Azerath: How do you see your local black metal scene? You have really great bands in Germany: Absurd, Bilskirnir, Aryan Blood, Heldentum, Magog, Runenblut, Schattenmond and many others.  
Surtr: There are a lot of black metal bands in Germany, so it is impossible to know them all. We aren’t really active in the german black metal scene, so we can’t give a statement to this topic. Here in “Friesland” (if you do not know it, it is a region in the north-west of Germany, situated at the North Sea) there is a union of local bands called “The Frisian Horde”. Nordisk Velde is a proud member of this group. Together we arrange concerts, help each other out with lacking equipment or just meet to have a beer and listen to good music. But you’re right indeed, we have many great bands here in Germany.

Azerath: What are your favorite bands now and how strong does they influences your music?
Surtr: We have our favourite Bands like (old) Nargaroth, Darkthrone, Graven, Immortal, Bilskirnir, Shining, Nokturnal Mortum, Burzum, Windir, Deströyer 666, Judas Iscariot and many more... ! But it is natural that if you listen to music, you get automatically influenced. It’s hard to say how far other Bands influence our music. If you write music, the issue depends on your mental situation and many other not writable influences of environment and spirit.

Azerath: Tell me something about your side projects and your feature plans?  
Surtr: I play my bass in another formation called “Heidenblut”, which was founded in 1997. I joint them in 2005 and recorded an LP-tape called “Legacy of the Elvenqueen”. In the future Heidenblut will record a new album that will be called “Fire walk with me” and a still nameless concept album. Nordisk Velde will probably record a new full length album in the end of 2006. We are still working on it. We are planning to play some more live-gigs but that might become complicated because our session drummer “A.J.” plays in other bands which he has founded and so they have priority for him.

Azerath: Odin or Wotan, at all?   
Berg Ravn: Odin and Wotan are two names for one God which have different meanings to us. Wotan is a very hard sounding name, so it often stands for war and “the warrior” in this God. Odin sounds more softly and represents the spirit and the magic of this god. For example one of our demo songs is named “Krieger Wotans” because the lyrics deal with warriors who have devoted themselves to the Germanic religion. Why we use “Wotan” for the Germanic religion should be clear. When people think of this culture, the first god that occurs to them is Wotan. An other example is the song “Odin hat euch alle” which means that Odin has the enemies’ lifes in his hands. We can only represent a very small part of our culture in our music, because the main topic is too large.

Azerath: Are you interested and do you think that music should be linked with politics?  
Surtr: Sure, we have our own opinions about politics but it isn’t and won’t ever be linked with our music. We think that these two aspects have to be seperated. The music must stand for itself and should not be prejudiced by any political influences.