by Mike McShane

I was recently given a chance to do an interview with Legion of the mighty Marduk. Since Marduk have recently released an album (La Grande Danse Macabre) and completed a US tour in support of Deicide, I figured he would have a lot to talk about. As you will see from the following interview, Legion was so talkative that his answers often encompassed not only the questions I asked him, but also the questions that I would have asked him next, had he given me the chance. I barely got a word in edgewise. Many hails to Legion for being such a friendly, outgoing guy! You can tell he's very into what he and Marduk are creating...pure unholy Christraping Black Metal!

ID: How are you doing?
Legion: I'm doing pretty fucking fine. I was kind of road-worn when we got home from the US tour because just before that we'd been doing a European tour as well, and [there was] only four days in between. So it was basically like two-and-a-half to three months out on the road with no stop, and this weekend we headlined one of the stages at the Grasspop Metal Meeting in Belgium together we played with Cradle of Filth and Motorhead and Megadeth and Judas Priest and stuff so that was pretty cool.

ID: So how did the US tour go for you guys?
Legion: It was awesome. I mean, we didn't really know what to expect at all, we just went there in the state of mind to just expect about anything, you know, and it turned out really cool. We had some backlight problems and stuff like that because some change-ups with the bill and everything. There was some problems when we first got there. We didn't get to play on proper equipment so on some shows we had some amplifier blow-outs and stuff like that, but I mean it all got sorted out after a while, and so apart from stuff like that it was pretty good. We were real satisfied. I mean right now we're planning a new leg of touring.

ID: Are you coming back?
Legion: Yeah, during this autumn. We've been talking loosely about it with our booking agency so as it looks now it'll be somewhere...October most likely. Definitely during fall time anyway. Because then during Christmas, and maybe a little bit before that like late November and December, we'll play throughout Europe--at first as a headliner and then we'll do a couple of shows together with Cannibal Corpse and Kreator.

ID: Awesome! I just have to say that the new album, Le Grande Danse Macabre, is great.
Legion: Alright, alright.

ID: I really love it, from the opening riff of "Ars Moriendi," that just blows me away and then it does not stop until the album is over.
Legion: Yeah, that's cool to hear. I think it turned out pretty cool, because after Panzer we had nowhere to go into like that really fast area because Panzer Division Marduk was an all-grinding album, but we had a ton of ideas for slower stuff and more diverse stuff. So we just sat down and wrote basically what we felt like playing for the time being, and also to be a nice wrap-up together with the lyrics and have everything come together as a whole. So, I think it definitely turned out real good.

ID: I agree. How did the recording for that go?
Legion: Pretty quick. I mean, it was pretty much like a punk rock recording. I was really freaked out that everything was so smooth because we always felt like that; that we know exactly what to do before going into the studio, and up until now we haven't spent any time on producing stuff. Next time we'll definitely spend more time in the studio toying around with some guitar licks and more guitar solo ideas and stuff like that. But this one only took nine days to record and mix, it was--hah, it almost freaked us out because everything went so really damn smooth. So, when I got there to do the lyrics, or the vocals, I entered the vocal booth and four hours later I was done and I was like, "What the fuck is up with this?" You know? Because on "Panzer Division Marduk" I was in there for like 20 hours, maybe, divided into two days. So, now we just tried out a couple of songs, and my voice was there from the beginning, and it was just like, "boom" and then we had it on tape. So yeah, it was a really quick recording. Then we just mixed it and we really enjoyed what we heard from the beginning so we didn't really consider staying in there longer and trying to fuck around with the range and add stuff on top or whatever. We let it be pretty minimalistic in that sense, you know? That it's basically just like two guitars, one bass, drums and vocals and it's just like "boom!"

ID: Sounds like it went great.
Legion: Yeah, I mean, it's just like...especially how when we record in the Abyss Studio, Peter, he's such a really good friend of the band, he's been for ages, he's been with us on two tours and one gig as a second guitarist, and we're really close to both him and his brother. So when we go up there it's pretty much we can use the studio at our disposal, you know? He just tossed us the keys and then he just supervised everything because we know how to operate that studio, except for like mixing and some other stuff. So, going up there, it's almost like using a studio of your own so it makes you work very relaxed and it's cool up there. You don't have anybody leaning over your shoulder and like, "Hey, but guys, blah blah blah blah blah." Just like, he's just laughing and, "Do what the fuck you want," you know? So it's really good.

