As far as I know, Nuclear Blast never deals with neophyte acts which are, therefore, still badly known worldwide. Consequently it makes me wonder how did you manage to get signed to this company without formerly even having a mini-CD out?

- Well, our first demo received enthusiastic responses even in the major press, so already labels like Century Media showed their interest. With our second demo, which sold more than 2000 copies, we received even more offers, so after some negotiations, we decided to join the best company, namely Nuclear Blast.

In my view, "Higher Art Of Rebellion" is quite a different work if we would compare it to "Blacken The Angel". Sort of less commercial (well, not really "less commercial", but more likely "less intelligible") as well as much more versatile and undoubtedly distinguishable. What's your opinion on such a comparison?

- Well, it's interesting, as many people said it would be more  commercial than "Blacken The Angel", because we used clean vocals and so on... but it isn't, we don't care about being commercial anyway. Which band would record an album in Romania if they're out for commerce? We've got different goals, we try to deliver the best stuff we can, but we don't sell ourselves. We do whatever we like, we're open-minded in many ways, that's why there are so many influences on "Higher Art Of Rebellion".

I was (and still is) wondering why have so many people (nine, to be exact) have taken part in "Higher Art Of Rebellion" recording sessions?

- Well, first of all because of the problems with our vocalist Vlad who's still stuck in Romania. He's a founding member of the band, and native Romanian. He lived in Germany for some years, but wasn't allowed to return once he was back in Romania. So we had to use the talents of Akaias for the first album. We wanted to feature both vocalists on the second album, and as there was need for good, clean vocals, we used Byron as well. And as Vlad played keyboards in earlier times, too, we had to get a keyboard player, her name is Christine. So, all in all there were nine persons involved.

Byron's voice sounds truly bewitching to my ears! Where have you found him? Furthermore, did you already confirm his participation in the next work of yours?

- He's a friend of Vlad, also Romanian. I got to know him when I visited Vlad for the first time in Romania, and I was surprised about his great voice. We tested him on the new version of "Ribbons / Requiem" which was first featured on "Death Is Just The Beginning 5" as "Ribbons '99", and later on the limited edition of our second album. The result was great, so we used him for the second album. And I'm pretty sure we'll use him also for the third album. He's also been on tour with us last year.

Despite that "Higher Art Of Rebellion" is pretty diversified piece, there's one song which definitely stands out of even such a compositionally-various CD. Obviously "Body Of Clay" is what I'm talking about. Firstly, what does it deal with lyrically (since I'm strongly convinced that it also should be different in terms of poetry), and secondly, what impelled you to enter such a controversial and unorthodox (and, to be honest, "un-black metal") tune "on the agenda"? A lot of people just hate it, y'know…

- I was surprised that so many people like this song, as it really doesn't has anything to do with black metal. The lyrics are taken from a poem of Mihai Eminescu, a famous Romanian poet. Compared to the rest of the album, those lyrics are quite simple, so to say, and easy to understand. So just read them, hehe. More or less, it's a song about love. Of course no bullshit-stuff like you get in the charts, this 'uh baby I love you so' crap. First, it was a song that Vlad wanted to use for his solo-project RA, but after I've heard it, I convinced him we should use it for AGATHODAIMON.

"Higher Art Of Rebellion" was recorded at Magic Sound Studios, located in Romania. For how long have you stayed in that country? What about sharing with us the impressions? I guess, there're plenty of them to be remembered…

- I stayed there for three weeks if I'm not mistaken. It was not the first time that I've been to Romania, but it's always an experience. That's why there's a special section on my website dedicated to Romania. It's a beautiful country in some places, but it's terrible to see that there are also so many poor people, children that live on the streets and so on... if you're living in a western country, you should travel once to Romania to discover that life can be real hard...

What are the latest news regarding Vlad? If I'm not mistaken, he's been replaced by Akaias because of the impossibility to leave Romania, however is there any chance to get him back to Germany? Besides that, how could it happen that a man wasn't let to return to the country he lives in?

- No, he's not replaced. We still work together, although it's very hard with such a geographical distance between us. And to tell this old story again, Vlad was born in Romania and doesn't have a german passport, so he has to get a Visa to come to a state that belongs to the European Union. As he was involved in some trouble with the law, it was very hard to get him to Germany. So that's why we went to Romania last time.

By the way, regarding this mess with a singer… AGATHODAIMON's lyrics are written in both English and Romanian, and that makes me a bit confused since I can't really figure out how does Akaias (being German) contrive to sing in a language he's not acquainted with...

- We also had German lyrics by the way. Of course Romanian isn't Akaias mother language, but English isn't as well. As long as he understands what he's singing, it's okay. The reason for this simply was that we had the songs for our debut album already recorded when it was obvious that we wouldn't get Vlad in time to the studio. So there was no time to translate all of them into English or German. On the second album, Vlad is taking care of the Romanian lyrics.

