Gathered friends, welcome to the “TreeTalks” episode for Bionicle Day 2025!

We hope you’ve enjoyed the 810 festivities.

This last week, we released the final single remaster, “Causeway of Legends” originally from “Ide’s Journey: Act 1” published in 2022, alongside the “Le-Koro Band Greatest Hits Vol. I” album, which debuted with a pop-up-trivia video for the beginning of 810NICLE Day 2025’s Day 2 celebrations:

This “TreeTalks” is something a little different. Instead of myself, Waddlez3121 has offered to conduct a special interview.

So, gathered friends, we begin in the jungles of Le-Wahi…

*  *  *

Sanso steps out of the shade of the trees of Le-Wahi and looks around in the clearing a suspicious note told him to come to – alone. Something is amiss, but how would he ever know?

Before he can do anything about it, a big stranger steps out of the shadow under Sanso’s feet and scoops up the now-panicked Matoran, and tosses him into a spiderweb. The Dark Hunter’s gravelly voice speaks to a bush at the edge of the clearing. “I got him.”

A Matoran of Iron steps out of the shadows, and her tan Ruru and yellow toes stick out from under the many sticks and leaves camouflaging her before she peels it off to reveal her burnt orange torso. “I owe you one, Shadow Stealer. Thanks for the help.”

A very confused – and upside down – Sanso cuts in. “What’s going on here?”

“We mean you no harm,” the Matoran speaks, “you’ve just been very elusive. In spite of all of these interviews, you yourself are a bit of a mystery. So, I took it upon myself to gather some of the most burning questions from across the island and beyond, to sit down with you, and to get them answered.”

“And the spider web was necessary?”

She nods. “Yes.” From a small tablet she produces a list of questions, and continues, “So, tell me a little bit about yourself, Sanso… or should I say…

“Marcus Rose?”

*  *  *

What was your introduction to BIONICLE? What was your first set?

My first introduction to BIONICLE® was actually in a roundabout way through the teaser trailer for the Mask of Light movie. My family owned the 2002 Hallmark “Dinotopia” miniseries (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinotopia_(miniseries)) on VHS, and for whatever reason one of the trailers before watching the show was the teaser trailer for “BIONICLE: Mask of Light (The Movie)”. However, I was probably 4 or 5 at the time I saw it (~2003 late or early 2004 when we had the VHS?), so I was scared of the visuals and haunting narration! Not to mention my family didn’t have cable, so my parents never saw the other BIONICLE commercials and put the dots together that it was a LEGO thing! So, I never engaged with it! Fast forward to 2006, and my lifelong friend Andrew was an avid reader, and was raving about the story of BIONICLE. It was through him that I was introduced first to the sets, then the online game of MNOG, the comics, books, movies, and everything. My trio of friends in elementary school would make up adventures, play BIONICLE Heroes as a pair (one person controlled WASD, the other the mouse, periodically trading places), build MOCs, and just totally absorbed that world. Everything around that time is kind of a blur of activity, so I think my first set was either a Vohtarak, or Kazi, although I think I got the most mileage out of Vezon and Fenrakk. My dad was always one for pretend, and so he would voice Emperor Palpatine, who would interact with all the other characters in the house, trying to expand the Empire’s sphere of influence throughout the household. Lots of shenanigans ensued! 

What brought you into the community? What was your first public space? Also, how did you come up with the name “Samuel9248”?

Chronologically in my BIONICLE adventures, I got my username next. This was probably around 2009? I was 10, and my parents had their own LEGO account to order secret Christmas presents (as you do) and get the LEGO Club magazine, but it was when LEGO updated the Bionicle website to include a game built within My LEGO Network that I asked to have my own account. For some reason, in my youth I really liked the name “Samuel,” such that stuffed animals, made up characters, and even one of our cats had the name “Sam.” I can’t remember what the real reason is, but present-day-me blames “Lord of the Rings,” which I do remember my parents used to read to me before bed at one point. In any case, I tried to get the username “Samuel,” but it was taken, and LEGO suggested three other options with four random numbers tacked on the end. After crying and complaining about it for 10 minutes, I finally conceded and picked “Samuel9248.” It’s since been my username everywhere!

