With a full-on tour coming up, Ring has to be watchful of his health. The tour itself is a new experience for him, being far closer to a traditional rock tour than the weekend clubbing sessions he has become used to. “We’re going to be on a tour bus for almost two months, playing almost every day which is a really cool and new experience for me because before all my life was basically this kind of techno touring just at weekends and then you go back during the week but you don’t get anything done because you’re still completely flashed. So on Wednesday you would start to be productive again and then Friday you leave again. That’s been my life for the last two years. It’s fun but it’s really hard to get things done and it’s also really hard to have a life in Berlin because you’re always getting pulled away.”
The kind of non-stop tour that the four-piece Apparat band is setting out on now is tough even on the youngest, freshest, most eager of groups but for a band of hardened techno veterans in their mid-thirties, it might present a few extra challenges to their stamina. “Totally man! It’s still fun and it’s basically one of the reasons I’m still making music because I love traveling and I really love playing shows. I’m still a party guy, it’s really hard for me to resist, to not get drunk after a show and I always miss the moment when I should go home. It still happens to me but when I was young that was basically the concept. I was always partying. When I went somewhere to different places and other countries, I missed my flight on purpose, I was just hanging with people there for another two days and then I went home. It was so cool, it was a constant trip. There was so much cool and interesting stuff happening. Right now I just can’t do that anymore because my body just tells me it’s too much. Hangovers take three days now and I can’t really afford that anymore! Also when I play with the band, it’s also some kind of a physical thing. I need to be able to hold a guitar, play a guitar and sing and stuff. I have to take care not to be that fucked up anymore! I think if bands start doing this kind of touring, you really have to learn how to behave.”
One might wonder just how sincere such a claim is when his inspiration is coming from the ultimate hedonistic source. “I just read the biography of Lemmy, you know the Motorhead guy? It seemed like he always got wasted and he’s still alive but I don’t know, I think he’s a phenomenon.”
I think he’s been declared dead more than once over the years.
“Exactly!”
Apparat – Black Water by Mute UK
Apparat’s new album The Devil’s Walk is out now on Mute.
