If you’re a fan of symphonic metal, you should already be familiar with the majestic music of Leaves’ Eyes. With a focus on Norse mythology and the Viking Age, their lyrical imagery and conceptual records are beyond compare. The powerful and beautiful female/male vocalists Liv Kristine and Alexander Krull has them oftentimes referred to as the Beauty and the Beast of the genre. With the release of their newest album, the epic “King of Kings,” I had the chance to speak with Liv Kristine and find out all the latest happenings with Leaves’ Eyes.
KE: Let’s talk about the new album “King of Kings.” It’s a concept album about Norway’s 1st king Harald Fairhair. Would you give us a little of the historical background on what the record is about?
Liv: The concept of King of Kings is based on Harald “Fairhair” Hårfagre’ life and a special event in the 9th century of Norway’s history. The story, decided into 12 chapters, centers around the Battle of Hafrsfjord and Harald Fairhair’s siege. Hafrsfjord was a decisive battle, and the fame of Harald’s victory was henceforward numbered among the dearest themes of the scald and chronicler in the Middle Ages. The battle paved the way for Harald to gain control over most of the western coast of Norway and rightly call himself king of the country. He placed a Jarl (earl) over each province to govern it. King Harald “Fairhair” is remembered and honoured by medieval historians as the first king of Norway, as in Haraldskvæði.
KE: The album is also very personal for you. Weren’t you born near the historic battle place?
Liv: I have always been interested in history, Viking culture and expansion, and the happenings concerning Norway’s kings. Harald Fairhair is to me the most interesting one, winning this important battle in Hafrsfjord, having extraordinary aims and goals for his home country. Amazingly, the great battle took place where I was born and raised. In general, my birthplace and heritage plays a vital role in the band’s origin.”I grew up by the sea, I played under the sun.” These were the first lines of a poem and a song entitled “Norwegian Lovesong” which I wrote some time before the birth of Leaves’ Eyes in 2003. These lines happened to play a most significant role in the story of our band. Since our debut album “Lovelorn,” I have always felt a deep connection to the history, culture and nature of my home country, Norway. Hafrsfjord is fjord or bay located in the municipalities of Stavanger and Sola in Norway, stretching 9 kilometres. It’s really worth visiting! I always feel a deep inspiration by the sea, moreover, this is a magical place.
KE: You worked with the London Voices choir and the White Russian Symphony Orchestra on this record. How did that collaboration come about?
Liv: At first we recorded “our own” Full Moon Choirs. The full moon choir consists of myself and a number of highly talented friends. We have sung on all Leaves’ Eyes albums and all of us are passionate choir singers. To make this album even more impressive we decided to record a huge professional choir in addition to The Full Moon Choir. Working with The London Voices (Starwars, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter) in Angels Studio in London was a unique experience! Alex and I flew to London that sunny April day with 14 kilos of note sheets in our hand luggage! Moreover, the White Russian Orchestra directed de by Viktor Smolski was also absolutely incredible. Viktor is an insider in metal (Rage) and classical music. All of them are fantastic musicians and both choir and orchestra added this special soundtrack feeling to our songs.
KE: You’ve also incorporated guest vocalists on this album, Simone Simons and Linda Fay Hella. What was behind the decision to bring in other singers?
Liv: “Blazing Waters” – This is Tosso’s baby on the album, an almost eight (8) minutes long highly epic musical masterpiece. In the song’s intro and outro you can hear my special guest Lindy-Fay Halla (Wardruna) joining me brilliantly. Snorri tells about the great, decisive and final battle in Hafrsfjord. 20,000 men gathered to fight in Hafrsfjord. I know Wardruna and their excellent compositions for the Vikings series. I love her voice and I was very happy to meet her in Bergen during my latest Norway journey. Her voice is so soft and magic, like a fairy answering to my soft voices. Amazing to work with Lindy-Fay! She is just lovely! For “Edge of Steel” I really needed a powerful voice. It was fantastic working with Simone. Our manners of singing complete in an amazing and powerful way. She is my perfect match for this song! I am happy she had the time to come to Mastersound Studio as she is also a very busy mother now like myself. We are a perfect match!
