YOUR LIFE ON HOLD Your Life On Hold is the gothic rock project of John Wolf, aka Jan Dewulf whom you may also know from Mildreda or Diskonnekted, or maybe even from Dream Cycle Inc. or J Wølf. It was about time that Dark Entries had another chat with this versatile musician, and the performance of Your Life On Hold at the Dark Entries Night of May 10, 2025 offers us a good excuse to extract a confession from Dewulf again. Hello Jan – or should we say John Wolf? –we are very happy to welcome you to the next Dark Entries Night on May 10 with Your Life On Hold. We had talked about this before, but then you answered me that the stage of the Kinky Star might be too small for a group of six musicians. When I heard that you are now playing with a line-up of three musicians, I was of course happy that you accepted my renewed invitation. Tell me how it is that you are now playing with a limited line-up? The trio setup was a practical necessity. But let me immediately add that the six-piece lineup hasn’t been scrapped entirely. It's currently on hold, but we’ll definitely hit the stage as a six-piece again – closer to achieve. When did you start, and how did that evolution go? We need to go back in time a bit for this. With Diskonnekted, I went through a personal musical evolution that started somewhere around the turn of the millennium—from enthusiastic novice to seasoned producer. You can clearly hear that progression when you compare the first and last Diskonnekted albums. The growth is tremendous. Our live shows also became increasingly professional, especially once we started incorporating guitars, which gave the sound a much more organic feel. Gradually, the idea began to take shape to wipe the slate clean and start something entirely new. That’s when the first seed of Your Life On Hold was planted. In the beginning, the focus was still very much on electronics, but that changed drastically when my life – due to various circumstances – literally came to a standstill. You could call it a midlife crisis. That’s when I decided to fully embrace a gothic rock sound. It felt like a necessity. Never before had demons been exorcised so spontaneously and effortlessly as during the making of that first album. Writing songs is my way of exorcising my devils. home, that is. The trio mainly came about so we could play further abroad. With six people, conflicting schedules and other commitments always made that impossible. With three, it works. That way, we’ve already played in Prague and the UK, and at the end of last month, we headed to Erfurt. To put it simply: with six, we sound more like the Fields; with three, more like the Sisters. Prague, Corrosion Fest and Erfurt were a blast, so Kinky Star is going to be great too! In the meantime, the trio has become a quartet: Mika from This Morn’ Omina will be joining us on bass for shows far from home—or at Kinky Star. Oh, and by the way, John Wolf? That’s the name I use when I make gothic rock. When I wanted to look up the start of Your Life On Hold, I came out in 2017. The debut ‘Burning for the ancient connection’ was released then. But when I read an older interview, it turns out that there was a longer search for the new sound that you wanted to www.peek-a-boo-magazine.be - 8 - You were immediately picked up by Solar Lodge, the label of Artaud Seth of Merciful Nuns and Garden of Delight. That is of course a quality label when it comes to gothic rock. How did that collaboration come about, and how is it still going? Back then, I had the feeling I’d made some strong demos, but the way things took off exceeded even my wildest dreams. I remember sending Artaud two demos, and that very same day he welcomed me to Solar Lodge. You can imagine the little jump for joy I did. The collaboration has gone smoothly ever since. I really appreciate the strong and unique identity of the label, and I’m proud to be part of it with Your Life On Hold. The second album ‘My name is legion for we are many’ followed quite quickly, already in 2018. How do you explain that this went so quickly? It was a highly inspiring period in which making music felt like a necessity. I was going through a personal
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