Epica talk ‘catchy’ sound on The Holographic Principle

Epica's Simone Simons
Epica's Simone Simons (Image credit: Getty)

Epica singer Simone Simons says their upcoming album The Holographic Principle has a more catchy feel than their previous work.

The follow-up to 2014’s The Quantum Enigma is set for release on October 1 via Nuclear Blast – and Simons also reveals they pushed themselves to make the record “bigger than before.”

She tells Spark TV: “It was a huge amount of songs and a lot to take in – but we put everything in this record and we hope that it will pay off.

The Quantum Enigma was received so well, we set the bar so high, but we accepted the challenge to make an even better record. And we’ve done everything bigger than before – we had more orchestra, a bigger choir. We had so many different instruments. Vocally, I put everything in the record that I can possibly do, and I’m very pleased with it.”

She refers to the album orchestration and choral sections as being “the seventh and eighth” members of the band, and adds: “Besides having catchy melodies, we also wanted to have really groovy vocal lines. And that’s something we worked on as well. We changed up some things to make it less predictable.”

Epica are about to head out on tour across Europe, with dates kicking off on June 4 in Belarus.

Epica tour dates

Jun 04: Minsk Re:Public, Belarus
Jun 05: Plzen MetalFest Open Air, Czech Republic
Jun 07: Bratislava Majestic Music Club, Slovakia
Jun 08: Rome Postepay Rock In Roma, Italy
Jun 10: Norje Sweden Rock Festival, Sweden
Jun 23: Copenhagen Refshaleon, Denmark
Jul 08: Geiselwind Out & loud Festival, Germany
Jul 16: Dunaujvaros Rockmarathon Festival, Hungary
Jul 23: Iztacalco Corona Hell & Heaven Metal Fest, Mexico
Aug 05: Zarasai Roko Naktys, Lithuania
Oct 01: Tilburg Epic Metal Fest, Netherlands
Oct 15: Sau Paulo Epic Metal Fest, Brazil
Feb 03: London O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire, UK
Feb 04: Paris Zenith La Villete, France

Scott Munro
Louder e-commerce editor

Scott has spent more than 30 years in newspapers, magazines and online as an editor, production editor, sub-editor, designer, writer and reviewer. Scott joined our news desk in the summer of 2014 before moving to the e-commerce team in 2020. Scott maintains Louder’s buyer’s guides, scouts out the best deals for music fans and reviews headphones, speakers, books and more. He's written more than 11,000 articles across Louder, Classic Rock, Metal Hammer and Prog and has previous written for publications including IGN, the Sunday Mirror, Daily Record and The Herald, covering everything from daily news and weekly features, to video games, travel and whisky. Scott's favourite bands are Fields Of The Nephilim, The Cure, New Model Army, All About Eve, The Mission, Cocteau Twins, Drab Majesty, Marillion and Rush.