About Me
Deus Sceptrum started back in September 2006 by Daniel Van Werkhoven. He recruited people from all over the world. Eduard Beneke, a guitarist and keyboardist from South Africa, Bruce Ogletree a drummer from America, Walter Tokich a bassist from America, Rachel Neilsen a singer from Australia, Andrew Van Werkhoven his brother a pianist, who also lives in Australia, and himself, who plays guitar, and lives in Australia.
Through the last few months of 2006, they threw around ideas for band names, and ideas for CDs. They decided on a band name; Deus Sceptrum, which is Latin, it basically means: God Rules.
Not long after, Daniel came up with the idea of doing a concept album, using the same song subject as a song he and Walter had been working on. Thus, after some stretching, they managed to fit the story over eight songs, one of which is an instrumental. No name was decided on for the album, that came later.
In January 2007, Eduard got a job in a different city, and much to his disappointment, had to resign. So then began the search for a new musician, one who could write keyboard music, for Andrew to play.
Shortly after Eduard left, Bruce gave us the news, he'd have to pull out, as he also had many other commitments, and sadly, did not have the time for another band. Then the search for two musicians began.
Around the same time, Deus Sceptrum changed which musical collaboration site they used, as the one they had been using, had crashed, and they wanted somewhere more stable.
After the site admin of the new site they'd found, had set up a forum for them to work in, and Daniel had setup threads for each of the songs, drummer John Wooten came along and on seeing the lyrics for the last song in the album, declared: "I want in when you get some beds tracked! What BETTER way to share the talent God has given us than to glorify Him? NONE I can think of!" So less then a month went by without a drummer, now they were left to find a new guitarist/keyboardist.
Months went by with no luck in that area. Then Andrew decided that he was holding the band back, and he'd pull out, letting them search for a dedicated keyboardist. So new search began for a keyboardist. This search was slightly more successful, they tried several musicians, but in the end they all had to pull out, due to lack of time.
Meanwhile, Alex Lloyd, leader of Spam The Band (www.spamtheband.com), a band which Daniel joined in early 2007, suggested Sojourn Of Faith as a name for Deus Sceptrum's album. Daniel like the name, and so it stuck.
In July 2007, Daniel hired digital artist Christian Hecker to draw their album art. The result can be seen by all on the cover of Sojourn Of Faith.
Then, come August 2007, a keyboardist by the name of Paul Dowers poked his head in the band forums, and said he really liked the music, and give him a shout if the keyboardist they were currently trying didn't work. He didn't, so Daniel sent Paul an e-mail telling him he was welcome to join. A few days later, Paul had recorded some piano and strings for the song "Why Did You Do It?" the third song in Sojourn Of Faith.
So after adding the keyboards to the mix, Daniel uploaded the new demo mix of "Why Did You Do It?" onto SoundClick.com, he removed the song from the Rock General charts, which it was sitting at about 100 in, to a more suitable genre, Goth Metal. And watched with amazement as it climbed in one day to 25 and then slowly up to 5. Where it stayed for a few days, then dropped back down again.
So now Deus Sceptrum has a full crew of musicians, all working hard on producing the best quality music they can for Sojourn Of Faith, which is scheduled for release sometime 2008.
Enjoy the music.
