<div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 0pt">After Forever, the Netherlands metal band, visited Los Angeles this week to promote the release of its fifth album “Self-Titled Album” and to announce their first-ever American tour.</div>
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<div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 0pt">The six-member group (Floor Jansen, Sander Gommans, Joost Van den Broek, Luuk van Gerven, Bas Maas and Andre Borgman) began as a metal band in 1995. Through the years they have explored numerous genres, which they’ve successfully infused into their sound.</div>
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<div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 0pt">Their latest, “Self-Titled Album” continues the After Forever sound by incorporating sounds and styles found across the entire spectrum of metal. Floor and Sander spoke with me about the U.S. release recently at the Key Club on Sunset Blvd.</div>
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<div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 0pt">“It’s not a concept album,” says Floor in her perfect English. The six-foot plus long-haired beauty is known as a language chameleon. “I like to write about things that fascinate me. That’s why I wrote a number of songs on the idea of energy. The energy between people, the energy of dreams, even the energy one gets from enjoying nature. These are all topics in this album. And things that I like to wonder about”</div>
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<div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 0pt">Both Floor and Sander have been influenced by metal and especially 80s metal, which is going through a kind of renaissance in Holland.. Sander, who also stands over six-feet tall, says “I was first introduced to metal by Judas Priest and other black metal bands. Metal is music I listen to in the evening. The structure is familiar and relaxing. It’s just like lounge music to me.” Floor has also enjoyed American metal, but had a hard time finding female-led bands early on. I really looked to all genres and just choose who I thought was good,” she explains. She also trained at the</div>
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<div style="margin: 0mm 0mm 0pt">“Self Titled Album” will be released in North America on September 25. The group plans to tour the Western United States in early 2008.</div>