20 years ago: Profile with VNV NATION

(The following interview was first published in the Orkus! issue September 2003)

20 years ago we asked Ronan Harris(VNV NATION) the very personal questions of our “profile”. Read the last answers about the end of the world, death and gravestones here in part eight.

What would you do if you knew the world was going to end tomorrow?
I would meet up with my friends somewhere and have a party. In the last hours I would like to be alone to reflect on everything I have done, regretted and achieved in my life, to ask myself what the meaning of our existence was, to make peace with some things and to prepare myself for what comes next. I would like to listen to music while the world goes to pieces, preferably something I composed myself. That’s not meant to be vanity – some of the lyrics I’ve written just express exactly what I would feel in such a moment. In the end I would scream: “Yo, Doom… bring it on.” I’m a very spiritual person and I know that death is not the end in this world.

Have you ever been close to death?
My answer here is not the usual “yes, he sat next to me in the club the other night”, but “yes”. I had to sit through a concert by a band whose music I loathe from the bottom of my heart. I honestly thought I was going to die of boredom. It was like watching paint dry.

What do you want on your gravestone?
Whoever came up with the last three questions should go out in the sun more often, smile a little and stop listening to Sopor Aeternus all day. I want my gravestone to say “Sorry, I’m not here right now, but please leave a message.”

Want more? In our May/June issue we conducted an in-depth interview with Ronan Harris on the occasion of his latest album “Electric Sun”:

Missed the predecessor parts? Click here for part 1

Listen to VNV Nation in our “Dark and Silent” playlist on Spotify: