Sarai Leon, a journalist, and one of the members of the a-ha Mailing List, recently had the chance to meet and interview Morten when she was in Oslo. Take a glimpse to see what is behind that smile and wonderful voice. (Interview and images are being used with permission.

 June 14th, 1999: It was 3:27 when I arrived to Café Clodion, by Thomas Heftyes Gate and Bygdøy allé. Once I'm inside, this lady comes to me and asks aloud if I'm the Mexican journalist that is going to have an interview with Morten Harket at 3:30. Then she informs me that he won't make it at 3:30 and that he will see me there at 6. Umm a disappointing beginning of an interview but time enough to go to Sentrum and eat a kebab with Rigmor, my host in Oslo "No onions please!". Then I got back to Clodion at 5:50 and took a table downstairs to wait for Morten. Upstairs it's too crowded and I wonder if my interview will be successful with all that noise after all. He arrives by 6:15, together with Sverre Flataby, and introduces himself, «Hi. Morten». So here we are time to begin... ooops? Did my friend tell you what kind of journalist I am? "No he has not well, let's see what happens]. Sarai Leon: For me as a Christian journalist is very interesting to know if you have some Christian experience. Do you think you can tell me about this?

Morten Harket: Christian experience?

 SL: How could you describe it?

MH: My approach is, because I've been asked so many times, my approach usually is that I don't discuss matters of faith in the media, because I don't believe media in general is capable of putting that across to a public. Faith is personal, is a private thing, it must be, and then it's a question of whether you... on what level you are active in the community. There are many levels and many different areas which you can promote what you stand for, and I don't believe in preaching at all from where I stand, from my standpoint, or from the point or the position that I may have to some people. What I do believe in is the individual, trying to alert oneself to his around senses, around world basically.

 [his mobile phone rings] Let just pass this phone...

 I believe that my position is not to actively preach my beliefs but to be who I am in a sense, as one who has his own standpoint or his own experiences before life, and I believe in awakening, alerting the individual, each and everyone of us, not by preaching but by possibly stimulating so that they can become or enhance the... It's very noisy here... even to think... to enhance oneself as human being, to become as acquainted with oneself and what we posses, what we are, what comprises us, what we are made of. I believe that is very important, it's important certainty in a democracy where it is expected by the individual to take part. It is very important that they actually do take part, and I think it is not just necessary, I think it is a must that all men in a democracy are alert living human beings and not just live on cruise with the rest of a pack of... you know, some kind of crowd. I'm against crowds in most situations, which is kind of interesting because I play to crowds and I stand before crowds either as a tv person or in a stage, but the crowd is a particular phenomena where individuals come together and form another being that behaves and leads and speaks and talks and moves differently to all the individuals, to any of them. It becomes a being on it's own right, in it's own right. It's a mass being, and they don't a head, they don't have reason, they're not rational. They are drives. So I'm very alert by crowds. Crowds are dangerous and they can be really potent. They also have no morals. It is only controlled in a fragile way by the morals of whoever's in the crowd and it's very difficult for individuals to be heard in a crowd. It's a very, very unstable state... any crowd is... very unstable, very fickle and it can turn against any one at any point in time, it's driven and it's the same crowd mentality that media is thriving on, and I'm very alert by the media as well, and that part of Christian activities I'm also very weary of. To any of TV evangelists, for instance, I'm completely against, possibly, because it is you are playing with or you're using means or tools in order to reach people that you not only control but you don't know what is controlling it. So I'm very weary of that and I think in general (that does mean in all cases) but in general to preach to people demands, takes a certain type of discipline by everyone involved in a sense, and it's maybe contradictory to what it also must be, cause it must be a completely open minded and free experience but it does require discipline and it works in a church which is disciplined through years, through centuries really, not necessarily discipline in the right way, but it is discipline and that's such a control setting. One can do service and so for so you can also preach as a priest and people sit and they listen and it's kind of framed and for all the people it is dull, it doesn't reach people. Then a lot Christians go outside the church and feel that they want to preach on the streets or wherever, what is fine too if you can meet people eye to eye. I think it works, it's a natural thing, but when you use mass communication I'm very often against it.