So, technically my first public space was My LEGO Network, but it wouldn’t be until 2019, two years into my bachelor’s degree that I’d get lonely enough to the point where I sought out another, more involved virtual friend-group, and entered the BIONICLE community proper. I’d been a longtime fan of The Beaverhouse YouTube channel ever since I heard the soundtrack to the cancelled “Bionicle: Quest of the Toa” game (linked below), and so while watching one of their streams where they were playing “Star Wars: Episode 1 Racer” and talking about BIONICLE, I got up the courage to chat with them, and actually engage with my community heroes. (linked here: https://www.youtube.com/live/4RhuVxl9t08?t=3274) I think that’s where I learned about Team Kanohi working on the Bionicle: Masks of Power game, and that the devs there had a discord server where they role-played their own original adventures on Mata Nui! I joined the Discord group, and quickly found my niche in the community. I kept role-playing with my friends there for the next four years, eventually becoming an admin of the server! Sadly, life took its toll, and I unceremoniously went MIA from the group right at the climax of what was to be my last, greatest adventure on the server. Even though I still haven’t finished that story, I’ve since apologized profusely to the people there, and made up with them. They were more forgiving than I deserved, but it’s still a strong point of shame for me. Someday, I hope to return to finish that story, and give all the players and our characters a proper farewell.

Have you ever been a part of a BIONICLE project before the Le-Koro Band?
The first community BIONICLE “project” that I was a part of was the BMOP RP server. I’d run some D&D-esque campaigns there, but I’m not sure it really counts as a whole project, since it was only ever that small group of friends playing together. My first real BIONICLE project that I published to the public came in 2022, when I assembled a bunch of songs I’d made for the role-play folks into an album and released it on that 810NICLE Day! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKV6SdB_B_E) I’d already been making music for a long time, but that was my first foray into long-form, story-related music-making. Then, less than a year later I decided to start a new rock-opera project which eventually became “Ide’s Journey,” and some of the musical ideas from the BMOP RP album made their way into the music. It was around then that I started organizing the real-life Le-Koro Band too, and the rest is history!

And of course, the main reason I brought you here has to do with the band itself. What led to the idea of creating the Le-Koro Band, in the real world?

Of course lol. I had a blast collaborating with others in my real-life collegiate rock band “Spit Fire” (https://spitfirevu.bandcamp.com/music) and my jazz band at home with my dad, so when I was starting to make music for my next project, I intentionally set about trying to collaborate with other folks in the Bionicle community, using the BMOP RP album as a resumé item to show I could complete a project and write my own music. Discord had worked in the past, so I started a new server. But…if you’re making a BIONICLE-inspired band, what would you call it? Apart from Cryoshell, the answer was obvious. Thus, I worked with the first folks that joined in the server to make the first album of “Ide’s Journey” as a proof-of-concept that “The Le-Koro Band Project” was a good organization for collaboration within the community! My hope was that having this shared space to pour our collective creative energies would encourage others to collaborate on musical projects as well, and that the organization would outlast my own spear-heading with the “Ide’s Journey” albums, continuing to act as yet another hub for the folk of this wonderful community for years to come! 

I have some questions from other folks across the island:
(Swert): What inspired turning this whole story into a concept album?

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been attracted to the idea of a rock-opera. I think it started with The Who’s “Tommy,” since that album was a favorite of my parents even before I was conscious. That music was playing in the background, so it feels like a part of my DNA. That said, we also owned most of the movies that The Beatles had made after some of their albums, namely “HELP,” “Yellow Submarine,” and “Magical Mystery Tour.” I’d watched them quite a bit when I was a kid, and so the idea of a musical story stuck with me. As I grew up, my family introduced musicals to me, and one of my favorite still to this day is “West Side Story,” Leonard Bernstein’s retelling of “Romeo and Juliet” in 1950s New York. His expert use of motifs throughout the entire work is absolutely brilliant. It’s a master class for anyone who wants to create a weaving, and emotionally complex story just through music composition alone. This deep-dive analysis by Sideways is a great video: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQlgiO29QT4)

And then, as my own musical skills and interests blossomed, I got into Progressive Rock, where seminal bands like YES adapted entire works like “War and Peace” into musical epics like “The Gates of Delirium.” And other epic concept-albums soon followed, like Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” (dad got his Philosophy students to sing ironically in class: “We don’t need no education!” lol), Jethro Tull’s tongue-in-cheek “Thick as a Brick,” and even more modern prog musicians like The Enid, Phideaux, Dream Theater, Between The Buried And Me (check out their “Automata” albums!), Devin Townsend (check out his video on how he made vocals into a Wall of Sound! He’s got a ton of other videos on his mixing techniques), Neal Morse, Haken, Ghost, Opeth, and Into The Great Divide. The list goes on! And each album feels like diving into a new sci-fi/fantasy novel. I tried my hand with the BMOP RP album, but “Ide’s Journey” was my first attempt at making the kind of music I love with the friends I care about.

(Pokermask): Who would you say have been your biggest musical influences, both as a musician, songwriter and producer?

