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Adranor and Valdemar created the Heruka Project in the year 2000, respectively in charge of vocals, bass, programming & vocals, guitars. The duo was highly inspired by the Epicurean philosophy, with sensations and moods being predominant. An ancient medieval city by the name of Erice is reportedly the origin of such inspiration.
The two musicians release Doxa Epicurea in 2001, by the end of which year Valdemar abandons the project. Adranor, who is also guitarist with THRONE OF MOLOK and bassist with LEGION OF DARKNESS, then pursues the efforts as a one-man-project and thus releases, in 2005, the present MCD, Leggenda. Recordings took place at Petit Studio, and mastering at Massive Arts on September 2004. Additional help was provided by Moha, in some guitar parts.
Consisting of 6 tracks and a total running time of 25 minutes, Leggenda deals with the aforementioned Sicilian city, adding touches of fantasy, therefore abandoning the Epicurean approach. Musically, what we get is not the raw Black Metal suggested by all the black & white promo shoots and layout, etc – what we get is a superb form of harmonised extreme fantasy BM, where keyboards are the counterpart of aggressive guitars, crushing riffs, in spite of the drum machine. Vocals have some variation, ranging from screaming to atmospheric and dark.
The strong point of the one-man project is actually the lyrical coherence and the fact that there is a common story underlying every track. For better understanding, the CD comes with a pro-printed, b&w booklet with Tolkien-inspired representative maps and diagrams, as well as a sketch of what I gather are the main characters of these “legends” at which the title hints. Seeing as the lyrics are again written in Italian, it is recommended that you understand a bit of the language if you wish to explore the band’s concept – but for those who do not, there are English translations on the band’s website.
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