We play Folk Metal – Interview with Evilon

The Swedish Folk/Death Metal band Evilon was founded in 2015 in the small town of Arvika (Värmland province). One of the two band founders, guitarist/vocalist Jonny Sjödin, has apparently left the band in the meantime, shortly after the completion of the second album ‘A Warrior’s Way’. In the year 2023, the line-up carousel has also turned very violently, if the information in the Encyclopaedia Metallum is to be believed. Reason enough to ask. The last remaining founding member Kenneth Evstrand answered my curious questions.

Hi, I’m Rainer and I write for Keep on Rocking and Metalheads Forever Magazine. Thank you for letting me do this interview with you. How are you doing?

Hi, Rainer and thank you for this interview. I´m doing good. Things are going really well with the band right now; we are delighted for having teamed up with Fetzner Death Records! It opens new doors for us, interviews like this one, radio plays all over the world, reviews, we have gotten more attention on our social media platforms, the streams on Spotify have been really good from summer this year and it continues still. It has also made it possible to release the album ‘A Warriors Way’ in physical format and we are very excited about that! The future looks really bright for Evilon!

Please introduce the band briefly.

The band started in 2015. We play Folk Metal. The lyrics focus mostly on norse mythology.

In 2023 you released your second album ‘A Warrior’s Way’. After that there were a few line-up changes, including founding member Jonny Sjödin. How did the band cope with that?

Well, there was no question about that I wanted to continue with the band. The question was how. Me and our bass player KR (Kjell Rune) gathered on midsummers eve and had a meeting where we decided that the music is so good that we had to carry on with the band. It was sad to lose the old members but that is how life is sometimes, our paths goes separate ways.

How did you find the new band members?

We found KR a couple of years ago, he was following us on social media, and he really liked our music. He has his own Black Metal project called Doedskamp where he plays guitar but when we lost our former bass player Björn, KR wrote about maybe he should pick up the bass as he had played in earlier years and I thought that sounded like a good idea, he auditioned for Evilon and he is still with us. David our guitarist and I had actually been chatting with each other for some years, he has been a fan of Evilon and I asked if he would join the band. Tor had earlier on been doing the vocals for KR’s band, KR suggested to try out Tor and with his thunder roars there was no question that he should join the band. Robin I had met some years ago, I knew he played drums, I asked him and he said yes!

Will the line-up changes change your sound?

Well, it is me, the only remaining founding member who still writes all the music so I guess that means that the music will be recognizable in the future. But we have two new lyricists in David and Tor, and they also take care of the vocal arrangements which means that there will be changes in how the vocals sound and of course we will have Tors amazing vocals on top of the sound picture in the future as being heard on the single we released some time ago called Brothers Of Evilon. Robin approaches drumming differently than it has been done earlier in Evilon, bringing new and interesting energy into the band’s sound. David and KR also brings their playing style the overall sound which makes it sound awesome!

How will the band continue with the new line-up?

We are in the process of recording new music and the recordings are almost done. We will be playing live, bringing both older and newer stuff to the audience.

Back to the second album. How satisfied are you with it?

Very satisfied! I think it sounds very good with interesting arrangements, heavy riffs and enchanting melodies, just the way I want it!

What was the reaction from the press and fans?

Very positive reactions I must say! It has been really fun reading all the reviews and comments!

There were five years between ‘Leviathan’ and ‘A Warrior’s Way’. How do the two albums differ musically?

I think on ‘A Warriors Way’ we focused even more on getting the Folk Metal sound especially with the melodies. With ‘Leviathan’ we were still incorporating more Melodic Death Metal into our music but on ‘AWW’ I think we refined it to be Folk Metal as we will continue on doing in the future.

Thank you once again for the interview. Is there anything else you would like to say to your fans at the end?

As I answered earlier on in this interview, we are recording and we will be releasing completely new music hopefully this year and in the beginning of next year so watch out for that, follow us on social medias. Stay Metal!