Aside from the musicians mentioned in the answer to the previous question, my biggest musical influences have been the people whom I’ve met in real life. My father is probably my biggest musical influence, for obvious reasons. I’ve also practiced under a Baltimore drummer by the name of Eric Kennedy. Even though I only took lessons with him for a short while, they were very dense with helpful information and impactful in terms of influencing how I play today, and I’ve looked up to him ever since. His mind is an encyclopedia of drumming information, and he’s probably one of if not the best jazz drummer on the east coast right now. If you ever have a chance to see him live, I highly recommend it.

I was blessed with the opportunity to meet my musical heroes at performances. Of them, YES frontman Jon Anderson was all smiles when my dad and I met him and his solo band in 2019 on their “1000 Hands” tour. They demonstrated the practice that goes into a band to sound tight in time with one another, playing new orchestrations of complicated prog rock songs seamlessly. I’ve always admired Jon’s ability to weave thematic motifs, and turn over mystic lyrics that seem to fit, not matter how ridiculous they may sound. To that end, I also took a “How to make a Progressive Rock Album” class with Neal Morse. He talked about his music-making process, whereupon he and his band craft motifs and ideas to follow through a musical narrative to parallel some lyrical one. It’s an extensive process, even if you cut out much of the intangible “God is influencing the way I write” advice. I got some good advice out of it. I also had the chance to see King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard back in undergrad. Despite them being the most prolific band I’ve ever met, with genre-hopping skill that surpasses The Beatles, their claim to fame in my mind is their ability to cohesively improvise jams together, melding medleys across their vast discography in original live performances.

One musician that I felt a close connection to, however, was Dr. Lonnie Smith, a hammond B3 organ player, I met him after a show before he passed away. Upon learning I was a jazz musician like my father, he grew a big smile and remarked that we were all family members. He was also a skilled improvisationalist, and viewed playing music with others as a conversation of the soul. (https://jazzline.com/video/dr-lonnie-smith-faith-musical-philosophy-interview) That’s the kind of music I’d like to make: something that takes a little bit of everything, but is fundamentally sourced from your soul, and thus a collaboration on the scale of Ide’s Journey, or any album for that matter, becomes a shared experience with the performers and the listeners. Everything else I’ve learned musically, is how different people go about achieving that goal.

(Alzoru): Serious question: Has Ide’s journey been fully planned out?
Silly question: Is Lewa leading the Le-Koro Band?

Yes, in fact! We’re still finishing up the details of Act 3, but the plot was officially finalized in its overarching story about midway through the development of Act 1. So, we’re enthusiastically developing the conclusion, and doing our best to make sure everything fits together musically for a climactic and cathartic finale!
As for who’s leading the band? I’m not sure. 🤔 I imagine it’d be the real Sanso, but that’s probably just ‘cuz he had the most lines in MNOG and MNOG 2, electric boogaloo. Regardless, I think Matau is the band’s manager.

What are the origins of the narrative of Ide’s Journey? Have there been any interesting ideas left on the chopping block that you’d like to share? Was it always supposed to be such a large project?

Believe it or not, the narrative of Ide’s Journey wasn’t there at all from the start! I just had the idea for the premise to follow in the footsteps of the beginning of the Mata Nui Online Game, where the listener embodies the role of a blind protagonist in an audio-drama/rock-opera set in some future Spherus Magna after the events of Greg’s serials, waking up in the desert with no memory of their past, summoned for some great destiny. After Perp3tual shared his cover of the “Chronicler’s Company” song, and after I’d had a conversation with Aikuru, who suggested the name “Ide” for our protagonist (it means “hearing” in his Matoric conlang!), I drafted up some imaginary intro to the story, where our protagonist comes across Hafu in the desert, and he begins the journey of escorting them to Old Vulcanus.

One of the ideas that was left on the cutting room floor was using processed text-to-speech voices for the characters, like in SuddenlyOranges’s “Reviving Bionicle” series. We also dropped the processed voices after the first album, favoring audible dialogue more than a cool sound effect. Another idea was more religiously following the development of Bionicle’s music history as we go through the story, but that was a little too restrictive for the creativity of the band, so we dropped it in favor of appropriate songs for story beats.

It was also originally intended to be just one album, but as more and more folk suggested ideas for where the story could go next, and more scenes and character conflicts were fleshed out, the concept grew to a 3-album, 3-act structure, and then we eventually even had to split Act 2 into two discs to give the story some proper character development!

I can see it’s been quite stressful running this project, even though you’re not doing it alone. What’s helped you power through the tough moments?

