Rock My Monkey: Hello, you are listening to the Rock My Monkey netcast on RockMyMonkey.com. Today we are speaking with Candice Night of the band Blackmore’s Night. How are you doing today, Candice?
Candice Night: I’m great. Thanks, Mark. How are you?
Rock My Monkey: I’m doing pretty good. How does it feel to be able to do a ten year anniversary with Blackmore’s Night and be bigger than ever?
Candice Night: It feels a little old. (laughs) No, just kidding. Ten years in, though, you have to look back and go, wow, we’ve been doing this for a decade. That’s pretty amazing. It feels really good. I feel like looking back at the work that we’ve done, all the different albums that we’ve done, going way back to Shadow Of The Moon, it just feels like everything’s been such a natural progression, a really natural evolution, and every stage has kind of reflected where we were songwriting-wise, lyric writing-wise, performance-wise, even instrumentation. So I feel like we’re right up to date with the last one we did, The Village Lanterne, and the DVD, Paris Moon. And we’re on to the future. We’ve got a lot of stuff in store and coming up. So it’s a good thing.
Rock My Monkey: What do you feel this DVD offers fans that Castles And Dreams did not?
Candice Night: Well it’s actually, you know, it’s the first time that we ever played in France. So we were kind of like a little nervous, because we didn’t know how they were going to respond to us, or if they were going to throw rotten tomatoes at us, or just kind of walk out. You have no idea the very first time you play in a place. But the theater is a world renowned theater, it’s the Olympia. And when we walked in and we saw so many people that were dressed up. We were just amazed at everybody. It’s almost like they studied Castles And Dreams because they just knew. They were on their feet when they were supposed to be on their feet. They were yelling ‘Hey!’ at the right moments. They were clapping along and singing along, and we just felt like we could really capture that, the magic of that moment. And of course, you know, some of the extras, we have a lot of the interviews of course between Ritchie and myself, but we also started interviewing some of the other guys, the ones that make it all happen, really. The guys behind the scenes. The security guys, and the production guys, and management. So there’s a lot of people that really help to make Blackmore’s Night a family, and really allow us to do what we can do onstage. The people you never see. The unsung heroes. So they get their moments, as well, on the DVD. Oh, and you know what else, we have a limited edition that’s out. It’s kind of like in this antique sort of box that includes not only the DVD, but also an audio cd, as well. So that’s within the package with this beautiful, kind of Toulouse-Lautrec artwork on the top of it. Once you get past the limited edition, then you can purchase either just the DVD or the audio cd. So there’s different varieties of ways you can get involved with the experience.
Rock My Monkey: You actually predicted my next question. I actually wondered about that, because what I got, the promo version of it, was a cd and a DVD, but everything I’ve read lists this as separate releases. Where can people go-are there direct links on your website that people can get to the limited edition version, that has both together?
Candice Night: Yeah, actually it’s going to be at FYE stores as well as Amazon.com will have it. I believe Borders is going to have it. So it should be any major retail store should be able to have that. Or if they don’t have it in stock, if it’s already sold out, they can probably just order it in for you. It’s definitely available for sure.
Rock My Monkey: I’m actually going to try to see if I can find that link on Amazon. That way people can just click on the album cover that’s on the text version of this interview and be able to purchase it without spending time doing all that hunting.
Candice Night: All the searching. Yeah, you don’t want to do that. Thanks. (laughs)
Rock My Monkey: Since the promo version doesn’t come with full packaging, what can fans expect when they get this, as far as booklets, photos, and other packaging extras?
Candice Night: Good question. Yeah, we have, of course, all the lyrics that are involved with it for each one of the songs, all the credits. Just the beautiful artwork that’s involved in it. Actually, the record company was much more involved with the packaging than we were, but I think with that limited edition the thing that sells me the most is besides the fact that you get both of the products within one, it’s this beautiful kind of hinged, antique sort of box with the original Paris Moon cover artwork on the top of that. So it’s a really nice thing even just to have out on your desk somewhere, because that artwork is, it’s just such a beautiful kind of timepiece. It really brings you back to Paris in the Toulouse-Lautrec days, the days of Moulin Rouge, the original version.