 SL: Because it is just an obstacle to meet the people eye to eye?

 MH: Because there are other forces involved that you have no control of, and they are active and they are no necessarily good for anyone. The very powerful forces, and I'm not necessarily speaking evil or good even here I'm just saying there are forces there that definitively I know, I see it in what I do. The most interesting for me... my role is not to be a leader as such. My role is to be a medium for something else.

 SL: What could be this 'something else'?

 MH: The medium means that I am possibly a filter or whatever or a catalyst for something to them, to each and every individual, and they need all the same in a sense, they are souls and spirits and if I can be... in my role, in my position... which is also giving me, the crowd is the catalyst also possibly for me, for the music, if that is in a healthy balance. Then they're a wonderful thing. And I think most adoration or adulation is harmless. It is prepared by media forces in to be much more than it really is, but it does mean a lot to all other people because it is a private thing again, they listen to music in their headsets and it relates to their lives, so it becomes a real personal thing. That is I think valuable, and the fact that they then start to idolize whoever is singing this or whoever is writing this music or whatever, but it is also natural, and I think most of so call fans are healthy in that respect. For some people it will turn into something unhealthy but you'll always have that, but in general I don't think it's a non healthy thing at all. I think if the people that are in the positions of being catalysts, if they are sound people as well, it is a good thing. The other thing that is important is the individual is receiving this. It is also an interactive thing and it wakes you up to yourself, to what you are as a spirit. And music can do that, and films can do it. Cause you're always saying something, you're always pointing at something, you're always setting an example, we all are, everyone is, only in the positions like the one but I had for long time now. It is much more focused. But it really doesn't means more, and most people know that if I behave bad people see that and then they make they own mind about it, they make up their own mind, and if I set an example that they actually respond to in a positive way, then it reinforces what they believe to be right.

 SL: Have this adulation or adoration hurt you in a personal way sometimes?

 MH: It hurts in the sense that it is very noisy and there is no real communication, there is no value to it. You cannot build on it, you cannot use it for anything really, cause it's one way communication, but it's not really that at all, it's some sort of response to...

 SL: Just a response to a stimulus?

 MH: Yes! That's what it is. And the thing is what can I do with it?

 Nothing!

 [interruption, strangely my tapes side A is over; has time run so fast?]

 I need to look after my own garden, in a sense, I need to grow the things that I'm supposed to, as an artist and obviously as a private man as well. And the adulation, the idolising is of no use in that sense. So I need to let it just be what it is, but what I do have coming with this position obviously is an opportunity, at times, to use it for other things, for instance if there are particular things you want to alert people about, but I'm very careful doing that, because my wish is people to be perceptive enough to see for themselves, with their own eyes, what they should see, in a sense.

 SL: Instead of you telling them everythi

 MH: Yeah! I do not want to point in any direction and say to people - "You should come here or you should go there".

 SL: Why?

 MH: Because I don't believe in that way of bringing children up even in a sense. I want them to discover it, so if I can prepare the ground so they discover in, in a sense. I'm talking about kids now. That is the role of the parent. But nothing is learned for real unless they discover it themselves. It's the same with me, I need to discover things if I am to learn something real. It's the process of discovery that matters, that makes you learn. That's why I feel the role of any artist on any level, when you are a pop artist, or in music or in art, on a more demanding scale. You are still really just a medium, and the process is depending on people opening up to themselves, but if you learn what the artist can do is to wake people up further to their own senses, they become more a human being in a sense, more alert, more aware, possibly better at that telling where the balance is between right and wrong in each case, and I don't believe in any set truth with right or wrong even. I think it's a complete floating picture that is always changing but there are some parameters that stay the same. I'm not so interested in answers as in questions. I believe questions are vital, and if we all became better asking questions, we would all benefit from that. We are too concerned with answers, and we want answers without going through questions. We buy answers. Answers are just practical things, it's a practical way of solving something, but they don't represent the truth even, they represent what works at that point in time. But if you don't ask the question again the next time you may possibly fail. I believe answers are photographs, they are true the very instant they were taken, but the moment after, everything has moved slightly so you need to take another picture, which is opening the lens and see where everything is now. That's the process of living and being alive. Answers are dangerous to me, really! Much more than what we are aware. Also for Christian people, answers are very dangerous.

