Pro-Jekt

The Lord Dog chews the fat with Kev Rice bassist - Pro-jekt

Live at Labyrinth April 22nd 2006 - photo by Chris Winder

I would describe your sound as that early 80's electro pop feel, or Depeche Mode when they were at their most muscular, darkest and tattoed with the driving guitars of Rammstein thrown in, but maybe you know best. What influences your sound?

We’ve been called many things, not all good, but we like your description ..
Pro-jekt have influences from our dark and twisted past, there’s no particular formula that we stick to ,we just write songs .. we have a lot of respect for both the Goth and Metal scene’s and lots of bands that we grew up with ..

You seem very unpretentious for a Goth band, 'laddish' even. What do you think of the 'precious' tag that most Goth bands seem to get?

A lot of bands do seem to take the whole image very seriously and don’t seem to let go and actually enjoy what they are doing, not that we don’t give 100% and be as professional as possible, we just really enjoy the live thing and we think it comes across on stage. Some of the bands we have gigged with have the ‘image’ and spend a lot of time in the studio, we like to get down and dirty , hot n sweaty and to get out on the road and tour !

You seem to attract a higher proportion of females than males that appreciate you. Now that seems to me much better than sweaty blokes any day, but do you get many offers of meaningless, no questions asked, brief episodes of sex.? If so can I join the band, some of those Goth chicks are hot!!?

Ha Ha ..now that would be telling ..
but, we don’t mind the ‘Gothic Ladies’ coming to the shows at all …
this in turn does attract the male audience , maybe they haven’t come to see Pro-jekt.. but hey..?!

Now I notice that on your new 'Defiance' album, you have a hidden track, your own leftfield cover of Abba's SOS. Was that a random decision or is it a precursor to an album of 70's and 80's cheesy bands covers by Pro-Jekt? Can we expect to see a Cheeky Girls track on the next album?

Hmm.. let me think.....
NO, actually Pro-jekt have always done crazy covers, for us more than anything, and because its ‘fun’, it’s great to see peoples faces when they recognize the tunes !
‘’hang on isn’t that….’’
We did Depeche mode’ just cant get enough’ on our first demo …
As well as Led Zep’s communication breakdown on our ‘Mean times’ ep.
We’ve even done ‘tainted love’ and ‘friends electric’ a long time ago …
As for the Abba S.OS. Although it’s tongue in cheek , to get people talking !
We have actually made a disturbing doomy gothic metal classic!

'Drowning in someone else's soul' and 'Dig my own grave' doesn't seem the sort of songs you write in the pub over a few beers watching the 'footie', its the sort of stuff I would write when I get my tax bill. So who wrote the lyrics and what's the inspiration behind them?

As you point out in a live environment Pro-jekt are all guns blazing Gothic fucking metal !
But as songwriters and as individuals there’s a lot going on, we can be quite deep and intense and inspirational, we are four different guys ..and we bring our own things into the mix. Lyrically these kinds of songs have their own meanings and flavour’s of Love, life and death, but we don’t like to over explain or over analyze, we like the listener to have their own ideas of what the songs mean to them ..