ID: That's cool. You guys think you'll be going back to the same studio for your next album?
Legion: Yeah, most likely, at least for the recording. We have been talking about mixing at a some other place just to get a sound of our own again and maybe work with some producer actually next time, but we don't know. Because that producer's gotta at least share kinda the same vision as us, otherwise he'll be like, "Yeah, hey guys, I just heard that, that and that was kind of hit right now, you could make yourselves some more albums if you sound like this or that." And we don't want that, somebody to interfere with our ideas, maybe just like some death metal smartass who can just come out with something like, "Hey, what about this and that?" You know, just come up with some ideas to add on a little bit to what we have created, but we don't know. The only bad thing about Abyss is that, I mean, everything's very--from the beginning it was us and also Dark Funeral was up there pretty much the same time as us, doing their first album, and ever since pretty much all the black metal bands that sound anywhere near us also went there and were like, "Hey, give us that sound." So, all the new bands coming out from up here, they want to sound like some certain particular way or something, and I mean, yeah, it's kind of shitty that you get mixed up with too much bands because they've all copied the way you sound. So from that point of view it could be good to go to another studio at least for the mixing, to try to get more of a sound of our own. But on the other hand, it's sort of not our problem if people wanna rip off stuff from us because then if we change and, let's say that Marduk, Immortal, and some others got a different sound, then all the youngsters would get that sound anyways. I mean, definitely for the recording next time we're going for that studio, yeah.

ID: So, to change things up a little bit, what are some bands you've been listening to a lot lately? Is there anybody in particular?
Legion: Yeah, since I got home, it's... let's see, what's been up? It's like, Danzig, as always (laughs), Rainbow and stuff. Yeah, ever since I got home it's been not so much metal. Normally I just listen to like Slayer, Possessed, and then the 80's heroes like the heavy metal dudes.

ID: Right.
Legion: Also like Exodus and stuff like that, like thrashy metal, and also some really cool death metal like the early Morbid Angel albums, and Deicide and stuff. But ever since we got home it's been a ton of Ozzy Osbourne (laughs), like the early albums with him which are so fucking amazing, like "Blizzard of Ozz," "Diary of a Madman," and "Bark at the Moon." That stuff has been going all the time pretty much so...it's been good. Just dig out some old 80's music and also like Rainbow and shit from the 70's. And yeah, just kick back and listen to a little bit different stuff than what you've been tangled with the entire spring and stuff. It's been, actually, since like a month before Halloween last year we've had like ten days off from the band. So now it's really good to get some other shit going than just the brutal stuff. Definitely going to be some more of that shit during this summer, trying to get a little perspective of everything.

ID: I was wondering if we could maybe talk about the lyrics a little bit. You've always got a lot of really blasphemous lyrics; from "Fuck Me Jesus" all the way through. Even the description of Marduk's music that you always hear is "Christraping Black Metal," you know?
Legion: Yeah.

ID: Is there any particular reason you like these kinds of themes so much? Legion: Yeah, I mean, it's...what should I say? It's uplifting (laughing).

ID: [Laughs]
Legion: It's like, it's a great feeling. I mean...I guess that we're just passionate about it, you know? It's like a great thing. I was a sucker for all this shit when I was a youngster, when I guess it was hard rock and movies and occult stuff, just fascination for the occult, which led me onto this path and always when you're a youngster and searching for answers you hook up with people who think like you, you know? So you can just expand your mind through talking to people who think and feel the same way as you do. And ever since I hooked up with Morgan we've been pretty much impossible to separate. We've always been hanging and talking about everything, and he was onto the same path as me pretty much. We've been covering a ton of different shit lyric-wise, since the start, or since I got in the band as well, but everything is definitely from a certain point of view. But that is not really so strange in that it's what we think and how we look upon the world. So yeah, definitely, I think it's a really great feeling to just haul out this totally blasphemous stuff.

ID: Marduk has always been known for kind of upholding the ideals of the early black metal scene. Do you have any thoughts about the current state of the black metal scene?
Legion: Yeah, I don't really know what to say about it because, up here, there is no scene anymore. I mean, yeah, that second rise of black metal up from up here, it was pretty much Mayhem was the first band that got onto it. They woke it all up again and maybe even earlier, actually, was a band called Morbid from Sweden. I don't know if you've heard about them?