 SL: Let me ask you something. You have travelled to so many countries and played for so many people, different races, but the heart is the same, I guess. What do you think the people, the audiences, the youth needs in music right now?

 MH: The youth, the young people? We'd never given young people a thought more than other ages. We don't really relate to young people more than to old people.

 SL: Ok, let's think about «people». What they need now in music?

 MH: They need something that they believe is genuine, that's the main thing, that it is genuine. The music speaks to people through all ages and obviously all races, so the fact that something is genuine I think is demanded by today's people.

 SL: I assume you have changed a lot since the very first days of a-ha.

 MH: I don't know, I'm not sure.

 SL: Or maybe not changed but learned?

 MH: Yeah, I've learned, yes.

 SL: Maybe you have learned how to react to some things better than before. So at least your life has changed?

 MH: It did change dramatically when we had success but since then things have not really changed a lot. I've just learned but I'm probably more clear about things and I'm more firm and tougher in decisions so I stop things at an earlier stage when I need to. I'm better at maneuvering things now. But I've always been honest with things and that means that when things have not been right and I've had to change things, even if some of them have been very tough, choices, then I've never really avoided things, I don't avoid things; if they have to be then they have to be somehow. I don't know that I changed as a person that much.

 SL: But some circumstances changed. You became a father, for instance.

 MH: Oh yeah!

 SL: Then it enriches your life.

 MH: But it doesn't change me. I don't feel that. I get to know my children as they grow and I see how fast they grow and then I see how completely unique they all are. They're not like each other, they are uniquely different, each one of them has their own life, and I play a certain role in their lives but no more.

 SL: I know that maybe you see yourself just like a guidance to them.

 MH: I'm a role figure for them, of course.

 SL: But you really want for them the best. Every parent wants the best for...

 MH: "Ummmm, and the worst" in a sense.

 SL: In a sense? So they can learn?

 MH: Yes. I need to prepare them for how life turns, so that they can actually be playful with it and learn to play in spite of things as well, as much as because of things. But that does mean that I drive them through things, I can't. It's very much a balancing act. But as an example: I can tell them how to behave in the table and then I do the complete opposite myself to break that, because if it is a rule it doesn't count, as a dictating thing, but it's how we organise ourselves. That doesn't mean you can go the opposite way. It's possible to do that and it's legally to do it but you must learn when to do it and when it's right to do it in a sense, and when it's right to throw everyone off by doing what is... I'm hurt of in a sense.

 SL: I think of children. You must think of your children. They would like to listen music and they will grow with certain kind of music so, what do you think 'from the point of view of a father' what is the responsibility of musicians towards the audience?

 MH: The only responsibility is that you are genuine about what you do as much as you can and that you are true to yourself and that you respond to what you can do and that's what they learn from. I have no responsibility towards anyone to play a particular thing they need to hear. They need to hear something that is genuine regardless what it is. We must be genuine, and if it's genuine music about hate then that's an experience as well, but there's a balance as well. I don't play heavy metal to my kids because it doesn't interest me, but maybe they will start to play it when they are 14 years old. I don't know, and then we'll talk about it if they want to talk about it, maybe we do and maybe we don't. They are free spirits and free souls. They always were. All children are. All people are, no matter who your father and mother is, and either your father and mother is insecure or stupid and they don't understand and try to control it beyond this point, then that is very obviously harmful, cause people shouldn't be curbed, it can take them a lifetime to break those chains. They are so responsive to anything you show them, if they believe or see that you love them. You can be strict with them, off course, also beyond what is legal today, because what is happening in society today is that you are not allowed to touch kids, you are not allowed to spank them, which I believe is wrong. But if you have a law like that then it must look like that because if it's legal to spank them then it's being abused by the wrong mentality and then the only way to stop that is by making it illegal. I don't actually hit them because I don't have to. You can hit them with your voice as well.

