Interview: Doro: „The band, the crew and the fans, that`s my family.“<br>STALKER series „Women In Rock“ - STALKER MAGAZINE inside out of rock´n´roll

Doro: „The band, the crew and the fans, that`s my family.“
STALKER series „Women In Rock“

She is Germany`s Metalqueen no 1, actually also worldwide. Recently she played her 2500th concert, and two more followed at this year´s Wacken Open Air (as a guest of Skyline and Saltatio Mortis – see STALKER festival report ). Plenty of reasons to chat with Doro Pesch.

Saturday afternoon, Wacken Open Air. And, as in the last years, Doro is also here. We visit her in her dressing room and asked her a bunch of questions. Doro is not only very nice and friendly to us, she is also real open minded and enjoys to answer our questions. Thus it doesn`t matter that she leaves the train of thought sometimes in this limited 10 min interview time.

Doro, meanwhile you have played 2500 concerts...
...many more already!

How many have you played now exactly?
You should ask my die hard fans. I think it should be around 2600, maybe 2580.
Do you know any other Heavy Metal band that has played as many concerts as you did?
There are actually some of them. I think the Scorpions, they should have played twice as much. I know it because recently I had a laudatory speech concerning their life achievement. But I am not sure if there is any other band which has as many concerts. It is a real huge number. Actually not all of my concerts were counted. In the 80s, when there was no internet, I played also many short show cases. I am not sure if all of those are counted. However, I am right now above 2500 and not below.

Once you said, that you always keep the first weekend in August free because of WOA. Is this here something like a family meeting for you?
Yeah, I am always happy when I´m allowed to play here. But I cannot play a whole show here every year. Some time ago, a real die hard Metal fan had the idea to make a WOA hymn. Normally we write all of our songs by ourselves, but when I heard that song, it got straight to my heart. Holger Hübner, WOA organizer, asked me if I could record this hymn, which I did of course. Holger said then, that I have to perform it also in the next year. This is the reason why I have to take a look in the calender every year to find out when WOA is happening. During that time we cannot go on tour. Therefore, we actually had to reject some tour requests. It is really great here. I always meet many old friends and sometimes I can also make new friends. Some years ago, I met some Australian Metal fans. They called themselves ``Metal Warriors`` and asked me if I could play a tour in Australia. The only problem was, that we had no booker downunder that time. They answered that they could book a tour on their own. First I thought that they only claim it because of their euphoria. But some weeks later the contacted me. One of them has just put his parents out of their house into a hotel and invited us to live in his house. So we really did a tour there. Incredible! But all of that was only a result of WOA. You get so much positive power an energy here that you can easily forget all your troubles. You can listen to cool music for the whole day and meet your friends. This year is actually the first time that I am here for all three days.

Are you busy the whole time or could you watch some bands already?
Today I am really busy. But yesterday I could watch some moments of Judas Priest. Later on I joined Saltatio Mortis on stage to perform `Salome` together with them.
Did you already search for your own house over here, as you are at Wacken so often?
Not yet, haha! Mostly I stay in the tour bus. I don`t know for sure if I will be here every year in the future. But we have talked already about our 30th anniversary, which we will actually celebrate here. This will be in 2013. I celebrated the 20th anniversary in Düsseldorf, my home town, and my 25th anniversary as well. We did everything possible there: great stage production, many guests and I think that we can not make it better there. Now we are talking to the guys of WOA. I think it would be great, because they try to make everything possible. The also like extraordinary stuff. Elsewhere you can play normal shows with some pyros, but here you can also make some strange stuff.

Does it still give you the heebie-jeebies when you are standing on stage, watching the audience in front of it?
Yeah, it is always such a great feeling! I sometimes feel like I almost pee in my panties. There is always so much energy. When we play `Für immer` and I see how touched the people are, I sometimes have to turn around or I could not go on with the show. It gives you a high for the next few hours and days: It is like a drug.

We know you as the Metalqueen, maybe from WOA or from TV. But how does your private life looks like?
I don`t have one because this is a 24/7 job for me. I am either on the road, in the studio or I am writing songs or making some promotion. This is my life. I am not married and I have no children. The band, the crew and the fans, that`s my family. And it is always a bunch of work to take care of all of those guys... I could not image to have a family, too. What you see is that what you get: There is nothing more, that is my life! I never wanted to settle, I always wanted to be on tour, playing every evening in another city and see how happy it makes the people at the concert.
We thank the Metalqueen for this nice talk. If you want to check out how much fun Doro has on tour, you should note October and December. Doro will be back on the road in Europe (October) and Germany (December) again (see STALKER tourdates)!

http://www.doropesch.com/

Author: + photo: Timo Päβler
Date: 2011-10-03

Read comments: 0 Write comments