Rock My Monkey: You mention that the record company was very involved in the packaging of it. I gotta say, SPV has actually quite a reputation with putting out very extensive packaging on their DVDs, and not cutting corners on that. So it’s good that they’re continuing that.
Candice Night: Yeah, that’s true. It’s amazing, actually, whenever we speak to them about their ideas as far as packaging is concerned, they really brainstorm, and try to really think outside the box of different ways that they can do things. So whether it’s for the holidays, sometimes they get involved with pre-Christmas wrapping on things, or leather boxes. They’ve done stuff with us with velvet boxes and gold embossing. That side of them is really incredible. They’re very artistic when it comes to the packaging.
Rock My Monkey: With a band like Blackmore’s Night, the vibe you put off is a major part of the entire package, and with the shows you have all kinds of theatrical accouterments. Do you think the packaging of a release like this, how important is that element to the overall Blackmore’s Night experience?
Candice Night: Well, to me, as the artist, or part of the group that is the artist, it’s very important, because we want people to really have the full experience. So the second that you, if you’re getting it sent to your house, or the second that you go to buy it, if you aren’t drawn in-we get very involved, even with the artwork that’s done. We’re involved in every aspect of, not only the packaging releases, but also the editing, the sounds, the songwriting, which songs are going to go on there, which songs are going to be kept on the cutting room floor. Because a lot of the shows that we do usually are probably about two and a half hours is average, which would actually lead you into like a triple DVD set. So we try to cut it down to a single DVD, or even with Castles Dreams, a double DVD. So we do have to go through all the editing processes and things like that. But we really like to get involved with it, because we know it’s a representation of us. This music, although it’s not commercial music, it’s not the kind of thing that you’ll hear readily on the radio when you’re in your car, I think it’s because of that that we have such loyal fans. They’re really kind of the independent thinkers that aren’t going to be dictated to what to listen to and what’s cool and what’s fashionable. They know better. So they know if they, if it appeals to them, then they kind of get absorbed into it, and they pass it on to their friends. I think that really builds your most loyal fan base, as opposed to people that follow fashion to whatever’s on the radio. So for us that every aspect of Blackmore’s Night is reflective of what we’re trying to put out there.
Rock My Monkey: Blackmore’s Night seems to take pride in being a very intimate event, but as the band’s popularity grows, do you think that will put that intimate vibe of your live shows in jeopardy at all?
Candice Night: You know, it does sometimes. As a matter of fact we really try to keep the places that we’re playing-we actually request for it to be between 800 and 1,000. When we first started doing this we really wanted it to be just a couple of hundred, like between two and three hundred, just to keep that intimacy there. But it’s grown and grown, especially overseas. We wind up going between 3,000, 5,000, some places 10,000 people. And you do wind up losing the intimacy. And that for us is a great loss, because we really like to have that personal connection with the audience. We like to get them involved, like to get people up dancing and singing, or include them in on the stage show, or ask for a request. And when it becomes too many people, you kind of lose that connection a little bit. For us, again, being involved with every aspect of it, we’re involved with not only where we’re playing, but the capacities of where we’re playing. We try to keep the ticket prices down so everybody can afford it, and it’s not too expensive. The problem with that is that we wind up losing money every time we go on tour, because when you’re playing smaller places, they usually like to hike up the prices. We don’t like to do that. We want to keep the prices as low as possible. It’s important to us to keep that connection, and to have no wall up between the band and the fans. We want everyone to really kind of feel as if they’re having a party at our house, or they’re involved in this kind of party and having a great time. It’s kind of like coming to a Halloween party. You can get dressed up, you can get involved with it. You really wind up leaving there with an incredible, positive energy, which is really nice to see people walking out of there smiling.
Rock My Monkey: In the first couple songs, in the stage banter of the first couple songs of Paris Moon, you crack a few jokes about Ritchie’s dark and stoic stage presence. I’m sure that most Blackmore’s Night fans would agree that your eclectic and charismatic stage presence is a perfect ying to his yang. But when you said those remarks, it made me wonder if he secretly shares your sense of humor about his quiet and brooding personality.
