Some songs we work are very difficult to write. It's not easy to put an eerie atmosphere around the songs. Frank & Rene are the riff writers and together we tight the songs. We are always try to develop a tragic and doomy atmosphere. The real feeling must be in our minds, all our minds and then we finish a song. I can say that it's very difficult to do that. The main part is that easy song must has a sort of a gloomy feeling in it. Bart writes the lyrics about fantasies, little stories, tales, no hardcore bullshit..We hate that..
We have two contracts now at home, one from Peaceville and one from Foundation 2000. We're talking with both now.. In January we will choose and in March we're going to record our debut called 3 "the hopeless" out in June/July.. With a lot of news tracks on it.. All very long (8 min.-+).
The Gathering interview, Blasphemous #2, 1992
THE GATHERING released their debut album, Always..., on this day in 1992 through Dutch label Foundation 2000.
First we had a great deal with Peaceville, but Hammy only could do something in 1993!! And the budget wasn't that great, so we decided to sign a 2 record deal with Foundation 2000. Our debut is out now, and we've very proud of it!. Foundation 2000 heard our demo, and they called me the same day. He was very enthusiastic and 3 months later our debut was a fact!!!.
Hans Rutten / The Gathering interview, Sombre Eve #1, 1992
Foundation 2000 is a very small label but they do a lot of work for us, so far we're really happy with them and because they're just a small label we won't easy become just a number a catalogue. The distribution is pretty good, could be better but we don't mind. The album won't be a concept album, the songs are all a sort of individual fairytales and don't have any connection with each other.
Bart Smits / The Gathering interview, Slayer #9, 1991