 SL: Have you had problems with pride.

 MH: No, I don't actually, because I am really honest at heart, that's the way I am so the pride doesn't have the upper hand.

 SL: Tell me something about your music, your solo career. Are you satisfied with what you get from it, with what you are doing, with what you have done? I mean, not with the band?

 MH: Yes, oh yeah yeah yeah! I've never had a better period in my life then after a-ha. That's without comparison, by experiences from 93' in general give me a lot more that I've ever got with a-ha, but a-ha is now doing a new album. We are just starting the middle of it now and that is a new period that's opening up when it comes to the band. That may become very interesting. I didn't write music with a-ha. It was Pål and Mags, they did it most of the time. I did it little but it was not like something that I felt a calling to do. On the contrary, I needed to wait because I would be writing for the wrong reasons, just for the sake of writing, which I didn't want to do, so I waited. That is to do with the honesty that I'm referring to.

 SL: Maybe you needed more to tell about?

 MH: So in 93 that all changed where I went through a lot of self-adjustment, I got rid of everything inside in a sense. Started from scratch. Started thinking things inside. From 91 to 93 I started pouring things out, I got rid of things I trusted, in a sense, nothing. Everything I knew I had to got rid of, it was a very tough process.

 SL: Like a crisis?

 MH: It's not as if it depends on definition of crisis but I went into it deliberately because I realised that I was blocked off and I couldn't get any further and I was not where I was meant to be, whether it would be a-ha or my own stuff or wherever. I was not in the right [thinking for exactly 17 seconds] my disposition was wrong, so I could not be the medium that I knew I was meant to be, so I needed to get rid of things.

 SL: Let me ask you one thing: Did God play a main role in this?

 MH: No, not with his finger. Not like that. I'm made the way I am and I am given what is necessary to see this, and I saw this at that time and I realised that I had to change, I had to change on a deep level because I was too good at controlling things. Control was my way, I could control whatever I wanted in a sense. And I was not...

 [Interrupted by my friend who came down the stairs to the non-smoking zone where we are chatting. He came to say he would be waiting for me upstairs if I want to take more time for the interview. It was about 19:00. Morten answers]

 Yeah, we've come quite far! [laughs]

 [My friend says I take every minute I can get. Both of them speak in Norwegian for a while and I have no idea of what they said. My friends asks if I have an issue of my magazine at hand to give out to Morten. I say I have one so he leaves.]

 Um...where was I? [grin]

 SL: You where into God played a role?

 MH: Yeah, I needed or I had to completely open myself for things to happen and I was controlling things. I can control whatever I wanted. I was clever at that, and I was naturally good enough at different things so it came very easy to me and my control was my biggest problem, cause I needed my intuitive and instinctive side to open up as opposed to the brain element to control and that was a process that lasted a year and a half I think and it was very tough. And as I came out of that, it's really tough. You throw everything out, absolutely everything. Everything! Faith as well. Christianity, everything! [makes a sound of throwing away things to the air] Out the door. Family, everybody, and it takes time.

 SL: And then what you get?

 MH: Then whatever is genuine will stay with you.

 SL: So is faith genuine to you or not?

 MH: Yes.

SL: I mean, I think that word «Christianity» became just like a label, but I prefer to talk about a personal relationship with God. Did you just throw it away?

 MH: Yeah. I had to. Because it had to be a genuine process and I had to empty everything out and then see basically what was left, what survived. And that whatever was genuine would be a building block for the next period for me.

 SL: What is God for you now?

 MH: I can't answer that because...

 SL: Is He becoming «something» or...?

 MH: It's a force. You know, «Lord, Is that is your name?» whatever that name is, but I refer to it, it is there. There's a song about that on the album that I did, my own, the Wild Seed album.

 SL: Yes, I know.

 MH: You know it ?