Candice Night: Well, the funny thing about-the good thing, actually, about me and Ritchie when we’re working together, or especially onstage, it’s just that we’re so genuine, we’re so honest. Seeing us onstage and the way we talk to each other is exactly the way you would see us sitting at a dinner table. We have the same rapport. We kind of-I call it ‘poking the dragon and then running.’ We joke around like that all the time with each other. It just felt natural to at that point, if you’re being onstage and you look over and you see the same person who you kind of share your life with, you kind of get caught up in being normal. There’s no posing that goes onstage. There’s nothing that’s said every single night. There’s no worked out banter, or worked out choreography. When you see us, it’s just really us and who we are. So that’s why it changes every night, because it’s really just about the same people that we are at home, or at a dinner table or something. We just always joke around with each other like that. It’s normal for us.
Rock My Monkey: Even when you tried to do some choreography on the Paris Moon DVD it still came off as very casual, let’s say.
Candice Night: (both laugh) Right. Exactly. It’s all about really having fun onstage. It’s funny, because I think when we’re onstage, it’s really these emotional peaks and valleys. We really like to take the audience on an emotional ride, a journey with the music. There are some songs-and actually, this is one of the few bands I think where you can do that. You have that creative freedom to play a Joan Baez folk song, or you can play a tavern song, or a pop song, or a strictly Renaissance song with Shawms and Rauschpfeife and Cornamuse, or amazing instrumentals. Ritchie can just go out there and just play a ten minute beautiful instrumental that’ll just make you cry out of it’s beauty. So we love having that creative freedom, where we kind of get on our feet and get everyone to dance along, but we can also sing a song like “Diamonds And Rust” that’s so melancholy and reflective, it’s just so beautiful. We just love having that freedom of being able to do anything we want to, and bringing that audience on that emotional, musical journey with us. That they can have a great time, be on their feet, and then they can sit and listen to some really intricate, brilliant instrumentals that Ritchie is coming out with. And then they can kind of swing their beer mugs to some of the tavern songs. It’s a different experience within every song, and we love that variety.
Rock My Monkey: I hear a rumor that your Christmas cd from two years ago is about to be re-released with a ton of great extras.
Candice Night: Extras? I don’t know if there’s any extras on it. That’s a good question.
Rock My Monkey: But it is going to be re-released.
Candice Night: It is definitely going to be re-released. You know, there’s so many things that are going on right now. We just stepped off the road. We actually, we shot a video for “Village Lanterne”, which of course was the title track from our previous album. But then we put it on Paris Moon. And we actually shot a video for that where they suspended me under the water. I did a four hour under the water scene as the Lady Of The Lake singing the words from “Village Lanterne”, which, remind me never to do that again, because it almost killed me being under the water in a dive tank for that amount of time. But it really came out as a beautiful visual. We shot it in Schloss Rabenstein over in Germany, which is about eighty miles from the Czech border, actually. So that is actually hitting the internet in force now, I believe. They’re putting that out every place. So that is going to correspond with the DVD and cd Paris Moon release. We have Winter Carols, which as you said is going to be re-released. Right after that, that actually happens end of November, and throughout December. Which we actually do really well. Pretty much every year there’s a song called “Christmas Eve” that winds up making the Billboard charts that we love. We invited all the neighborhood children in to sing on that. We’re actually heading over to Germany right now to do some television shows performing “Christmas Eve” as well. And then January we head back into the studio and we finish recording the rest of the tracks for the new album, which will be out next year, definitely. So there’s always something in the works. A lot of stuff going on at all times.
Rock My Monkey: A member of Twisted Sister recently said that the reason their Christmas cd did so well is because a download doesn’t look good under a tree. Do you find that having Blackmore’s Night releases so close to Christmas helps you guys as well?
Candice Night: I think that, I find that with holiday releases it seems to open the market a little bit more than the rest of the year. In America especially, it’s very, very closed. It’s funny. If I do interviews with people from overseas, other radio stations or magazines, and they always say ‘Well, you’re from New York, so you must have so much more variety on the radio stations.’ Unfortunately, we might have ten rock stations, but every station is playing exactly the same thing that the other station is playing. So we don’t get a lot of variety even if there are more stations. Actually I think they have more variety over in Europe, because they kind of just open it up and allow anything to be played. They don’t really even have specific stations. I think you’ll hear a folk song, then you’ll hear a rock song, and then you’ll hear an orchestral song. So I think mentality wise I think they’re much more open to different types of music. But over here it seems that the one time where you can actually kind of get played or get some more attention brought to your product, if you’re not going to do it in the typical commercial ways like being on the radio, or being on MTv in between reality shows, is holiday time. It seems a lot of people are able to get more attention to their type of music at that time. People seem to be more open minded when it comes to December time. Maybe it’s the warm fuzzy feeling of Christmas. I don’t know. (laughs) It’s something.
