don’t think I’m prepared. I have thought about this because there was someone saying this [before]. I don’t have any influence over it, and I also don’t know if I should. I don’t know if I want to weigh in on that, one way or another. If that is what people do, I cannot stop it. I certainly don’t want to encourage it, but it is something that will happen outside of my sphere of influence. Also, I don’t want to be too judgy about it either.
Dead Rhetoric: There’s a lot of personal elements to the lyrics on The Obsession. The press sheet talks about the music being an ‘exorcism,’ and there is one song titled exactly that. It that how the songs feel to you in terms of the lyrical presentation?
Wessels: Sometimes they do, especially “The Exorcism,” that one is really cathartic. I still have moments where I will just have many feelings and I will not know any way to deal with those except for making it into songs. Then sometimes it will feel better. That happened for a number of songs on this record I think.
Dead Rhetoric: Much of the time, people talk about the positives of putting yourself into the music in the lyrical approach. What do you feel are some of the drawbacks or negatives if you see any?
Wessels: It can be sort of vulnerable. You are kind of putting your weaknesses on display. It can also feel just a little embarrassing at times. I always have this feeling that I always want the music to be useful, in a way. I want people to listen to it and feel better, or not feel alone. I want it to do something. I feel like, especially if you are talking about things that are a bit complicated, the only way to accomplish that is to be honest.
I have certainly had moments where I was thinking, like with “Dopamine,” for example, it’s about that numbness from the antidepressants. In a lot of Western countries, like 1 out of 10 people are on these sorts of medications. I didn’t know about any of these side effects and I felt like it was kind of taboo to talk about it. So that was motivation for me to put it in the song. But I definitely scratched my head when I was like, “do I really want to be singing that I am dying just trying to get off” but then I realized that if I wanted to talk about the things that people don’t talk about the side effects, then I have to say all of those things. So it can feel a bit vulnerable, and I don’t know if there are people who would judge you for it…probably there are.
Dead Rhetoric: The internet…
Wessels: [laughs] There will always be someone judging you on the internet.
Dead Rhetoric: Looking specifically at the “Dopamine” video, how did you want that to portray the lyrics of the song visually?
Wessels: I wanted the video to be one big Dopamine shot. I wanted it to be super colorful and super happy, but then I wanted us, Simone [Simons] and myself, to be completely deadpan and sad in the middle of it. I had this vision of crying over a birthday cake, and that’s the vibe we went for and took it over the top. I kind of wanted the video to give people watching it the Dopamine shot that I was talking about lacking, in the song.
Dead Rhetoric: You mentioned the taboos, and it’s almost kind of shocking at this point, at least within the metal scope, because there’s a lot more people that voice things in regards to mental health and different conditions, that there is that taboo sense. But if you compare it to the pop scene, where there’s not really much talk about it, it makes more sense that there’s more of a compulsion to talk about them in the other music scenes.
Wessels: I think it’s probably also there in pop, the genre, as a whole. I think that just within the most popular songs are often songs that are easy to digest. So I think that there is less. In the metal scene, especially at festivals, there are often flyers and telephone numbers for groups and places where you can go. I think that it’s improving. I don’t know as much about that from a pop perspective as much as metal because it’s not really my scene. But I hope it’s there too. I hope there is a level of support and discussion, and I think so.
Dead Rhetoric: Given the metal scene being more of your area of expertise, what would you like to see more in the scene as we move forward in the metal industry, scene, or community?
Wessels: One thing that I am hoping for, you see a lot of people stop touring because it’s so expensive. I hate to be the person that says ‘things should just become less expensive’ because it’s like poof I just wave my magic wand. But let’s put it in a positive spin, I hope there is enough of a stage for artists who are just beginning or don’t have enough of a financial support behind them. I am funding a lot through the Patreon, for which I am so so so grateful. Now I have a deal with Napalm Records again and they are so supportive. And it’s still a big investment! I just hope that making music doesn’t become something that you can only do if you are fortunate enough to support it. So I hope there is enough stage and support for everybody.
Dead Rhetoric: What’s next for you this fall and into 2025?
Wessels: I am still doing the song of the month, and I should probably write a song like right now because I have a mixing day coming up and I don’t know what I am writing yet. So there are some songs coming, then we have one more festival, then there’s a song coming up with Kamelot and it’s going to be nice to be on the stage with them again on October 11. We also have a release show in Utrecht which I’m really excited about. Then we are going on tour with Vola. I’m very excited for that too, and I’m a big fan of them. Then we are making plans for next year. We have our hands full.
Dead Rhetoric: Realistically with the song release schedule on Patreon, do you see yourself getting back to the US?
Wessels: I really hope so, and I think realistically maybe. It should be possible. I don’t know when and I don’t know where, but I am working on it. I’m actively chasing that.
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