The most difficult part, I think, has been the stress of time-managing the project, my own life’s responsibilities, and the interpersonal discussions that come with any project where creative differences arise. I just want everyone to have fun, get along, and have a good time. And normally I can manage it fine! But when folks are stressed (and I especially am stuck with a sleep deficit from working on music late at night), I can fall into a depressive sadness. When that happens, having the mentorship of other members of the community to show me how to best manage things, to experience things with an objective third pair of eyes and ears, and to support me when it feels like my hands and voice are cursed to ruin everything I touch, has been invaluable. Without them, none of this would’ve been possible. Everyone’s multifaceted talents, their jokes, and above all else, their kindness, has made me love working with all of them. Sincerely, this community is the best thing to have come out of my time working on these BIONICLE projects, and I hope these people are folks I’ll get to stay friends with long into the future!

When the album is said and done, what are you looking forward to after it? In fact, are there any other projects you’re working on right this minute?

Heh, the main project I’m working on right now is getting my freaking PhD in Materials Science! 🫠 That’s no small feat! So, what with the research hours and classes I have to take, I think I’ll probably take a step away from leading larger projects within the BIONICLE community for a while after Ide’s Journey is done. I’ll still be making music of course (just try and stop me!), and if anyone else has a project idea or song they want to collaborate on, I’ll be more than happy to help! But, I’m looking forward to taking a break from the limelight for a while.

That sounds fancy. What are you gonna do with a PhD in that?

Hopefully, I can become some kind of “Great Being” inventor (without the tendencies for world-domination lol), who can make a device or discover some physics breakthrough that actually helps people more directly. I don’t know if that’ll lead me down the route of academia, to a national lab, or to work in the industry, but I do know that I’ll have fun and excel wherever I go. So, for now, my goal is just to learn the instruments and do good research, making as many connections as I can! I fell in love with Physics thanks to my mom’s work, so with my skills in music, philosophy, writing, languages, math, and science, I am made up of combinations of my family and friends! Thus, ultimately, I hope to use these skills to help people as long as I live. Kinda corny, I know, but that’s who I am! 😅

No, no, I get it too, I have a similar reason for applying for rhetoric and composition when I start my own postsecondary education soon. That’s really cool, though – you’re quite multitalented! I hope that goes well for you! 🙂 So, last question: how did you decide to start using Sanso as your identity during the interviews?

I’ve been playing pretend with my family ever since I was young, making up stories about stuffed animal “Beach Tigers” and our LEGO characters having grand adventures with my friends, so when I was considering how to go about conducting the interviews, adopting Sanso’s persona seemed like an obvious choice. It makes it seem like we as human beings are working with the characters in our stories to archive their own adventures. After all, it’s the community that keeps BIONICLE alive through telling our own legends. Just like the concept for Ide’s Journey, it invites the reader to take an active role in the community and in the creation of these new legends we’re making together, to tell stories of darkness, hope, and love (yes, it’s canon!) that parallel our own life, and, just like playing music, invite the listener to engage in a conversation of souls. After all, even if LEGO’s forgotten it in the wake of their own greed, that’s the point, right? To “Play Well,” meet cool people, and have fun making cool stuff together. Unity!

Duty! Destiny!

*  *  *

“Thanks for letting me pick your brain,” the stranger says.

“Letting is an interesting word to use,” Marcus replies.

She shrugs. “I’ll let you go now. Come on, Shadow Stealer, let’s get him out of this tangle.” Shadow Stealer grabs the Matoran of Iron by the ankles and lifts her up to grab ‘Sanso’, and the two of them yank him out of the web, which wobbles in protest.

As Marcus regains his bearings, Shadow Stealer turns to him and asks, “Do you want a ride back to Le-Koro?”

Marcus nods. “Yes please – we don’t have much time to prepare for the Naming Day celebrations.”

“Here,” Shadow Stealer says, guiding the Le-Matoran over to the darkness again. The two melt into the shade, leaving the tricksy Matoran of Iron all alone.

After a moment, she calls out. “Shadow Stealer? Marcus?”

Silence.

“Hey, I won’t tell anyone if you still want to go by Sanso. Your secret is safe with me!” she calls out into the thick canopy. No response. No response, that is, except for from a tiny little Fikou that drops onto her shoulder – but she shrieks in panic anyway.

*  *  *

Special thanks from both of us to all of the Le-Koro Band members: who submitted interview questions, who lent their voices, instruments, editing skills, and most importantly, love and care to this project and bring the legacy of the Great Spirit to life. Thanks also to the many excited supporters of the album and everyone who has kept the band going strong for all this time!

Interview led and intro/outro written by Kylee Vontella (Waddlez3121). Good times, everyone!

We hope you’ve enjoyed these interviews, and had a wonderful time taking part in 810NICLE Day!
If you’d like to join the band, follow the linktree below (https://linktr.ee/lekoroband), and feel free to reach out to chat in the comments, or wherever you find us!

Until next time, see you out there! – Sanso and the Le-Koro Band