Rock My Monkey: Trans Siberian Orchestra has had a mind blowing success with their mix of traditional Christmas songs and style. After the attention you got from Winter Carols, is there any chance of Blackmore’s Night doing a holiday tour as an annual thing?
Candice Night: Yeah, we’ve actually been talking about that for a long time. What we usually do every year actually is we have a very-it’s the complete opposite of what TSO is doing. We have a very, very small restaurant. Well, we don’t own it, but a friend of ours own it. And what we do it every year we have an ‘invitation only’ concert where we play all of the holiday songs, the ones that are on Winter Carols as well as ones we’ve been just playing throughout the seasons around friends and family for years and years. As well as a lot of the other Blackmore’s Night songs, actually. It’s free to come watch it. Basically what we do is we just ask people if they’re feeling generous to donate to a local charity. Usually we send money to Save A Pet, which is a local animal charity here, to try to help them get through the winter season, which seems to be very difficult for a lot of local animal charities. And every year it’s great, because a lot of people just kind of delve right in there and give a lot of money to the local animal charities on our behalf. So it’s great that we’re able to do that. But as far as like a big, huge tour, we’ve wanted to do that for a long time, and I think it’s just a matter of finding the time to do it, and actually getting everyone-at this stage we actually are looking for a bass player, we couldn’t even do a December tour if we wanted to. But it’s something that’s definitely going to be in the works. We’re even actually going to release a second holiday album that we’re compiling the songs for that now. So yeah. We’re definitely going to do it. There’s no confirmed, definite information as when it’s going to happen. But stay tuned, because it is on the list of things we want to accomplish.
Rock My Monkey: Wow, you’re excellent at predicting my next question. I was actually going to ask if there was ever going to be a sequel to Winter Carols. On to the next one.
Candice Night: Yeah, I’m a little psychic. I’m a little psychic. (laughs)
Rock My Monkey: At the beginning of the credits of the Paris Moon DVD, you give a little speech about the band being like family, but everywhere I look lists you and Ritchie as the band and everyone else as just session musicians. Did they start out as just session players and become way more than that?
Candice Night: I think what winds up happening-you know, when we invite people to be in the band, we sort of have this list of criteria. It basically starts with, of course they have to have the musicianship to-there’s a lot of people that can only play rock, or can only play like gypsy, Celtic music, but there’s not a lot of people that can play both, where they can slow down enough to be involved with folk music or instrumental music. So we really need people who are well rounded in their musicianship. So that’s A, number one. And the second thing is, will you dress up? (laughs) Will you wear the tights and stuff onstage, and just be ready to have a good time out there, and enjoy what you’re doing. You’re bringing other people on this journey with you so it’s kind of really like this party kind of scene. We want them to kind of have that messy sort of minstrel look, which we love. But really way up there is the fact that they have to nice people, and they have to really get along with the other people in the band, on the road. I mean, it’s kind of like going to summer camp when we go on tour. We don’t go away for that long. We go actually probably about three weeks at a time, maybe a month at a time, and then we come home for a month. So we do that about four times a year. So you’re never far away from home for that long. You get to come home and see your husband or your wife, or in our case, our cats. (laughs) It’s always good to come home. You’re not away, burning yourself out for too long in that time. But while you are out on the road, you’re spending a lot of time with the other band members, and the other crew members. It’s so important that people roll with the punches. You’ve got to have that roadworthy kind of persona, because you’re going to have things that aren’t perfect on the road. We’re going to have to at some points pick up at four a.m. and have to change hotels because they’re going to start construction at six a.m. Things that you just don’t know what’s going to happen. And there’s some personalities that really can’t deal with that, that aren’t flexible at all, and they start to get a little-there starts to be friction, let’s just say, sometimes on the road. But a lot of the people we’ve been with for a long period of time, they know exactly that the one thing you can especially expect on the road is it to be unpredictable. And if you can roll with that, and you’re enjoying the personalities of the people around you, they become some of your closest friends, and they wind up being friends, and friends for years. So it’s not only just the crew members and the band members, but it’s funny, because it winds up being also the audience, as well. There’s so many people that travel throughout so many different countries with us, that we wind up seeing in the front row of every show, that we’ve become such close friends with, that every tour we wind up doing, almost lines up like Thanksgiving. It’s like a reunion for all of us, like a family reunion. Like you’re sitting down at that table and just seeing the same people and really being able to have that kind of family experience and these friends out there that you wouldn’t normally have. So for us, all of that is really important to have that connection, them being your friends and being able to travel with them and experience things with them, and everybody winds up enjoying themselves if they’ve got that right personality. That’s what we look for.
