CR: Let’s begin, how is the new album doing? Your third, are you satisfied with the final results of it? How far and how different is The Inquisition from your previous production Far from Heaven?
Magnus Winterwild: I think it’s going great, we have not yet seen any actual numbers of how many records that are sold so far, but if you look at the reviews and the feedback we have gotten it’s the best we have gotten of all our albums. We are very satisfied with the result of the album both with how the songs turned out and that the sound was a little bit heavier this time. The biggest change between Far from Heaven and The Inquisition is that all of the guys in the band have been more involved in the songwriting this time, and I think that has made the overall sound more heavy.

CR: What about those record deal companies? Is everything ok with your new record label? Do you guys have a confirm deal?
Magnus Winterwild: We have not yet signed anything but hopefully we will do it in the near future, we have a new record deal with a new label, but I won’t say anything more until we have signed the contract.

CR: I haven’t seen any tour dates in your web site, why is that, are you guys not playing live at all?
Magnus Winterwild: We have all been busy with our regular jobs and our lives beside the music, so we have not had the time to be able to tour as we would have liked, but that will hopefully change until the next year.

CR: Many of our readers don’t know Axenstar, how would you guys introduce yourselves to them other than sending them to play your records, how can you explain Axentar proposal of metal to new fans?
Magnus Winterwild: We write music with focus on strong melodies and melodic guitars, but we always try to play as heavy and fast as we can. That may sound as a contradiction but we do our best to make it work. We will not change our style of playing just because there is a new trend or whatever, we play the music we do because we love it.

CR: From your latest album I have only been able to listen to the samples on your web site, since is very difficult here in Costa Rica to find your records, but for what I have heard the drums bring a little more anger and power to the songs, I’m correct or totally lost in this topic?, and I can apologize enough for not having this latest album.
Magnus Winterwild: That may be right as I said earlier we tried to get a heavier sound on this album and Pontus (our drummer) had more input this time on the songs and how he played.

CR: Axenstar began as a cover band “Powerage”, why did you guys decided to stop playing other peoples songs and write your own?
Magnus Winterwild: It’s fun when you start a band to play other bands songs because then it sounds good right from the beginning but as you go along you get bored with that after a while and want do write own songs. And if you have higher goals than standing on a bar stage in your hometown playing covers you have to write your own songs.

CR: Has the transition from a cover band to an original band been difficult?
Magnus Winterwild: No not at all, we have all played in other bands before and we were used to writing our own material.

CR: What do you want to achieve which every album you guys record? Is it more a on the way development let the art of it guide the record, or do you enter a studio with a goal in mind?
Magnus Winterwild: We always try to record the best album we can at that point in time, when we have written a number of songs that we feel are strong enough to be on an album we record them and hope that there is someone else in the world that think the same as we.

	Pic courtesy of: Axenstar "If you have higher goals than standing on a bar stage in your hometown playing covers you have to write your own songs"

CR: Speaking of the record that got my attention, Far from Heaven, can you tell me about it and why does it sounds so familiar to some Nigthwish songs from time to time, other times a little Hellowen and some others Hammerfall (other than the fact that the last two are power metal), and what are your main inspirations to write music, what do you guys think when preparing an album?
Magnus Winterwild: When you write music you can get influences by almost anything and if you play metal and the style we play it’s impossible to be totally unique so there is always someone that think that you sound like another band and even that you have stolen some riff or melody of some other band. We all listen to Nightwish, Helloween, Hammerfall and all the other great bands that are around. And when you sit down and write music unconsciously you take some of this and some of that and then add your own touch to it, and I think that’s why you can hear similarities to other bands in the same genre.

CR: In Far from Heavens there are also moments in which I’m taken back to 1985, I don’t know why this records gives me that old melancholy for metal back in the 80s, but was this your intention, are you guys influenced by many 80s metal bands or just 80s music in general?
Magnus Winterwild: We all grew up with the music from the 80’s so that is the foundation we stand on. We never try to sound like something in particular, but when your first impressions of metal music is the metal of the 80’s you probably will get some inspiration from that when you write your own songs.

CR: I have noticed in the previous two records the speed and aggressiveness have been claiming in each record, is that your goal to get harder, faster and more aggressive with each production?
Magnus Winterwild: No not necessarily, you always evolve as a songwriter and try to write in new ways so then you push the boundaries a little more each time and we try to broaden our sound so that there is more difference between the hard and fast songs and the slow and heavy songs.

CR: It must be very though to have a metal band in a country like Sweden , where so many great bands born every day? What can you tell us about your struggle and the bands reason for survival in such a hostile environment?
Magnus Winterwild: It’s hard but at the same time a very good thing that you get such hard competition because then you are forced to play the best you can to be able to get some attention. And I think that if you are true to yourself and play the music you love and respect then the other bands see that and you get the recognition you deserve.

CR: Are you guys living of the band, I mean are you guys musicians 100% of the time or do you have jobs to sustain your music career?
Magnus Winterwild: In a perfect world we could live of the music but for now we all have to have regular jobs to be able to survive.

CR: Do you guys have any other music projects other than Axenstar?
Magnus Winterwild: Not at the moment.

CR: What is Axenstar’s next step, where would you guys like to tour? And what kind of expectations do you have towards the band?
Magnus Winterwild: Well the next step is to sign the new contract and then record another album, probably in the Spring of 2006. It would be great to get the chance to go to Japan for a tour and also to South America . I expect us do our best and then we will see how far it will get us.

	Pic courtesy of: Axenstar "I think that if you are true to yourself and play the music you love and respect then the other bands see that and you get the recognition you deserve"

CR: What do you guys think of music trading person to person, and of the music trading via internet do you guys think it could be another way of promoting your band all over the world?
Magnus Winterwild: I think it’s great for unsigned bands to get the chance to spread their music over the internet but then when you sign a record deal you start to hate the downloading idiots, because if none will buy your album then you won’t have a record deal anymore and in the end there won’t be any music to download. So I hope there will be some new technique that will make sure that if you want to get hold of some music that some poor artist has worked hours and hours on, you have to pay for it. It’s common sense actually because you don’t go into a store and steal the products they are selling but that is the same thing as downloading music from the internet without paying for it, and people don’t realize that. They say that “why should I pay for something I can get for free”, well why should they get paid for the work you do everyday? I think that people only think of themselves and how they can benefit from the things they do.

CR: What lies in the future for Axenstar, would you guys consider ever playing in Costa Rica ? What have you heard of our country? (If you have heard something)
Magnus Winterwild: Sign the new contract, record a new album, tour the world and get extremely famous!

CR: Anything you will like to add
Magnus Winterwild: I have not heard that much about Costa Rica but I will certainly check it out if we get the chance to tour South America .