In September 2008, Within Temptation visited Kherson, a port city in the south of Ukraine, just north of the Crimean Peninsula.
The Dutch metallers were nearing the end of a year-and-half-long tour for their fourth album, The Heart Of Everything, and it was their first time in the Eastern European country. Two days later, they would play a show in the capital, Kyiv, but it’s Kherson that sticks out most vividly in their minds: a former Eastern bloc city on the rise, the beautiful tree-lined streets, the wide Dnieper River. During their stay, they were treated to a ceremonial tour with the mayor and invited, poignantly in hindsight, to plant a tree for peace.
“They put us in national clothing and gave us traditional food,” vocalist Sharon Den Adel says, remembering the warm welcome. “We had an amazing few days.”
When Russian president Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Kherson was the first major Ukrainian city to fall. Russian troops occupied the city from March to November, before it was recaptured by Ukrainian forces.
“The resistance there was really strong,” says Robert Westerholt, Sharon’s husband and Within Temptation co-founder/studio guitarist. “Every night, they would come out and literally slit throats of Russian soldiers, [come] out of corners and attack them in every way they could. They were really paranoid, the Russians, they never felt at ease there.”
That staunch defiance inspired the band to write Cyanide Love, one of several songs on the band’s new album, Bleed Out, about the Ukraine War. ‘Sunflowers will soon be growing over your grave,’ sings Sharon over tense synths and downtuned guitars, a reference to a viral video on the first day of the invasion: a Ukrainian woman offers sunflower seeds to a Russian soldier with the harrowing wish that they bloom in his pocket after his death. ‘You’ll take it, you’ll face it / The barrel of my smoking gun.’
“We really hope to go back [to Kherson] one day,” says Robert, and his voice aches with sadness.
We’re sitting in the stylish but homely kitchen – all high ceilings and tall windows – of Sharon and Robert’s house in a pretty, peaceful countryside town, 40 minutes from