The lyrics of yours mostly deal with vampiric and alike motifs, right? You know, these subjects get more and more "mass consumption" sort of thing nowadays. A trend getting incredibly common. Aren't you going to make an attempt to distance yourselves from possible accusations in being CoF copycats (that regards only lyrics, of course) or whatever? It gets more and more irritating when death metal acts sing "exclusively" about gore, mass murderers and social problems, whilst black metal ones deal with satanism, occult crap, historical events (sort of Viking stuff, y'know) and vampirism. Isn't there anything else to be inspired with?!

- Noooo.... where do we feature vampires?? We have a song that is called "Neo-Vampirism", but it has nothing to do with vampires, it deals with our society. If anybody thinks we copy Cradle, he should have a look at our lyrics! Cradle do have really great lyrics, but they're completely different to ours! I suppose people think of a vampiric attitude as our vocalist names himself Vlad Dracul. Who, by the way, was a romanian, historic person, and no blood sucker, or whatever Bram Stoker made out of Vlad TEPES.

"Evil", "war" and "misanthropy". These three words strike as imprescriptible part of black metal, at least when it comes to most bands' image and lyrical canvas. Do you consider these words to be of importance talking about the principal message behind the music genre your music is reckoned to? Please, give us your own definition for each of the words I mentioned.

- Evil: An essential part of our music somehow, but I guess we've got a different view concerning this word compared to some of these elitist, 'true' black metal bands. War: One of the plagues of mankind. I wish we'll never face a third world war. I just can laugh about bands that praise war. I guess those are the first to shit in their pants when they stand face to face with a soldier that's pointing his gun to them. Misanthropy: Everybody is it, more or less. I'm a person that needs a lot of privacy and room for my own, as I can't stand being in crowds of people for a longer time. I don't care for any person except for those that are close to my heart, and these are few. To me, the combination of these words isn't important to our music. You should ask MARDUK and other bands like that instead.

Nevertheless, should be a notion of "evil" necessarily associated with aggression and feelings similar to it? Generally speaking, is it a 'congenial' side of life or one can does without it?

- No person is 100% evil or good. It's the balance that counts. Some tend to one, some to the other side. But being evil is surely more entertaining ;)

The flesh is weak, for the man's strength is his spirit. What kind of pleasures would you give your preference to: the pleasures of flesh, or the spiritual ones? Epicureanism shouldn't necessarily be the namesake for mademoiselle de Vercken, y'know (check out "The Inevitability Of Fate" by Marquis De Sade to find out who she is)…

- The pleasures of the flesh do really have an impact on me. But of course this is connected to the spirit as well. The sole look of a woman might turn me on, but it's again the combination of spirit and flesh that is able to satisfy my full needs. But hey, I'm carnivore, this says everything, hehe.

"Higher Art Of Rebellion" already is a year old now. When are you going to unleash it's followup? Any songs ready? Where are you planning to record 'em at? Magic Sound again, I suppose?

- Noooooooooo. Not again Romania! Fuck no. We want to get a good  sound again this time, we'll stay in Germany. We're working hard on new songs, I think we'll record the next album around June or so...  

You have a couple of side-projects (or whatever you call it), namely NOCTE OBDUCTA and RA. Tell us anything you consider to be of importance, regarding these acts.

- Our "side projects"... well, I left NOCTE OBDUCTA one year ago after I've played with them on one demo and 2 albums. It simply became too much to handle two bands, as AGATHODAIMON always is my main priority. Matthias, our drummer, still plays in NOCTE OBDUCTA as it's a good practise for him to play in more than one band. Our vocalist Akaias has his own band ASARU, which is rather black metal (traditional) oriented. And Vlad is working on RA, he has just released the second album "Sinnocence" on his own label Tribal Productions. Hyperion also has a solo project, but wants to keep it secret.

What do you know (and think) regarding Russia? Any metal bands coming from our lands you've heard lately?

- Russia... hm, I only know the old legends like KRUIZ, and have heard GODS TOWER and others. But to be honest, I'm not very interested to discover new bands as I've not enough time to listen to music in general...

Well, thank you for spending your time to answer this interview. I hope, the questions were fine. Anyway, praise me or curse me, but here's some place for you to say (or add) anything you wish…

- Thanks for the interview of course. It's great that even people from Russia have heard of our band! If you'd like to check us out and have internet connection, visit our website at http://www.agathodaimon.de, I'm sure you won't regret it! Of course you'll get the latest news about the band there as well.

AGATHODAIMON contact -
Email: Wickler@gmx.de