Here’s a chance for you to tell our readers about your new release, ‘Pagan Prophecies’. But could you please start off by introducing the readers to Fortid? Founded in Reykjavík, Iceland 2002. Solo project until the year 2008, when I moved to Norway and created a full line up band. Fortid released a trilogy from the Völuspá literature before releasing the fourth and first full lineup album Pagan Prophecies.

It’s been a long time since the release of final chapter of the Voluspa trilogy. What happened in the meantime?

We’ve played some shows around Europe as well as working on our new album. We were a five piece band until our synth player dropped out. That took a toll on our musical arrangements and delayed us quite a bit, both for the stage and the studio. The studio process for Pagan Prophecies began in December 2010, but went through a lot of delays with our producer’s excessive touring and his studio shutting down. We have relocated the album process to overall 4 studios actually.  And now onto ‘Pagan Prophecies’ - track-by-track! What inspired you, which topics are you dealing with, what do you want to express with the songs etc.

01. Pagan Prophecies

Inspired by the ancient Völuspá prophecies. It’s our ancestral views on the world, how it began and how it will end, expressed through the eyes of our modern world. It’s an attempt to link the old to the new.

02. Spirit of the North

Adresses the ancient spirits and talks about the coming of Christianity. It sought out to destroy our ways of life by condemning our beliefs, virtues and pride. It is about preservation of our roots.

03. Electric Horizon

Electric Horizon brings us back to the future where Christianity has taken stronghold and new beliefs emerge into that society such as the Islam faith. Dark times where symbolized manmade structures have spread so vastly that it has detached us from our roots and connection with nature.  It is about war, deadly machinery, mass murders, pollution, destruction,  as our week and tolerant society turns a blind eye to the truth while sinking into the empty capitalism. 

 04. Lesser Sons of Greater Fathers

Decaying lines of legacy. Each generation is weaker than the one before. This goes for men, beasts and our dying nature.

05. Sun Turns Black

Refers to the wolf that swallows the sun. A symbol of retribution and destruction. The wolf is bound and feeling betrayed until he gets to pay for that injustice in Ragnarok.

06. Ad Handan

It means ”From Beyond”. It is a personal vision towards the journey to the other side.

07. Endalok

Endalok is a post Ragnarok lyric. The earth sinks into the sea as the Pagan Prophecies foretold. This also explains our very long outro consisting only of rain and thunders out on sea. 

Tell us a bit about the artwork – who made it etc. and how important do you feel it is to have a cool artwork?

It was made by the talented Helgorth Harmaja at Babalon Graphics in Finland. He basically took my vision and drew it up the way I asked him to. The cover is very conceptual and is very important to the whole visual image of this album. The fire and ice symbolize the antonym elements in the world, also according to Asatru belief, the elements that forged the first living being. The rune is mannas, symbolizing man, but if you look closely, it has lines going out to the sides from the bottom. This makes two death runes reflecting each other, and so this becomes in whole, the beginning and the end for mankind.

Thomas Nielsen, September 2012