With good reason, The Last Dance has been compared to artists David Bowie and Peter Murphy, and bands Depeche Mode and The Cure. Yes, one can discern sonic traces of these and other great bands in the TLD sound, but The Last Dance is a band that breaks stereotypes and defies easy categorizing, like the best bands most often do.

For all their intensity, The Last Dance is exciting and enveloping, rather than assaulting. The vocals, by front-man Jeff Diehm are clear, resonant and seductive, while the Edge-like guitar sound of Rick Joyce creates an unrushing wave of melodic energy that's irresistible. The technically precice and rumblingly harmonic bass lines of Peter Gorritz add to the addicting quality of TLD's aural appeal.

On their last European concert tour, TLD joined the classic gothic folk-rock band All About Eve, who have been redefining what darkwave music can be since their origins as contemporaries of Sisters of Mercy, The Mission and Fields of the Nephilim.

Rick - Thanks to a friend in the UK. Steve Carey is friends with All About Eve and when they needed a support act for their tour, he recommended us. It was beyond great for me personally, being a fan of All About Eve for years and years. The best part was just how cool Julianne and the band were. When we met them for the first time, we'd been delayed and arrived late to the show.
We were already supposed to be playing, and they held the show and had all their equipment set up for us to use, so literally we arrived at the venue and were on stage playing within minutes. Frantically trying to get everything sorted, I ran backstage and there was Julianne. I stopped and said hi and she asked what I needed. I grabbed a cup and said, "A glass of wine?" She said, "take the whole bottle!" and handed it to me. Totally nice and down to earth. It was a great experience.

How did their crowds respond to you?

Jeff - It was a slightly different audience for us with All About Eve. While they have many fans in the current club-scene, they have many fans that still like the music and the band but don't go out to clubs quite so much any more. We did pick up at least a few new fans, especially the show in Colchester where we returned a week later for our own show.

Peter - I think we definitely made some new fans, including Julianne herself, so that was a really great thing. Even though the two bands are not really similar at all, it seemed to
work. Both bands got along and I would say that their crowd at the very least seemed to enjoy us enough to listen politely to our set and not heckle us or throw stuff at us!

Did you have time for any sight-seeing? Tower of London? Stonehenge?

Jeff - We were supposed to visit Stonehenge, but were running late getting up in the morning - the story of our tour lives! We'd seen the Tower on a previous trip when we had more time, and have spent plenty of time sightseeing London. I think my favorite tour-tourist story would be the Alamo in Texas. We arrived at the hotel and were looking up on a map how to get to the venue. The Alamo is right on the way, but we had to be at the venue in an hour and still hadn't showered. We drove there, parked the van, walked around the outside of the building, took one photo in front and drove on to the venue. That's just how it is. You're in these lovely cities with so much to offer, and you spend all your time driving, lost, or inside some horrible club! It was torture to drive into Rome and not see anything. We arrived when it was already dark and left right after the show to drive back to Germany to fly home.

Peter - I think we did most of our UK sightseeing the first and second times we were there. The most recent trips we saw new cities that we had not been to before, but there's not a lot of time and none of us really had enough money to do more than visit some pubs.

Are you planning to do Last Dance versions of any other band's songs, like you did with Dead Man's Party?

Rick - Well, the Britney cover came out on the last disc, Reflections of Rage, but I'm guessing you're overlooking that one. If an idea for a new cover comes up we may run with it, but no plans for one at the present time.

Jeff - You never know. Those things usually come up because you're asked to do a cover for some other compilation.

What are your after-parties like?

Jeff - Typically calm and boring! A few clubs will stay open after hours or have a party elsewhere. Most of the time we pack up and go to bed. Whenever I read about bands and their after-show stories, I feel like we must be the most boring band in the world! But after a day of driving and all that work, I'm usually ready for a good night's rest!

Rick - Normally our after-parties are us chilling with friends we have in a particular city, having a drink or 2 then crashing out to sleep as we must do it all again the next day.

Peter - Sometimes the promoters or fans organize an after party which might be at the same club, a different club or even someone's house. They range from all night crazy bashes to a few people sitting around chatting. Otherwise, we usually just go to the hotel and sit around having drinks, talking about the shows and the tour and laughing at some of the really silly and bad programs on the T.V. in whatever city we are in. I'm particularly fond of laughing at the late night porn ads that seem to be ubiquitous all throughout Germany. I'm not sure if it's the "interesting" looking women, the hilariously bad music playing in the background or the combination of both, but it never fails to make me laugh.

Is there a sense of friendly competition between yourselves and other bands, like Bella Morte or London After Midnight?

