Dear TSF and TSF-members,

A short-report from Sharon about this weekend;

Friday afternoon we came back from Japan, where we did two clubshows, which was a great experience! Those Japanese people rock hard :-). Saturday-night we had the honor to close the Waldrock festival, in Friesland. Most of us crawled into bed around three or four o'clock. Except for Martijn and Jeroen who drove through some glass, from a car accident that had just happened. They had to change a tire in the middle of the night. Believe it or not they were still lucky compared to some other cars who had the same fate and were standing still with four flat tires.

This morning Robert and I were woken up by a wake-up call from Robert's mobile phone. At least that's what we thought... So, we jumped under the shower, had breakfast, brushed our teeth etc. We had just started our drive to Eindhoven, when I asked Robert 'How long is this drive to Eindhoven?'. 'Why?' he replied. 'Well, why do we need to leave at seven o'clock?' 'It's not seven o'clock ,it's nine o'clock'. ' Oh my God, you're right it's seven o'clock...
Apparently my mobile phone went of reminding us for an appointment we had in Japan but filled in a wrong date or something.

As I have the same mobile phone and apparently the same taste for ring-tones, mine went off two hours earlier...lol. We drove back and slept another one and half hour...zzz We arrived at the Effenaar at 10.30. This was the first time for us in the new Effenaar. So we took our selves on a short tour, to check out the venue. We had lots of things to sign for the lottery and after that we went through the acoustic songs and preparing the drum-kit as the band-sound. We had not played 'Restless' for a while and this was the first time we played 'Angels' in this way. So that needed some practice as well.

To my surprise 'Ivar de Graaf' and his girlfriend were also present. Our former drummer was asked to present a quiz. So he recorded a few of our songs but they were performed in a different musical style. 'Stand my ground' became a salsa song, Ice queen was performed in a country way and so on. Pretty hilarious :-). Contestants had to guess the titles and had to the answers to a lot of diverse questions in order to win some WT stuff.

After a short question round between us and the fans we had a signing session. Next time we will take even more time for it because 600 people don't fit in 45 min. So the 45. min became more than a hour and still we didn't have the time to sign everything, our apologies for that.

After our acoustic set and a short and spontaneous drum performance of 'Silvin' Stephen's son, we said goodbye to Sabina from TSF. We are sorry to see her go and hope that the new ' Sabina' will have the same talent and devotion. 'Sabina' TNX for those two years and the rest of TSF I would like to thank you on behalf of WT for your hard work and time for today, the magazine & internet site this year. TSF-members thanks for your presence, the cards, flowers and all the other gifts and we hope to see soon!

It was also really great to see the members from outside of the Netherlands increasing so rapidly. Tnx for coming all this way to our little country and we hope you to see you all again as well!

All the best!

Martijn, Ruud, Robert, Jeroen , Stephen & Sharon

Attention!
- The venue will open its doors at 13:00 instead of 12:00 as indicated earlier. This means the program will start at 13:30!
- The A2 to get to Eindhoven will be partly closed this weekend, due to maintenance. You're adviced to come to the fanclub day with alternative transport!

What? Where? And when?
The official Within Temptation fanclub day 2007 will take place on Sunday July 8th from 13:30 till 17:00 in the Effenaar in Eindhoven.

Program:
Like last year, the presentation will be in the capable hands of Ivar de Graaf. The program starts at 13:30 and will consist of an acoustic performance, an autograph session, a question round, a lottery and a WT quiz. Obviously you'll have a chance to win cool prizes during the lottery and the quiz, such as (signed) CD's, DVD's, shirts, a litho, tickets for the WT concert in Eindhoven at the end of November and more! For the quiz Ivar will select volunteers from the audience. The autograph session will last 45 minutes and unfortunately there's no room to change this. Because of that you're only allowed to have 1 item signed per person and there won't be time to have your picture taken with the band. If everyone sticks to these 2 simple rules we're confident that every member who is interested will be able to obtain an autograph.
At the back of the venue there will be the possibility to sit down, for those of you who need a little bit of rest every now and then. Obviously, all band members will be present at the fanclub day, so this might be your chance to get your picture taken with them. Around 17:00 the fanclub day will unfortunately have to come to an end.

