Hail to Thee!!! My first question will be quite typical and predictable - could you tell me the history of the band?

- Ok... I’ll try the short version. The band was formed in 1992, at that time under a different name. Back then the their music was plain death metal and during the following years they played with DESULTORY, AT THE GATES and others. In ‘94 there was a reformation of the line up. With a new guitarist (Pasi) and a new drummer (Hugo) the first demo titled "Dance Of Dying Dreams" was recorded. From there on their music has evolved more and more towars black metal. As you all know, “Pandemonic Requiem” was recorded in Dec. ‘96, and since Johan was tired of both playing bass and screaming, I joined the band right after that.

No Fashion promotes your debut CD, “Pandemonic Requiem”, as ‘...symphonic mayhem...’, but I can’t see much symphonic elements in the stuff you compose...

- Um... well. I have no idea where that came from. You'll have to ask No Fashion about that.

What caused such a delay between the album’s recording and its release date?

- I guess the answer to this question would be the same as above...

I think that the band’s name should reflect the mood of the music. Would you agree with me? What does ‘Noctes’ mean and how did that name appear?

- I agree. I don't think there is a straight translation of 'Noctes' is any language. Johan came up with the name, and I think he got it from 'nox noctis' which means ‘night’ in Latin.

What are your impressions of the Studio Sunlight and Tomas Skogsberg’s work? Are you pleased with the way “Pandemonic Requiem” sounds?

- I think the guys had a great time in Sunlight recording "Pandemonic Requiem", and everybody is satisfied with the result.

Who is that Lord Havila who helped you with backing vocals on “Orphean Horizons”?

- Lord Havila is an old friend of the band. We used to share rehearsal rooms with his band before. He is currently involved in a project called THE CRYSTAL TEAR.

Female bassist in the band is a rather weird thing to see... How do you get along with four evil men, or are you even more evil (*grins*)?

- Evil? Yes, that would be me. There aren't a lot of women who are in to black metal, and the few that are only hang out at parties or gigs and act groupies. That’s good though, because that leaves all the more room for me! No, but seriously, I have played in bands with only women - and it sucks!

All of you use their real names instead of those typical aliases… Is it a challenge against settled BM traditions?

- That’s something we have never even discussed. I guess we feel figuring out cool names for ourselves is not a priority.

Are you happy with No Fashion Records as a record company and with the way they promote you? F.ex. LORD BELIAL couldn't ever say anything positive in regards to No Fashion… Did you ever have any offers to change the record company?

- As others, we have had our moments with No Fashion. It took them 1 year to release an already recorded album and the guy who was supposed to work with Hugo on the layout was a complete idiot. For this album Hugo and Holger will be working with some new people though who seems really cool, so I think it will work out. Don’t know for sure though until the new album is out. We haven't talked about changing company. It hasn't gone quite that far yet. We'll see how everything goes with the new album. It's looking much brighter now though than it did last winter.

You have quite unusual (“Butterfly”) and ‘good-sounding’ (“Twilight Elysium”, “Reverie”, “Attila”) song titles, at least they don't sound typical or heckneyed Who writes lyrics in NOCTES and what are they telling about?

- Johan writes all the lyrics and makes up the song titles. He has a personal interest in ancient history so I think that influences him a lot. Besides that I believe the lyrics are mostly about dreams and (sexual-?)fantasies, heh heh.

One more thing concerning your lyrics... All of them seem to be written in English and that’s great, since there are too many Swedish bands composing their verses in their own language it is a good thing, but foreign listeners like me dont understand anything...

- Besides that it's good to write the lyrics in english so that people can understand them, I know that Johan finds it more easy and natural that way.

What about your motherland? Are you pleased with the country you live in?

- Sweden is a good place for us. Not to many religous people, and pretty much freedom. There has been far to few black metal gigs here in Stockholm during the last year though. Somebody has to do something about that! In the old days, Holger and Johan used to gather some bands at "Aztor", a place where we used to reherse, now and then. Now that most of us has got jobs and stuff, no one seems to have the time for that anymore.

I asked a lot of Swedes this question, but no one of them could answer me The question consists in the following: why does Sweden possess NUMEROUS number of bands similar to each other and works of the ones who influence all of them, I mean DISSECTION, AT THE GATES and DARK TRANQUILLITY...
 
- Um... yes, that’s a good question... (the answer is even more good :( - ED)

I wouldn’t call “Pandemonic Requiem” a brand new stuff, so may I hope that you have at least some new songs ready? When are you planning to release the second album of yours?

- Actually we have just finished recording our second album, which contains 11 tracks and probably will be titled "Vexilla Regis Prodeunt INFERNI". We chose Sunlight again, but this time we worked with Jocke Petterson from DAWN and THY PRIMORDIAL. It went really smooth and we are all very pleased with the sound. It's slightly different from "Pandemonic Requiem". Less reverb on all instruments and more vocals. It should be out sometime this Spring. We have now just started working on material for what will be our third album.

And now it’s time for the final pandemonic requiems
 
- Yepp. Thanks for now. I'll see you in hell.
 

NOCTES contact –
Email: asa.rosenberg@sodertalje.mail.telia.com
       noctes@rocketmail.com