 SL: Yes

 MH: Simple, basic and straight to the point. It's all there. It doesn't go away whether I turn my back on it or you know, it's all there. For me it's [thinking for 10 seconds] well I don't know where to start if we're discussing that. It's to do with everything. We know now in science that when you break things down into the smallest particles there is nothing, become down to nothing, beyond a certain point of magnification. You go from matter 'like you and I and this table' and all of a sudden, at a certain point, it dissipates into nothing, there is no more matter, it's just different vibrations of energy, and whether that energy becomes light or sound waves or matter. So beyond a certain point there's no physical world, in a sense. There's so many signs to this discussion. I've always felt that time is a phony thing. I don't trust time because there is something not true about time, and time belongs to the physical world. We know that, because time is affected by speed. So it belongs here.

 SL: So let's talk about this new album a-ha is doing because that's important too...

 MH: In all of this, yes.

 SL: Tell me something about this new album.

 MH: Because this is a [pause] I never talk about an album before it's done, all I can say is that it's interesting.

 SL: Ok, tell me what you can say. May I take you some pics?

 MH: Yeah yeah [While I take some pics] I'm excited about it. I didn't expect any thing in particular - I didn't know whether is right to do another album until we met again. We were asked to perform at the Nobel Peace Prize.

 SL: Yes. I've seen the video.

 MH: That was kind of the starting point. We felt like doing a few tracks again. We've all had a long break, possibly the final break, but then it just naturally come together again.

 SL: After so many years?

 MH: After so many years or after these years, could have been ten more years. They couldn't be less, I think, cause we all needed to do things and get it out of our systems, and get the past out. And get rid of things that we needed to. We needed to be free on our own again, and this is a playful thing. Quite playful album. Very good songs. This will be a strong album.

 SL: You're writing songs for this album, are you?

 MH: Not yet. We don't know that. To begin we started with songs that Pål and Mags had. They've written new songs also but then we'll see [deep yawning]. It's a process that evolves.

 SL: I guess you're enjoying the process?

 MH: I am, I am. Believe me, I would not do this album if I don't feel like I feel that it's right.

 SL: What are your expectations on this album?

 MH: They've [the expectations] have been met all the way. We want to do an album that is genuine. It must be a strong album, but it already is. It has nothing to do with what we did in the 80's. Nothing to do with what's happening now. It's just a collection of songs, it stands by itself, on it's own, it doesn't answer for anyone either.

 SL: When will it be released?

 MH: Soon

 SL: Soon?

 MH: I mean this autumn.

 SL: Autumn? That's great!

 MH: Cause we don't have any time to throw away, we need to do it now.

 SL: So a-ha is about to release a new album this autumn?

MH: Yes. Sometime in the autumn, probably Scandinavia first and then after Christmas, but these are speculations.

 SL: Which label will it be released under?

 MH: We don't know now, because we've started negotiations with different companies so I cannot say and I could'nt say even if I knew. There's a lot of interest, though.

 SL: Really? [Does he know we all are dying to listen to it??????? Little he knows I know it is WB, Ha ha!]

 MH: Oh yeah, very big.

 SL: So it seems it will be a very interesting album

 MH: I think I know it'll be a strong album. And so will my own.. I'm very tight about what is waiting there as well. I have a lot of songs, so much has been written really since the Wild Seed album, but I need to work with the music's producer, which hasn't started yet. That's really the next thing to happen, as I need to find the right people.

 [Then I finished my interview turning the recorder off. We chatted for a while after I turned it off. He dramatically changed his attitude from this point. Yes, he was kind and cooperative through the interview, but what I mean is he was not an artist talking to media anymore, but a man talking from his heart. He even told me the scientific names of some orchids I took pics of in my last trip to San Miguel de Allende, in Mexico. Finally he lent me his mobile phone to call my friend in the Parliament, and even asked me if I had a problem to get there. I didn't, so he introduced me to Ole Sverre Olsen and then we said goodbye. He gave me this strange Norwegian hug they have, than is like a kind of Mexican hug but without the kiss in the cheek, just putting cheeks together for a while. Strange culture they have!].