Were you satisfied about the way Anomia1 was received ? What did you enjoy and dislike the most ?
Hi again, and thanks for the opportunity to answer some more of your questions ! The last album was received in a good way, we had many good reviews and it sold fairly well for a debut. We enjoyed the fact that there seemed to be a place for our music in the world, to get connections with people in other countries that understood what we set out to do. Somehow, it proved us right, we started this band to make some music that mattered to ourselves, that wasn't ever very intended to please anyone else. I think it's cool when journalists and promotors go a long way to pick references for what we sound like, and then says "Still, Bokor doesn't sound like any of these bands..." It's sometimes tough to have a style that's hard to label, but hey, it's metal. Enjoy it, or listen to something else. We didn't work hard enough to get gigs or a tour for the first album, which is a little disappointing. It's on the other hand a good thing, because it meant that we could proceed working on Vermin Soul and concentrate on that. If we had done a tour, we would have had much more fans, I guess, but it'll be more interesting to do shows with all the material we have now.

Two members of the band left ; what happened ? How did you proceed for this change ?
It was all a matter of priorities and logistics, I suppose. We're very laidback people in the band, but you do have to show up in the rehearsal room, you do have to be there to add your thing, you do have to show some enthusiasm for what we do. Everybody in this band have a lot of stuff going, families, work, studies, own companies, whatever. But when you're with the band, you have to give a fair deal of your priorities to it, and don't complain a lot when it's starting to clog up your schedule. We're doing this to have an outlet for energy and creativity. If it's to hard for you to make it, then quit the fucking band or be honest about your situation all from the beginning, so we can adjust to it. The new people in the band aren't really that new, they're also friends and people we have played with before. Daniel Melo is a little more metal in his approach on the drums, so that made it easier to arrange and produce some of the stuff for Vermin Soul. Jimmy Larsén brought a lot of energy and feelgood to the band when we needed it, because he's a very honest and straightforward dude that enjoys what he does, whatever he does for the moment.

During our last interview, you told me the new songs would go further in everything. How did you accomplish that ?
It was clear as soon as the new songs began to emerge. We always start out with riffs and basic song structures created by Thomas, and all from the beginning he proved that he was more into it than ever. We had this thought about working deeper on the dynamics, on the transitions between different parts. Writing a lot of complicated parts is easy, the tricky thing is to connect them in a way that make sense. If you listen to a lot of older progressive stuff, you often get struck not by the weirdness or difficulty of the music, but by how they make it sound easy and continous. So the dynamic changes were a main thing for this album. We like that, to connect the odd bits. There was even a weird country/bluegrass-style part in one song that didn't make it all the way to the album. Even Bokor has its limits, I guess.

I've read that for you this album is the first real album of Bokor ; in which way ?
Well, Anomia1 was initially intended to be just promo stuff, we recorded it along the way as we wrote the songs, and we had no real plan on how to produce it. It turned out well in the end anyway, but for this album we set out more like an ordinary record production. We wrote the songs, rehearsed and set up time in a studio to record it in a more controlled way.

Once more, the artwork was greatly made by Valentin Maelstrom ; what's his part in the vocals and the inspiring ideas ?
Maelstrom is a great person to know when you need inspiration and a kick in the ass. Working with him has the same quality as with the rest of the band, you suggest something and then he comes back with something you didn't really expect or want, but is still way better than anything you could imagine from the beginning. We used him for the growl vocals on "Viral Prophesies", which was more or less finished at the time, so he just did what we told him. "Western Desert Freeze" was a little different, since Thomas and Maelstrom basically produced the vocals themselves based on some lyrical schetches and brainstorming I had. He took great time to create the artwork for the album based on my lyrics and the feel of the songs.

Is there any links with the texts of Anomia1, or is it totally different for Vermin Soul ?
There's always some connections, I guess. But while Anomia1's lyrics was more about separate issues, and more based on traditional lore, Vermin Soul is a little bit further out in the unknown. It's rather complicated.

Can we consider it as a "concept album" ? In fact, it seems to take place in a world different from the one we know. And what's behind the use of this lexical field of the vermin (spider, moquito...) ? Is it metaphors considering the 'soul' in the title ?
Yes, it's in world different from the one we know, but mainly because it's from another perspective. There is some 40 billion bacteria in a handful of dirt. The earth doesn't belong to humans, neither to lions or eagles or anything like that. It belongs to insects, rats, worms, woodlice and cockroaches. To the viruses, we're just new niches in the environment. It's a kind of a concept behind the lyrics, but it's not that evident. It began with a phrase that I came up with for a song a long time ago : "All children know where spiders come from." There's a saying that goes something like "If God created everything, then he's very fond of beetles indeed." And what would a real god look like, if you take in the fact that he wouldn't be so damn interested in humans as we try to believe ? Even the Old Testament got it right in some places, with the seven plagues and stuff like that. That God is a God that pits humans against each others like ants, and against swarms of locusts, against poisonous toads, a God that endorses abscesses and bacteria as his main tools to scare off his opponents. I somewhat like that angle to it. If there's really any "soul" in the world, in the nature, then it's much more of a creeping, crawling thing that likes to eat a lot, breed a lot and shit all over the place. And it's probably a swarm of something, more than a single entity.

The album begins with what looks like apocalypse, followed by virus, leper... until suicide happens in the end. Is there some place for hope or a kind of salvation in there ?
The album is pretty much about death, yes. But also about life. To me, death is a very natural part of life, the universe and everything. Why make such a big deal out of it, like every metal band seem to do. It's interesting, coming to think of it... ha ha, imagine that it was the other way around, that everybody was obsessed with birth and every aspect of it. The metal symbolism would be interesting, instead of crucifixes and tombs, skulls and gravestones, you would have pregnant bellies, fetuses, vaginas, birthwater, birth sections of hospitals and stuff... As I said, the album's about death, famine, drought, disease and all that, but also about new life, or rather, the continuity of life. I guess that's the only salvation that is on offer, in the end, when you're an atheist and a sceptic. Life is essentially the wonder of the DNA molecule in conjuction with proteins, chance and time. That's the real wonder, and it always amazes me more than any religious myth in the end. There's this persistance in life, and it's there in "Viral Phrophesies", for example. You have this plauge that sweeps the land, and it's all barren. But the soil on the massgraves is fertile. Someday, new farmers will grow crops there, and the grass will grow thick and dense. You can survive in the desert for 40 days and 40 nights, eating locusts and stuff. The question is just how sane you'll be when you return to Jerusalem. There's always hope.

Thank you, Lars. I hope Bokor is going to find a way soon to play such great songs on tour !
That's our wish too, and we're working on it ! We're really open to any suggestions and ideas, so anyone that's interested should get in touch with us. You're welcome, and thank you to for good questions !