Stands:
There will be stands from The Silent Force and Within Temptation. At the TSF stand you can get the new official fanclub shirt for only € 15,-! Of course, you can still also get the original fanclub T-shirt, but for the reduced price of € 10,-! Something else you'll find at the TSF stand are tickets for the lottery for as little as €1 each. Furthermore you can buy your copies of fanzines 3, 4 & 5 here for €3,- each. Fanzines 1 and 2 are unfortunately completely sold out. Last, but not least, you can get beaufitul, original etchings of Sharon made by artist Tim Verberk. These etchings are numbered and thus limited! Including a nice passe-partout they only cost €20,- per piece.

We're happy to announce that Frank and Joanna Koopmans will be present with their stand this year too! Frank is the maker of the gorgeous, limited WT pendants. They will be selling gorgeous fantasy figurines and beautiful jewellery among many other things! And they will have another unique item to show you: the prototype of our fantastic TSF-PENDANTS! Starring Sypho the dragon, of course ;)



Transport:
From Friday July 6th 22:00 till Monday July 9th 5:30, the A2 highway will be closed for all traffic in both ways from junction Batadorp and connection 31 Veldhoven. The traffic will be diverted and this means you'll have to take a longer travel time into account. Because of the enormous traffic rush that is expected, you are advised to avoid the A2 Ring Eindhoven during this weekend and plan an alternate route, or choose a different type of transport. The State will be working on the road in order to renew the A2/A67 Ring Eindhoven. So it is advisable to come to Eindhoven by public transport. The Effenaar is situated right across Eindhoven Central Station, and thus perfectly reachable by train from all directions. For information on train time tables, check www.ns.nl and for a travelling plan to the Effenaar, you can go to www.effenaar.nl. For more information concerning the close-down of the A2, click on this link www.randwegeindhoven.nl.

Tickets:
All members from Holland, Germany, France and the U.K., who had paid for their tickets by Monday July 2nd 10:00 at the latest, will be getting their tickets by mail. You can check persoonlijke fanclubdag pagina to see if your payment has been processed. The other members will be able to pick up their tickets at the entrance of the Effenaar, where they will have to show a valid I.D. These members will get a confirmation e-mail by Saturday July 7th 12:00 at the latest. PLEASE NOTE: no tickets will be sold at the door! And make sure you have your The Silent Force membership pass with you, because you might be asked to show it. Of course not all members have a (year 2) membership pass, because their membership was activated or re-activated after March 21st. Don't worry! There will be a list at the entrance with those members, so it's not a problem. To check when your membership was activated, go to mijn profiel pagina.

And more...
As with every event, there's a couple of rules you have to take into account. It is not allowed to bring your OWN food and beverages (into the hall)! Of course, food and drinks can be bought inside the Effenaar! It's also possible to leave the venue, if you want to go eat somewhere else. If you go outside, you will get a stamp, that will allow you to go back inside without problems. (Photo)cameras are not a problem, as long as they're not professional camera's with removable lenses. Of course there will be an extensive photo-report on the website and in the coming fanzine.

Of course we’re all huge fans of WT, but who is the ‘biggest fan’ of our favorite band? That’s what we’d like to know! Send us a photo that shows why you are Within Temptation’s biggest fan and you’ll have a chance to win 1 of 5 signed copies of the 'American What Have You Done single'!

Send your photo to info@thesilentforce.com or to Stichting The Silent Force, att. Online contest, Postbus 1085, 2280CB, Rijswijk ZH, The Netherlands before August 31st. The winners will receive their prize as soon as possible after the contest has closed and their names will also be announced on the fanclub website. Only TSF members can participate and correspondence concerning the outcome of this contest is not possible.