Rock My Monkey: Now is the time of the interview that I like to call the Lightening Round where I name something in popular news or popular culture, and you sum up your thoughts in one short sentence. Ready?
Candice Night: Okay. Yes.
Rock My Monkey: Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul.
Candice Night: I am up on a lot of the Republican candidates, but I am not familiar with him, so we can go to the next one, because I’m not really sure who he is. (laughs)
Rock My Monkey: The NBC show Heroes.
Candice Night: I’ve never seen it.
Rock My Monkey: The iPhone.
Candice Night: The iPhone. I don’t have one of those, because I usually have a tendency to hold onto something until it breaks down on me, so I’m still probably two phases behind any other phone that’s already out there.
Rock My Monkey: President Bush.
Candice Night: Can be very entertaining when he’s trying to be comedic.
Rock My Monkey: Fox News.
Candice Night: I actually enjoy watching Bill O’Reilly.
Rock My Monkey: Recording Industry Association Of America.
Candice Night: That’s a good one. Trying to get royalties, I think, out of any organized group that is collecting on behalf of the artist is always a struggle. That’s the end of my sentence. (laughs)
Rock My Monkey: I do have one final question. Every year we do choose one final question that we ask every single band from classic rock legends to the most extreme death metal bands at the end of every interview. Partially to stump people but also to see who kind of wimps out and won’t answer.
Candice Night: I think you already stumped me on the last series of questions. (laughs) How much more difficult can it get? I’m ready.
Rock My Monkey: Oh, just wait. This is the final question, though. This year I’m asking people to look into their crystal ball and predict what political figure, world leader, musician, celebrity, anybody world wide famous, who do you think might die before the end of the year?
Candice Night: Oh, wow. That’s really tricky.
Rock My Monkey: And I always find it interesting how the artist uses the question. Some people just actually do a prediction. Some people actually do a wish. And I’ve actually had some people do a call out to a friend of their that they were worried about, because their friend was partying too hard.
Candice Night: Wow. This is really interesting. I’m going to say somebody, and it’s not because the person is heading down a dark path or anything, I think it’s strictly from an age perspective. And I hope this doesn’t put a curse on anybody when you say this. That would be terrible. But I think maybe Olivia De Havilland.
Rock My Monkey: Who’s that?
Candice Night: (laughs) Who stumped who now?
Rock My Monkey: Exactly!
Candice Night: I thought the name of the game was to stump me! She’s a great classic actress who was in a lot of films with Erroll Flynn.
Rock My Monkey: Oh, I’ll have to ask my wife then, because she loves that era of movies.
Candice Night: Oh yeah? Yeah, definitely ask her. And actually while you’re asking her, ask her if she’s already dead. I don’t think she is. (laughs) But then it’s definite. I think they just actually honored her a couple of years ago at the Oscars, one of those lifetime achievement awards. She was one of the great beauties and classic actresses of her time, going back decades and decades, back to the forties or so. She still looks amazing, very present and very classy, the way that she speaks. Just strictly from an age perspective I would call her, call her out. (laughs)
Rock My Monkey: I thank you very much for doing the interview, anybody listening to the audio version can go to RockMyMonkey.com for the full featured version with clickable links, readable text, and many more wonderful features. I’m asking people to click on the DVD cover above and below this interview to purchase Paris Moon by Blackmore’s Night. And I do hope to see you guys up on tour up in the Northwest sometime soon. Thank you very much for your time, Candice.
Candice Night: Thank you, Mark. I had a great time.
