Hi Greg. Glad to hook up.

Thank you! We are extremely happy with the way it turned out. Well, it took 6 years to write them, ha ha. No, seriously, I just returned to my roots, to the kind of Metal I was playing before I started working with a keyboard player in the late 80s. All new guys are into this style as well, so we just followed our hearts and the music we like.

I hope so! I think the song quality speaks for itself and LION'S SHARE fans have always appreciated the band for always delivering high standard in song writing, musicianship and production. Also, I think there are songs on past records that are equally hard. It's just that the new lineup with a more modern drumming style sounds much more energetic. We have both new and old songs in our live set and a song like Unholy Rites from Fall From Grace fits perfect with the new songs; so, I think most old fans will approve and hopefully we will gain many, many new fans as well.

After all there's a brand new generation of Metal kids around now that wasn't here when we released our past records. Here in Sweden, I see young kids everywhere with MAIDEN, PRIEST and MEGADETH shirts, so we are very positive about this record.

Thank you very much! We always spend a lot of money on the recordings and production. These records will be around forever, so I'm very picky to make them as good as possible. These days with digital equipment you can keep a lot of the stuff from the demo if it turns out good, as long as you don't change the key or tempo. Some of the solos were made during these years and I think Bruce Kulick did his guest solo in 2004 or 2005 for example. The drums were done in an expensive studio like the mix, but the rest we did ourselves with our gear.

After the Entrance album, I was totally burnt out after taking care of everything regarding the band and doing the album/tour - album/tour thing non-stop for 8 years. More or less overnight I hit rock bottom and playing music wasn't fun anymore. After a year or so I started feeling a bit better and ideas started coming back to me. The only song that was written before the break is Cult Of Denial which I had most parts written for around the time we did Fall From Grace, parts of Soultaker and the verse riff for The Edge Of The Razor. The rest were written between 2002 up till we recorded the album. All in all, I think we wrote approx. 23 songs and picked the one's we though fitted together the best to make a balanced and interesting album.

Patrik is a great singer and friend. I heard an mp3 right before his first ever CD came out in 2003 (SPACE ODYSSEY). He felt honoured to be part of the re building of LS, but to be able to work until we were 100% happy with everything, we didn't go public for many years.

Ah, a quote for the rest of the musicians: Sampo Axelsson (GLENN HUGHES) and well-known session drummer Richard Evensand; How did you hook up with them and how useful did they prove to be for the recordings of the new album?

Everybody that's on the album was hand picked for the vision and sound I had in mind, so - of course - they have a huge part in how the album turned out. I met Sampo when I agreed to do a one off show at Sweden Rock Festival with Sweden's most famous weather man Par Holmgren. Again, we didn't go official to avoid pressure from fans and media to deliver a new album.

To me it was an all or nothing scenario with LION'S SHARE this time. Either we go all the way and deliver a product that will knock people, or we don't do it at all. The band had already topped my dreams as a kid by playing huge Ice Hockey arenas with MANOWAR, DIO, MOTORHEAD, touring clubs with SAXON, U.D.O., ICED EARTH, NEVERMORE etc, so I wasn't interested in doing something half-assed just for the sake of releasing another album.

Of course, we are extremely happy they agreed to contribute. They all did a killer job. Mats sang on our first two records as well and is a friend since many years. Glen Drover from MEGADETH, I met after working with his other band EIDOLON and Bruce was in Stockholm to do a KISS expo when we invited him to the studio.

I've kept my eyes on AFM for many years and hoped they would be interested in LION'S SHARE when it was time for our comeback, and luckily they were. We wanted to do the album in our own tempo until we were ready, so they got involved right before we started mixing. The guys working there are absolutely fantastic. Feels like I've known them for years. Like old friends. Very nice family feeling.

We were looking for a mascot like MAIDEN's Eddie that we can have on future covers, on shirts etc. The cover doesn't have anything special to do with the title. It should only be attractive to look at. We have this huge backdrop live with the image, plus posters and shirts so we are very pleased with the way it turned out. The lyrics were written solely by Patrik and he wanted to write lyrics that reflects the dark mood of the music. Much is based on true stories from daily news papers, TV et; stuff that goes on around us.

Cult Of Denial is about some kids that addressed their plans to commit suicide on the Internet and other kids cheered on them to actually go ahead and do it. Hatred's My Fuel is about a person that killed and ate his sisters here in Sweden a couple of years ago.

I can only speak for myself and I couldn't care less. This is probably why I don't or can't write lyrics. I know to some people it can be the other way around, but not maybe so much on Metal albums. I'm sure it's important for Patrik though and he seems real happy with what he came up with for this record.

You know, many musicians do not pay any attention to reviews, claiming they write music the way they only feel. If I read something and agree they might have a point I get influenced, but most of the time I just hope they will be good so the label can use it to sell records and that people will get interested in buying the CD. Of course, I check out magazines etc to see what they think, but it's not like I would change my style of playing if someone complained. I think you must write from the heart and make sure YOU like the album before you can expect someone else to like it.

Yes, we did a video for The Edge Of The Razor that's gonna be on the limited edition (DigiPak version) of the album. It's not worth it if it's shit expensive, but we managed to do it pretty cheap so I think it was worth the money in our case. Besides the regular TV shows we can distribute it on YouTube and other Internet sites. Could be cool for fans to check out the band visually as well.

You have confirmed your participation at 2007's Sweden Rock Festival; I wonder how does it feel playing in front of thousands of Metal fans? Sweden Rock Festival can as well be the biggest Hard 'n' Heavy summer fest worldwide now, right?

Yeah, it's our third time there and the festival has been growing a lot since we played the first time in 1999. It's a really great festival with everything from good old Hard Rock to Extreme Metal. The fans come in all sizes and ages so we're lucky to have such a great festival in our country.

LION'S SHARE is a three-members group. Richard will move to Australia to get married so he was just hired to do the album. Right now we haven't decided if we should have a permanent drummer or not. So far we've done a couple of dates with a friend of ours named Stefan Norgren behind the kit. He will be with us for the other festivals we have booked as well. So far it's only Swedish dates besides a big festival we are doing in Norway with TESTAMENT, QUEENSRYCHE, DIMMU BORGIR, CANDLEMASS etc. We would love to go elsewhere but most festivals were booked when we were in the studio, so we kinda missed the boat so to speak. Hopefully, we can do a full-blown European tour this Fall.

I think finally USA is starting to appreciate our kind of music again. When we started out in the mid 90s, it was all Grunge and Hip-Hop over there, so we never bothered. The fans from there that have discovered us are totally blown away and are saying thank you for releasing this kind of old-school Metal.

I think it's so much about trends over there. It's a pity because many people love this kind of music but it's been totally ignored by the US media for the last 15 years.

Illegal downloading is not good. Spreading your songs on the Internet is good promotion, so it's both good and bad. Of course, it hurt the sales and it wasn't fun to discover our promo on the net way before people actually CAN buy it in stores. Worst scenario: young people growing up today doesn't understand they should pay for music. They are so used it's for free so it's nothing they react over.

Sure!! Absolutely!! I'm 100% a Metal fan and always check out new stuff from my old heroes as well as newer bands.

Thanks, and thanks a lot for doing this interview and for supporting LION'S SHARE. Hope everyone will like this album as much as we do. Stop by at our web page - www.lionsshare.org - for news and info. Hope to see you all on tour this Fall.