Jeff - There certainly is between some bands. Basically it happens one of three ways: There are bands that look up to you for what you do (or think you're nuts), but basically aren't in the same league when it comes to albums or touring. Then there are bands like Cruxshadows and Bella Morte and Frankenstein that you share a camaraderie with. They can take a joke and give it back. You insult and compliment and generally love them and wish them the best. The third kind is the bands who take themselves far too seriously. They just don't play well with others.

Rick - We're friends with most bands we play with, like The Cruxshadows whom we've toured with. When speaking with Rogue about it we agreed that there was friendly competition and because of that it made both bands better, doing better shows. Rogue even ended up doing sound for us many nights. With Bella Morte our friendly competition is not so much about the music but how we each can out do each other by having fun with each others show.... like the now famous pig incident that happened in Austria. As for London After Midnight, we've only played with them once, late last year. We each did our show, and respected the other for their show.

Peter - My favorite moments are during shows with bands that we're good friends with There's a lot of joking around, and the whole thing becomes a big family party. The people that treat it like some kind of war that they will do anything to win are missing not only the point of doing music, but also missing out on some real fun and good friendships.

Do you have a personal definition of what defines gothic culture?

Jeff - Loosely, I'd say that it's about the clubs and the fashion more than the music. You can spot a true Goth a mile away, but there are many more out there who don't get to dress the part every day.

Rick - I've been in this scene for quite a while, and I've experienced many different people, ideals, styles of dress and music. I see it as more vast than most people probably realize and much much more than just a group people dressing in black listening to darker music.

Peter - I don't know if there really can be a strict definition of gothic or any culture. There are always so many exceptions to every rule. I don't like to define myself in any strict way and I don't consider myself to be a part of any particular culture. I got into this scene mostly by accident because it was new and interesting to me at the time and I'm always looking for new and interesting things to experience. I liked some of the music and I liked the look of a lot of the people so I embraced it to a degree.

Are the musicians in Last Dance formally trained or self-taught?

Jeff - I've learned by doing it. Formal training would have been great, but it can only do so much for developing your own style. But even if you do shrug off lessons you need to learn good technique somewhere, especially as a singer, so you can last on the road.

Rick - I am self taught. I started playing years ago and learned to play by figuring out the entire Love album by The Cult and then by playing in bands.I learned music theory and such later in college, but as for playing guitar, all that is just me. I am definitely not the guitar player who goes into guitar center and plays Stairway to Heaven and such. But I do have the bracelet thing with my guitar down well I think! I'm happy that I learned to play on my own because I wasn't stuck into playing a certain way because I was taught that way. I had freedom to play the guitar however I wished, and I still do. That style, sound, etc. has become a part of the signature of TLD.

Peter - I started out as self-taught and for the most part still consider myself to be self-taught even though I did attend music college and have been studying music formally to some degree for many years. But I have always been a bit of a maverick and have terrible self-discipline when it comes to any form of education, so almost everything I know is a combination of formal training and stumbling through life and occasionally getting lucky enough to learn something!

Do you own pets?

Rick - My wife has 2 cats, Kendal and Cinder, so technically they're mine as well.

Jeff - Two 11 year-old Russian Blue cats, Beevis and Bungholio. They're the best example of why not to name your pets after popular cartoon characters.

Peter - My girlfriend and I have a dog named Reina and a cat named Stucky. We also have a few fish; one named Spike and two fighting fish named Roy & Montecore which will give you some insight into our sense of humor, if you are familiar with the Las Vegas performers Siegfried & Roy!

Shivers or gore in Horror Films?

Peter - Both, if possible. The ones that manage to have some cool makeup effects and some real crazy, scary parts and also have some really spooky atmosphere and intelligence are a rare treat though and I never get tired of those. I love Horror movies, even though I think most of them are pretty stupid. Sometimes there is nothing better than a really silly, really gory and over the top Zombie movie or something like that.

Jeff - Shivers!

Rick - Neither. I do not like horror films.

Have you ever experienced absinthe induced hallucinations?

Jeff - No.

Peter - I've not experienced an Absinthe inspired or any other kind of hallucination. I wouldn't mind trying Absinthe one day, but it's not high on my list of things to do.

Rick - Never. But I think having mono for 8 months may be similar!

Munsters or Addams Family?

Jeff - As far as the TV show, it's the Munsters. The best part was the very normal niece of the Munsters. She was the strange one in the family where strange was normal.

Rick - Addams Family. Gotta love Wednesday and Mortisha.

Peter - Addams Family, hands down. That show was great, especially for that time in America, which tended to be very conservative and stuffy until the whole 60's counterculture thing started to really explode.

Did Buffy belong with Angel or Spike?

Jeff - Hate that show.

Rick - I'm not a big Buffy fan, but if I had to choose I would put her with the red haired girl, because I like red hair!