1. It is quite a long time since you entered the black metal scene, one might say that you are already professionals in their field. What was your opinion and feelings about black metal at that time, when you first came into the scene? How are they now? I believe it is not only your personality which grew up, but also your opinions.

Yeah, that is inivitable to not change during all these years listening and playing extreme music. Some bands do their thing after playing for 10 or 20 years by still play just about what they did when they started out and some like to progress and see where the music takes them, Legion is always progressing and for our next album who knows what kind of new elements we will include. How black metal it is? I´d say not at all. We are not a BM as I look upon it, we´ve never have actually. It is easy to catagorizise it since the music has it´s shapes from the genre but as Jon Nötveidt also described Dissections music, they weren´t black metal since they didn´t raise their cups to worship anything, they just dealed with all around the dark themes and what not after he got out of jail and I´d say that Legion is a rather personal Dark themed entity with lyrics also dealing with damnation and sickness which is more our cup of blood.

2. About your last recording „Revocation“; I still remember very well the way how I fell in love with crazy fast guitar parts which were literally murderously luxurious! About the new piece I would say that you moved the main force into slower passages which excels by its intensity. Am I wrong?

Slow parts, as you call it, are one of the new elements that we wished to add for this album. We felt that certain riffs are better to play slower so we experimented a lot with playing a part in different ways. Hell, we could spend a 4 hour rehearsal to just progress 15 seconds through a song. Our creational process is where we put our most effort usually but for this album we also spent a lot of time in the studio trying different things out by adding a new dimension off effects and keyboards to the instruments we play.

3. In addition, you added into your arsenal of musical instruments keyboards. It gives the whole album a nice diversity. Who came up with this idea to use keyboards? Did you hire somebody to record these pieces, or is it someone from the band who is playing keys?

It was mainly David and Rikard who did all the keyboards on "A bliss to suffer". It was very time efforting since we never use keyboards on the rehearsals so we had to experiment through all the songs we had for the album. We couldn´t sit everyday in the studio and work for hours as you usually can when recording since we are also busy with other work. Therefore, the album has been delayed for some time now but it is lucky that we have our own studio so we don´t have to rush things which would end up in a not so pleased album of ours.

4. Not just the keyboards created a completely unique atmosphere. The recording offers a lot of epic moments, which in connection with pure atrocity creates amazingly sophisticated combination. Did you plan to create such atmospheric recording or did it come up spontaneously?

Epic, darker parts, has always been a thing of ours. We can´t have songs without those passages! Sometimes when we have created a really atmospheric cool epic lick we yell out in joy to each other and play it over and over again to find hooks that can fit with it. That´s they way it is with the creation of music, if you find the joy when creating then you shouldn´t stop until you can´t push it any further so sometimes our rehearsals have given me so enough energy to affect me hours after. Energy that creates creativity to write more material for the band.


5. We know that the vocalist Lazr Martinsson is back in band. Can you give us a closer look at the situation, how did it start? Were you discussing other possible singers? Were you also considering someone else than Lazr?

After we parted ways with our previous vocalist Kjetil Hektoen, we didn´t have a vocalist for a long time, but that didn´t really bother us since we have always focused mostly on the music and mainly the vocal patterns in the vocal department. When it was time to put down the vocals for "A bliss to suffer" we didn´t have time to look for a new guy to do it so we decided to do it ourselves. Me and David did some tests and we also asked Lazr if he could do some too and he agreed. After listening a couple of times we came to the conclusion that neither mine or Davids voice could be measured with how Lazr´s voice was. He was the only one that could make his contribution fit the music the best way so we asked him if he wanted a permanent spot in the band and he agreed to it!

6. Lately many black metal bands started using various voice positions than only a black metal vocal and your band is not an exception. However, in many cases it is just a try which singers cannot finish the way they wanted to. Fortunately, this is not your case! Was the intention in using more voice positions, to be nearer to the „modern“ style of Black Metal?

You could say that, as I mentioned before, we strive to find new elements all the time and this was one of them. It opens up many new ways of thinking when you blend in different voice pitch levels. Cleaner tonal vocals are something we will definitely use more of in the future.

7. The last album „A Bliss to Suffer” was released within three years, since the previous one. As it almost looks like some kind of intention, releasing albums each three years. However it is time long enough to create high quality album, perfect and sophisticated as this one is. Can you describe the last three years of the work?

3 is a magic number...I´m glad to hear that you like it! We are damn proud ourselves! It actually just took us one year to create this album we worked really fast with the creational process! The thing is that we recorded it for 2 years so 1+2= "A bliss to suffer".

8. As is evident from previous question, this album is the most advanced you have ever released. There is no discussion that this is a material for more demanding listeners. You, as musicians, have a reason to be proud of yourselves. Or are you keeping your heads cool and preparing maybe something even bigger?

I think it is more straight forward on this one than earlier. We played more technical on the first 2 albums so my guess is that is more easy listening now, totally opposite to what you said but I guess it is a way of listening :)

We don´t feel that we need to top this album, I think we gonna do that anyway thanks to our personal development both in the band and outside. That contributes to be more open to new things that we can blend into our music and I have already lots of ideas of how we gonna do next album.

9. Dragu, you must be very busy because of the duty to Devian nowadays. How do you catch in all concerts and rehearsals? Is there a possibility to organize everything the way that everyone is happy?

So far it hasn´t been a problem. When I was in Marduk rehearsing and touring a lot I could still find time for The Legion.
Since I look upon this band like a kid of mine I´ve never felt that it is too much of an effort. I take care of it together with David, Rickard mainly and sometimes with our more mobile members, Lazr and Kristoffer.

Sure, Devian takes up alot of my woken time since I write songs for the band but so do I for The Legion so it feels like I´m a centerpiece between the bands which gives me quite a lot of control on how things can work for the best to both bands. We also share rehearsals room so it is very convenient with sharing the rent apart from when it comes to lending things to each other....At one point (and this is just one of many examples) one guitarist of Devian "borrowed" things from The Legion without asking and also accidentally destroyed studio equipment, then a war set out and I´m in the middle taking blame for everything but hey, you have to be able to laugh about it too!


10. If I am not wrong, you have not visited Czech Republic (during your tours) yet. That is of course very sad, because I would gladly come to your show! Are you not interested in coming here and playing in the heart of Europe?

Of course we´d love to do that! All eastern European countries are my favourite ones! Mostly cause the people are so warm and friendly and that you have a interesting culture along with all crazy people at the shows (from my experience in Czech with Marduk and Devian)! Hopefully we will be there soon! If not, we will work harder to come over to your country!

11. Some are talking about shoddy and not so original names of bands. Have you faced this kind of in-reference or gossiping from your audience?

Not really, we have just heard good things about our band except for our 2 first vocalists that they sounded like Dani Filth from Cradle, but other than that just thumbs up. Even if we would hear any bad reviews of our new album we would pretty much not care, we do what we enjoy doing and it is up to each and everyone to agree or disagree.

12. This is all from me. Thank you for the interview and the last words belongs to you!

Thanks a lot for the opportunity to raise our name in Czech Republic! We are soooooo looking forward to come to your country and give you a violent doze of Swedish mayhem! If you can´t wait for us, visit us at http://www.legion.nu or http://www.myspace.com/legionsweden.