KE: The whole album had to be such a massive undertaking with so much going on. Was the process overwhelming at times?
Liv: It was two years of 24/7 presence and hard work at our own Mastersound Studio. It’s true, there are a lot of spices in this production. All instruments were recorded by hand, in several countries, from Norway to Belarus. The expression of each of the 12 musical pieces is individual, and this is exactly what we were aiming at: 12 strong, thematically bound, highly expressive and individual compositions. The basis for this fine, crystal-clear, broad and authentic sound was already obvious in the production of Symphony of the Night, however, King of Kings has an even bigger, broader, earthly and more authentic and soundtrack-oriented sound. The biggest production so far, I can tell you. We really wanted to make this album even more impressive. I would like to mention the broad aspect of the technical side of the production. Sometimes Alex had 300-400 recording channels to submit and mix in one single song! That’s incredible but Alex is the man for this. It’s fantastic to have our own studio with superb equipment and Alex’s incredible knowledge about recording and production. This is the basis for everything we create and our artistic progress.
KE: The music and lyrics are full of such great imagery so the visual aspect of Leaves’ Eyes is so important to what you do. Tell us about the video for “The Waking Eye” and the Viking reenactment group that appears in the battle scenes.
Liv: It was of vital importance to us to make everything concerning visuals absolutely authentic. The Waking Eye video clip was shot in Germany’s forests (with Rainer ZIPP Fränzen and his camera team), and at Norway’s fjords. We built up authentic settings like a small village. All the Vikings came to the video shoot from all over Europe. Some of them are Værjaborg Warriors. They are passionate Vikings in their spare time and professional fighters. For the battle scenes we even had authentic weather – it was raining and storming non stop and the ground was one big mud pit. Luckily, the sun shone the next day. You are quite lucky if you experience one complete day of sunshine in Scandinavia. The video shows Harald Fairhair as a child (played by our son, Leon), how his parents dream that he will become a king, visiting a seer. In the end he becomes the first king of Norway (played by Alex). On the cover of the album and in the video you see Alex in a traditional costume – he is the perfect man to step in the role of Harald Fairhair! The amazing artwork was done by Stefan Heilemann and Alex.
KE: Who comes up with the ideas for the videos?
Liv: Alex always has a killer idea and then we gather up to realize it, mostly with teams we have worked with before – people who know how important authenticity is to us.
KE: The videos and the music complement each other so well. It’s almost like watching a film. Is there any possibility of the videos being released as a DVD collection?
Liv: Thank you for your kind words. I would love to have it all on one DVD for everyone to watch and enjoy at home at their own flatscreen:-) I hope we can make that happen soon. On our home pages you will regularly find new clips connected to King of Kings, also “makings of”.
KE: Would you tell us something about the upcoming tour, the when and the where?
Liv: In October we will tour Europe, including the UK, presenting our new release King of Kings. We are currently rehearsing, trying to figure out which songs would fit this tour’s setlist the best. In March we will make a trip to Asia (including Japan for the first time), then a number of festivals will happen, too. Please stay tuned for more dates – a US-tour is in the making!
KE: Leaves’ Eyes has such wonderful, elaborate stage setups. What is in store for fans this time out?
Liv: Thank you very much. We always try to set up an interesting stage for our fans. If there’s a budget for it and a big stage we would always take the complete “show and party” with us. We would really love to, however, it’s not always possible, especially for club shows, where space is limited and pyros and flames are not allowed. We are working on the setlist right now, but I am sure that it will contain songs from every album. Moreover, I can’t wait to play some of the new songs live!
KE: With all the different elements in “King of Kings,” the orchestra, the choir, the folk instruments, will you be bringing any of those elements out on this tour and how will that work?
Liv: I would love to, as mentioned above. It would be like a dream coming true. Fingers crossed that we can make this happen!
KE: Thank you again!
Liv: The honour and pleasure is truly mine! Hope to see you soon at one of our gigs.
We would like to thank Dustin Hardman from AFM Records for setting up the interview with Liv. For more information on Leaves’ eyes including the new disc “King of Kings,” please go to: Leaves’ Eyes.