Attention! By participating in this contest you automatically authorize TSF to use your photograph in the fanclub magazine.

We’re looking forward to your entries! Good luck! :)

The solution to the puzzle from the 5th fanzine is RUNNING UP THAT HILL. 5 winners were drawn from all the correct entries:

- Denise Meyer from Varik, Netherlands
- Sharon Rook from Capelle a/d IJssel, Netherlands
- Laure Picard du Chambon from Veynes, France
- Ellen-Jane Kruger from Drogheda, Ireland
- Yael Nov from Jerusalem, Israel

The prizes (signed copy of THOE) will be shipped to the winners as soon as possible! CONGRATULATIONS!

We’ve had many great submissions, but in the end we decided to call our dragon SYPHO. This name was made up by Demi Vaartjes from Landgraaf (NL). He gave us the following explanation: “Sy and pho sound the same as si and fo from Silent Force. What’s more, Sypho resembles symphonic, and WT does make symphonic metal.”

The 2nd poster went to Liisa Koskinen from Finland. She suggested we call the dragon SILENCE, which we also liked very much. Thanks everyone, for the many wonderful and original contributions, and congrats to the winners! Sypho is very content :)

Finally we can also announce the location of the fanclub day 2007. It will be the venue 'de Effenaar' in Eindhoven. This venue has recently won the 3rd prize in the Dutch competition for the 'Nighttemple Award 2007' and is located opposite the central station in Eindhoven. We're convinced that we've found a beautiful and easily accessible location for fans in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.

Besides that, Eindhoven is reached easily and relatively cheap from various airports in Europe, so fans from other countries will also be able to come to Eindhoven. No flight to Eindhoven from a city near you? It only takes 1,5 hour by train to travel from Schiphol airport to Eindhoven!

More information concerning registration for this event and the program will follow soon!

More information:
Effenaar: www.effenaar.nl
Dutch railways: www.ns.nl
Eindhoven Airport: www.eindhovenairport.com

The 10 members of the The Silent Force crew are mentioned on the crew page. But there is one very important face connected to the WT fanclub, that doesn’t even háve a name yet: the dragon from our logo! Make up a suitable name for this magnificent little creature, and maybe you will win 1 of the 2 ‘The Heart Of Everything’ posters, if the dragon gets to wear the name you came up with!

This contest is for TSF members only. Each member can send in 2 names. Correspondence about the outcome of this contest is not possible. All entries should be submitted by May 1st 2007! Please send your entries to info@thesilentforce.com, or write to Stichting The Silent Force, att. 2nd online contest, Postbus 1085, 2280 CB, Rijswijk ZH, The Netherlands. The winners will receive their prize as soon as possible, and will be announced on the fanclub website.

Good luck! :)

The survey has been taken offline. We would like to thank everyone who participated. The lucky winners are:

2 Tickets for the WT concert on March 14 in Amsterdam
Imre Cok

A signed copy of The Heart Of Everything
Jaap Boogerd - Tessa Wong - Lizanne Gille - Smaranda Huizing - Desiree Arends - Nicolas Creplet - Frank De Beer - Rob Spits - Michael Katz - Wendy Post

An exclusive The Heart Of Everything poster
Benoit Gutz - Dave Hopman - Cédric Monperrus - Bianca De Wit - Erik-Jan Bijleveld - Kristien Lammers - Jeroen Van Holland - Robbert Zwanepol - Maartje Cooijman - Ilona Spierenburg - Maaike Van De Langenberg - Ana Sousa - Frank Winter - Auriane De Coster - Mark Delk

SonyBMG will contact the winners per e-mail for their addresses.

Peter Post has replaced Rob Spits as treasurer of The Silent Force. Hereby we would like to thank Rob for his dedication, and bid Peter a warm welcome!

The fanclub day 2007 will be held on SUNDAY JULY 8th! More information, for example concerning the location, the time and program, will follow as soon as possible. We’re already looking forward to it! :)