ID: I've heard of them. That was Dead's first band.
Legion: They were pretty much black metal already in like '87. And then the man who actually passed it on to Mayhem was Dead when he joined them because earlier Mayhem was not really Satanic. They had some Venom influences and stuff, but he was the one turning it into total black metal. And then Darkthrone came along and also wanted to be black metal and after that bands like Marduk and Immortal and Dissection and stuff got... or Dissection wanted to label themself as Satanic death metal, but to me it's really no difference, you know? It's like the two first Slayer albums is just as much black metal to me as anything that we have done, for instance, or like the early Morbid Angel albums or Deicide for that sense, it's like it could all be black metal really to me. But anyway, then bands like us got into it and it was a couple of great years that followed when all the bands who rose pretty much like the black metal bands then was kind of rebellion against death metal going soft, like, starting to toy around with all this kind of too much keyboards and female vocals, or lyrics about boycotting McDonald's, stuff like that. Then all them angry black metal guys are here to keep up the brutal traditon, and the gay thing is that when this scene actually started to gain some success they all turned pretty much wimpier than the death metal scene ever was. And it's all about red roses and violet light and, you know, it's like [singing], "Ohh ohh ohh." So nowadays, at least up here, it seems that the black metal scene is totally being destroyed by the power metal scene because that's what's growing really huge up here now, and everybody seems to want to be into it. Like former death metal guys who turned into black metal guys who still hasn't scored with their band, they all try to be like Blind Guardian or fucking Helloween right now, so it kinda sucks because I never, ever appreciated that music at all. Like the power metal thing to me is, well, I don't like it, that kind of German style metal, you know, or the shit that's like a ton of guys playing it right now and I think it sucks. Also, you know, stupid lyrics and a cover with a hand coming out of water or a totally cartoony-drawn dragon--that's what is becoming fucking huge up here right now. It's like...I don't really give it too much thought because it's so not interesting to me, and basically where I draw my bottom line is that Marduk will always be Marduk, and that is all that really matters to me. As soon as we feel that we have not got any more to give to the scene, we are better off doing something different, you know? Instead of trying to be something different and still call your band the same, because that is like, to let your fans down, pretty much. I mean look what happened to Megadeth, or Metallica, Anthrax...they were all great bands way back, and now from the early metal bands from the States it's like only Slayer that still is kind of true to what they did once in the past. I mean, today they are kind of different from what they did, but in some way you've gotta respect that because as a musician you want to develop, but I mean Slayer is still Slayer, you know? In one way because they are still about what they were about in the beginning anyway. It's still violence and insanity and a fucking brutal approach, rather than going soft and trying to be like fucking Alabama hillbilly rock just to sell some albums. So, that is the approach we are going to have as well, you know? As long as we are here we will be here to be brutal and obnoxious.

ID: That's good to hear. So, any plans for upcoming Marduk releases in the near future, or...?
Legion: Yeah, right now we're putting together all the material for a box set that is going to come out on Halloween, at least when it is scheduled to come out in Europe. And it's gonna be a box with a lyric sheet, it'll be like a booklet--a comic-sized booklet--with all our old lyrics, like a ton of unpublished photos and a biography and all kinds of stuff that can be cool to have. Also it'll be two cds containing all kinds of different shit and it'll be a one-and-a-half hour VHS video of previously unreleased material as well. We're sorting everything out right now so you're about to see what it'll be about, but it's gonna be pretty cool. Century Media will license it in the States, and we'll limit the set most likely to around 10,000. Then it'll be gone. It'll be kind of a celebration that we've been going for so long, and we have been asked so many times for our old lyrics which were never released on "Dark Endless," "Those of the Unlight," "Opus Nocturne," and, yeah, the "Fuck Me Jesus" demo, of course, but all that is on "Dark Endless." Also, in "Panzer Division Marduk" no lyrics was included, so that is going to be all the lyrics in there. We originally intended to release it as a book with all kinds of stuff in it, but then we just thought, "What the hell?" when we had all this shit just lying at home, collecting dust. We thought, "Let's throw that in as well." So that one is gonna come out during fall time, and we've already started to write songs for the next Marduk album, but we won't go into the studio most likely until June next year, so now we'll be home July, August, and September, from then on we'll tour October, November, December, and then we need some more months to just like go through all the material, really make it killer and work on some ideas to produce it and stuff. So maybe we'll record it in different sessions, we'll go there in late May, early June to do the basics and then we go in there to do some guitar and bass work and go there again with some additional guitar work, and then the vocals and mix it maybe two times, and then we put it out. So, it won't come out until next autumn the earliest.

ID: That box set sounds cool, I'll have to pick that up...
Legion: Yeah, we thought so, that it'd be a nice thing to own if you are into any of our works.

ID: Alright. Well, thanks a lot for this interview, I really appreciate talking to you.
Legion: Thank you, it was really cool.

ID: Anything else?
Legion: Yeah, I just want to send a great hail to the American Marduk Legions for making our US tour such a fucking blast, and we'll see all of you again. And, if you're not a metalhead you might as well be dead!

Official Marduk Website