MOONSPELL Releases 'Desastre' Video

"Desastre", the new video from Portuguese metallers MOONSPELL, can be seen below. The song is taken from the band's latest album, "1755", which was released last November via Napalm Records. The Portuguese-language disc was written about the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, also known as the Great Lisbon earthquake, which occurred in the Kingdom of Portugal. In combination with subsequent fires and a tsunami, the earthquake almost totally destroyed Lisbon and adjoining areas.

"1755" was produced by Tue Madsen (MESHUGGAH, THE HAUNTED, DARK TRANQUILITY, DIR EN GREY, DIE APOKALYPTISCHEN REITER) and features Paulo Bragança supplying the haunting voice of a Fado fallen angel who is a big part of the Portuguese culture. His fascinating vocals are included in the song "In Tremor Dei" (English-language translation: "Fear Of God"). The cover artwork was created by João Diogo.

MOONSPELL vocalist Fernando Ribeiro said: "I have been fascinated with Portuguese history since I can remember.

"The year of 1755 marked the birth of a new Portugal. Much more than just the greatest natural disaster ever to occur on European soil, the great Lisbon Quake, shockwaves cannot be reduced to a dramatic death toll.

"From absolute tragedy, a new city was born, giving way to a new time where Portuguese relied more on themselves than on the crown or the cross, granting us much of the city, the lay country, the free will that we enjoy today.

"This is not just another album from us. It's a musical and lyrical history document, a homage we pay to our legacy and to the amazing skills and resilience of our fellow Portuguese back then, of all mankind when brought down to the knees by the violent forces of nature and reason. Whatever is, is right... yet the earth shakes."

Fernando told Spark TV about the positive reaction to "1755": "Actually, we had a very good response. Sometimes things are a bit more cynical, but, obviously, it's not everything like in black and white. People love it and people didn't think it was that special. I think we had the goal as a band, which was to tell the story of [the Lisbon earthquake of] 1755, the story about Portugal. We can never anticipate it will be a story that for some people, it's almost fiction, but it really happened in our country, 262 or 263 years ago. If you asked me, I would definitely have expected it since it was an album in Portuguese, so you never know. I think the people who liked it, in a way, it validated our effort to tell the story, because it's in Portuguese, so it's not speaking in English. There could have been more of a linguistic barrier, but people understood that it is a concept album that had to be sung in Portuguese. That was probably the biggest question mark. I think it's still a MOONSPELL album. It's very intense, it's very dramatic. Like I said, it's all oriented to storytelling with the music, so I'm very happy people like it."