WITHIN TEMPTATION's SHARON DEN ADEL Says Focusing On Singles Instead Of Albums Has Been 'A Double Win-Win Situation'

In a new interview with Germany's Rock Antenne, WITHIN TEMPTATION singer Sharon Den Adel spoke about the band's decision to shift its focus from releasing albums to releasing a series of singles, enabling the bandmembers to indulge themselves in their creative processes thus delivering freshly inspired music. Asked if this new process has resulted in each song requiring much longer to complete, Sharon said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Well, to be honest, for us, this time, since we started doing only singles, it takes so much more time, so much more effort, because every single is a single. It's not just a random song on the album, where you also have, like, one or two or three in the end on the album, which are good but are not singles. But now we've been releasing a lot of songs that we think are singles and that we like ourselves very much. And of course, it was a way of releasing our stuff since just before corona started, actually. [We thought], 'What we're gonna do [this time] is different. We're not gonna release an album. We're just gonna do singles every time, just for the fun and see how that works.' And also with media attention and stuff, because a lot of times when you've recorded the single, they have the attention for that specific single, and then the next one, and then the album comes out and nobody talks about you anymore. And it goes a lot of effort and a lot of attention and time into a whole record. And now we get certain media for certain singles and other media for other singles, because it depends when they think it's something for them, then when they will join you on that adventure. So that's interesting to see that there's a different way of doing that. And I think in a way, especially during the corona time, it was the best thing for us to do, to stay in contact with everybody and to give people who like our music something and for us to stay sane while being locked up in our houses, of course. So it was a double win-win situation."

Last week, WITHIN TEMPTATION released a visualizer for its latest single, "Wireless". The AI clip was by created by Adriano Theel of Titanfilmmedia.de.

WITHIN TEMPTATION first released "Entertain You", "The Purge" and "Shed My Skin", singles that have all thrilled their fanbase, had great critical reception in Europe, peaked in the Top 20 of the U.S. Billboard Mainstream Rock Indicator charts and topped the official German charts. In July 2022, WITHIN TEMPTATION also released the official Jeb Hardwick-directed music video for the "Don't Pray For Me" single. It was the fourth single of the band's independent releases and will lead up to WITHIN TEMPTATION's next studio album.

Last December, WITHIN TEMPTATION released the official music video for "The Fire Within" single. The clip was filmed during the band's "Worlds Collide" European tour with EVANESCENCE. "The Fire Within" seven-inch single featured both the single version and instrumental version of the track.

In an interview with Barbara Caserta of Linea Rock, Den Adel spoke about WITHIN TEMPTATION's new approach to making its music available. She said: "We already decided before we had the pandemic to do it this way. A lot of music scenes already do this — music genres, actually — but in the rock [world], we still do a lot of the traditional way of releasing albums. And we just wanted to try this out. And then the pandemic happened, and everybody started doing the same thing. Which is a good thing, because you live in the moment and you write something and you release it… So this is really how we feel at the moment, and it's what we re reflecting with our music, I think. It's a good thing."

Regarding the differences between recording and releasing singles and concentrating on making full-length albums, Sharon said: "We put a lot of time extra now into every single, where normally this is the maximum of singles that we release, and we're gonna release more. So I think there's more time spent to it. But it's scattered all over a time, so it's really sometimes difficult to get back into the flow of writing again; that's the negative side of it. So it has its positive and negative sides. And with a whole album, it takes sometimes two years when you've written a song that it finally gets released, and it already feels outdated sometimes. So now it's really [easy to give each track] a fast release."

WITHIN TEMPTATION's last album, "Resist", was released in February 2019 through Spinefarm Records, the specialist hard rock label of Universal Music Group.

"Resist" featured guest appearances by PAPA ROACH's Jacoby Shaddix, IN FLAMES' Anders Fridén and ARID's Jasper Steverlinck.